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Gardening

Good morning all. I Installed Honesty Plant seeds which produced a lovely big bush that flowered in the spring.

It has dropped these flowers and I've a number of distinctive disc- like seed pods.

Is there anything I need to do to it? Will it come back next year? :cool:

Honesty is biennial, I think, so you plant the seeds one year and it flowers the next. Most people grow it for the pods rather than the flowers.

Collect some of the seed to be safe and sow it next May after the frosts
 
Good morning all. I Installed Honesty Plant seeds which produced a lovely big bush that flowered in the spring.

It has dropped these flowers and I've a number of distinctive disc- like seed pods.

Is there anything I need to do to it? Will it come back next year? :cool:

It won’t come back next year, but its kids might.

The great joy of these things is never knowing where they’re going to turn up next year, or indeed if they’re going to turn up next year. If you can tolerate the look of the seedheads, I’d do nothing and look out for new ones in 2023 or 2024. Alternatively you can manage the situation by germinating some more seeds now.

I love biennials! And indeed annuals. A lot of work though but very rewarding. I don’t do it any more, but that’s just because I’m too lazy. One exception. I have just - on Saturday - planted an Echium pininana. Please pray for me.

One warning. In my experience these non perennial plants can be bastards. They say they will flower after one year or two, but if they get it into their heads to wait for a third year, you can’t stop them.
 
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Will give it a day or two to dry out then rake it off the surface and burn the soil surface to eliminate as many weed seeds as I can :mad::eek::D

Got any black plastic sheet. Just cover an area and the stuff will die off underneath. If you cut some holes you'd still have time to plant through the sheet.

Better still use cardboard and lay compost (anything you can get) over it to about 3 inches. Tread it down and plant into the compost layer. 'No dig' all the way.

 
Got any black plastic sheet. Just cover an area and the stuff will die off underneath. If you cut some holes you'd still have time to plant through the sheet.

Better still use cardboard and lay compost (anything you can get) over it to about 3 inches. Tread it down and plant into the compost layer. 'No dig' all the way.

Great advice Gav, keep the tips coming, I am learning.
 
Jungle now cut down to ground level with the brush cutter :)
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Will give it a day or two to dry out then rake it off the surface and burn the soil surface to eliminate as many weed seeds as I can :mad::eek::D
Spray the whole area with roundup and rotavate. Or cover for a couple of months and rotavate. Either way you really should let seeds germinate after digging them in and then repeat the weedkiller or light obstruction.

Glyphosate is much easier, that's what I would do.
 
Glyphosate is carcinogenic - should have been banned ages ago but the EU is corrupt. They were caught red handed colluding by copy and pasting from the manufacturers own material into the scientific case for renewal of the license...
 
Isn't Roundup believed to be cancer causing ? Big legal claim going on in the USA

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/24/business/roundup-settlement-lawsuits.html

It's pretty safe, most of the claims involve people who have either not read or ignored the instructions.

One guy actually admitted to being soaked in the stuff every time he used it; that would be a sackable offence for him and jail for his employer in UK.

Read the label, don't overdose and comply with the safety instructions and you'll be fine.
 
I picked one of these up at the boot sale for £10

Unknown by , on Flickr

Waiting for a seal / service kit to arrive , give it a service before using in anger , burn off the surface and all the seeds before rotovating

These things will burn off top growth. That will probably kill annual weeds. Perennial weeds will survive probably. I don't think they will destroy all seeds, or even most/many/some/a few/any seeds. Some seeds may even germinate because of the flame.
 
It's pretty safe, most of the claims involve people who have either not read or ignored the instructions.

One guy actually admitted to being soaked in the stuff every time he used it; that would be a sackable offence for him and jail for his employer in UK.

Read the label, don't overdose and comply with the safety instructions and you'll be fine.

A friend of mine recommends using it for returfing jobs. Just glyphosate the existing turf, rotavate a couple of weeks later and returf on top. I think that's a pretty clever idea!

Life without it will/would be hard. How do you remove weeds which are growing close to plants you want to keep -- where you can't dig them out without destroying the good plant? With roundup it's easy -- you just paint the leaves.
 
These things will burn off top growth. That will probably kill annual weeds. Perennial weeds will survive probably. I don't think they will destroy all seeds, or even most/many/some/a few/any seeds. Some seeds may even germinate because of the flame.

In my experience if you simply denature the top growth, the weeds do regenerate however if you burn everything to ashes, they are very thorough. They are however very labour intensive. You really need a pyromaniac teenager who loads their tunes and imagines they are playing death zone 12 or whatever.
 
As Vinny says. maybe try a foliant feed (soluble feed via a spray on the leaves), but otherwise a soluble fertiliser over the roots, then add a mulch of compost and keep it just moist....don't over water, and see what happens in 2 weeks.
Can you recommend (or just find) a foliar feed? Amazon prime would be good!
 
Yes but remember it's a patch. Yellowing leaves is a nitrogen lack. Growmore advertises itself as a 7/7/7 fertiliser but is in fact Nitrogen high, so ideal for you here. I'd find a seaweed based liquid feed and use that as a foliar feed for every other day for two weeks. Don't spray if the sun is on them. Very early morning is best:) At the start I'd add a good pinch of Growmore around the base of each plant (about a tablespoon-ish is fine), fork it in lightly then water. After a fortnight see what is occurin!
Amazon Prime have this, which should be fine, although I've never used it myself.

Next year, make your own from wild Comfrey if you can find some, or plant a dozen or so from seed in a corner of your patch. I'll give you the detail if you want to do it, but it's a great general fertiliser for veg, and it's free!

Maxicrop POPGS4TL Original Seaweed Extract, Organic Plant Growth Stimulant, 2.5L, Concentrate

It's on amazon prime.
 


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