October in the garden

October in the garden

2022 is my first year of "proper" gardening. After moving into our first home in late winter last year, I wanted to watch the garden through the seasons before really getting stuck in. The pandemic of course made it harder to get supplies so I was so grateful when I found out I could just order all my seeds and bulbs from TRPG.

I never thought I’d have many summer flowers left over in October but my sweet peas are still going strong! This year I went for the “Blue Shift”, “Candyfloss”, “White Swan” and “Blue Ripple” varieties. I think the contrast between the bold and pastel blooms, as well as the complement of the blue and purples, is gorgeous.

It’s amazing what a difference cutting the flowers every week makes. I left some of my pots without cutting the flowers as an experiment and I can say that the plants I’ve cut religiously every week are still providing a huge flower haul! I love having freshly cut flowers to get me through the workweek. As a bonus, the other plants have gone to seed so I’m collecting the pods to experiment with autumn planting using the milk bottle method!

My cosmos purity are still thriving too, so they look brilliant by the front door with my sweet peas. I’ve been keeping on top of deadheading so I'm glad that the effort is paying off now! Alyssum “snow cloth” is going through a fab second flush as well, I definitely wish I’d planted more. It’s lovely to still have some flowers hanging on as the months get darker.

Most of the gardening this month has been cutting back perennials in preparation for winter (thank you Lizzie for your guides on this!). I haven’t had much time to do a lot in one go, but I’ve found that just taking a few minutes after work to cut back and deadhead has helped. We’re getting there a bit at a time. I’ve also started to move some of my more frost-prone plants into my little greenhouses, although I’m still struggling to remember to close the door at night! I need to get used to it now before the frosts really kick in.

I’m excited for my spring bulbs to arrive! I’ve got loads of TRPG bulbs on order with a mix of shade-tolerant bulbs, such as anemones, for my more shaded back garden, and tulips and alliums for the front. I’m especially excited for the tulip “table dance” and  I’ve already turned over the soil and done a huge deweeding so I can’t wait to get planting and mulching! I’ve got so many empty pots now that most of the annuals have gone over, so I'm looking forward to trying my hand at a bulb lasagna or two!