Potting up

[igenlode]

The towel-tomatoes are busy trying to flower, and I have repotted the largest ones, which I had already split up, into their possibly-final pots (they may still need to go up a size), and recycled the others individually into the pots thus vacated -- I now have six towel-tomatoes each in a pot of its own. (The outdoor-germinated seed never came to anything and eventually died.) I also repotted the largest of the Roma tomatoes into what should be its final pot; I need to give away the other one, which is now a large and vigorous seedling. The paper-bag seedlings have hardly grown at all since I split them out, thus illustrating that plants really do grow in proportion to their root space -- I need to get rid of those by one means or another. They want potting up if they are ever going to amount to anything, and I have neither the space not the inclination :(

Likewise I have repotted the two largest of the three marigolds into their possibly-final pots (I am working down my last bag of compost at this point and shall probably require some more for the benefit of the towel-tomatoes, if nothing else). The two self-sown ones which were put together into a single pot have remained dwarfish, but at least one of them is now attempting to flower, despite being far smaller than the later-sown ones!

I also split up the blue Swan River daisies into three plants that I plan to keep (two in one pot, one in another), plus some 'spares' in paper-bag pots to try to pass on elsewhere. I had rather run out of steam by the time I got to the pot of pink ones, so simply dumped the entire (rather shallow) pot into the top of a deeper one to at least give them more root depth.

The mesembryanthemums need splitting up further (currently in one tray and a pot which is starting to brim over with them), but they do take up a lot of horizontal space! I should probably simply get rid of some of the little ones, again, although in this case I do need multiple plants in order to get all the different possible colours... but at the moment I probably have about twenty :-p

I may *possibly* have some rudbeckia seedlings from my second attempt, but if so they are doing very poorly. Zero sign of germination from the chives this year.

Things that are currently in flower:

• Limanthes (now going over after two weeks or so)


• Flax (which has a tendency to flop -- I suspect I over-fertilised it, causing the stems to grow too long and soft without being able to support the buds at the top)


• Cornflower (currently being supported by the miniature rose since it also tends to flop)


• My one surviving sage plant, the other having now definitely died -- I have one survivor out of the original three and should probably consider replanting :-(


• Fiddlenecks


• A plant that appears to be *some* kind of Linaria, from the same packet (which means it may likewise be an obscure foreign variety rather than the native toadflax, which I thought I knew)


• Corn-camomile


• Lots of glossy red poppies!


• The pak choi :-D It does look very pretty, and appears to be setting lots of seeds in fat pods.


• Some tiny ephemeral speedwell flowers, and the little ivy-leaved toadflax.


• A very small forget-me-not which I didn't weed out (they are fine at that size but do tend to take over if encouraged)


• A small alyssum, which is sharing the pot with two corn-marigolds, some poppies and a possibly-nigella


• The miniature rose, currently rather surrounded by poppies (not yet in flower), even though I did try to thin them out at the start of the year... but I do like poppies, and they are very shallow-rooted so shouldn't pose too much competition. We have already had one episode this year when all the poppies in that pot wilted due to lack of water but the rose, with its hard, leathery leaves, appeared to be fine :-p