First sweetpea of 2022
wendyswonderlandgarden
My passion in life is gardening and specifically growing flowers from seed
Category: Sweetpeas
September 5, 2021
Summer 2021 review
I’m sad to say the end of summer is here and as much as I hate the hot weather that come with it and the lack of rain I like the garden in summer. I’ve had a mixed year with seeds and my vegetable growing but a good year flower wise.
I grew Tithonia, sunflowers, poppies, sweetpea and cosmos from seed this summer. The Tithonia are lovely but only started flowering in late August, however, I will definitely grow them again as they are still flowering and we don’t have much orange in the garden.
The sunflowers have done really well and are still going at more than 6 foot tall with multiple flowers per plant.
The poppies did ok but they never last long and so I often miss them flowering and therefore have no pictures. The cosmos I sowed late and as per their usual habit haven’t even considered flowering yet. They start later every year. The sweetpeas have been lovely although eaten by the greenfly. I have a few ladybirds on the plants but they are overcome with too much food I think.
The vegetables have been interesting, I sowed carrots, courgettes and tomatoes. The carrots I harvested today and look more like radishes.
The courgettes keep flowering but don’t create any fruit and my tomatoes while very healthy plants didn’t have many fruit but were largely neglected I think. I planted them direct into ground this year for the first time and I’m not sure I’ll do it again.
However, the roses including 2 new ones have been beautiful this year. The helenium, penstamen and many other cottage garden plants have been good and are still flowering or at least they were when I last checked but today it’s been so wet I imagine they may have suffered.
September 3, 2020
Summer review 2020
I hope this isn’t the end of summer just yet but I wanted to write a little review of my successes and failures in the garden this summer. I was on furlough from my job from mid March to the 1st June and luckily we had lovely sunny weather meaning I could spend more time gardening. This meant that I sowed more seeds and kept the garden as tidy as I could. There still seem to be a lot of gaps and we have extended a bit of border at the front which now need filling. I’ve taken some cuttings and hopefully they’ll be successful.
I grew sweetpeas from seed again as usual, 3 lots this time. 1 set in my propagater (these I collected from previous years), some container ones in the greenhouse and some in a pot as they were a present from a friend as a kit. The latter ones finished first but were very pretty. The others have been very successful, albeit with a little lull but have got going again quickly. I haven’t brought them in this year but try to keep on top of dead heading and so they keep flowering.
I sowed a cut flower called Daucus which is part of the carrot family, very easy to grow and although they need staking have flowered happily for months and continue to do so.
Every year I also sow cosmos and they come up easily and are very healthy plants however I think they are little divas in the plant world as they will flower only if they want and no amount of feed or nice compost, or even talking to will persuade them. I did some containers with them and other things and they are still not flowering even now. I have one plant that’s flowered for a few months and a couple with buds that only appeared in the last week. As much as I love them I have decided next year I will buy plants from the garden centre as they just aren’t worth all the effort.
I also grew some zinnia which are supposed to be purple but everyone is pink! They are good healthy plants and have flowered really well.
I also sowed some mini scented lupins, very easy to grow but all of them got ravished by the slugs and snails and never got near flowering
My long border has done well and I’ve added quite a few things to it, bergamot, heleniums and geraniums. The aim being a cottage garden style border full with no space for weeds
June 14, 2020
June 2020 in my garden
Lots of plants flowering at the moment, in fact properly something different starts each day. The soil seems dry again even after so much rain but at least the water butts are full! I went out weeding yesterday and was excited to find some more spaces in the garden which means o can buy more plants. Still only online for me! Anyway here’s some pictures of what’s currently flowering
July 10, 2019
Wordless Wednesday- sweetpeas
Castle Mey grown from seed in February
May 23, 2019
First Sweetpea to flower
I planted these sweet peas (grown from seed I have collected from previous years so not sure of the variety) late April. A bit early I guess but they were getting too big to stay in the greenhouse. I think it actually started flowering a couple of weeks ago but I’ve only just got round to taking pictures 
June 20, 2017
Sweetpeas
They’ve quickly become one of my favourite summer flowers. I should probably say cut flowers but actually I don’t bring them in much. I love them on the plant where I can get my daily fix of the amazing scent.
White ones in the back garden, some in a container and some in the garden. Pinky/purple in the front, some in the garden and some in a pot. In general the ones in pots are doing better.
wendyswonderlandgarden 