Diary of a weekend gardener

Still no rain, and 50 sick meconopsis

Much of the south and midlands has had heavy thunderstorms, but nothing here, just steady sunshine and fluffy white clouds, another perfect summer day. However it seems only fair that the rain should fall on those with a hosepipe ban and I would rather have the ordinary weather front rain that we've been promised for the weekend than a torrential downpour.

After the huge tidy up last weekend in the garden, I've been able to pay attention to detail outside as it's too hot and dry to be tackling new projects. But my young meconopsis plants have posed a new challenge with an attack of powdery mildew. It's entirely my fault as I had them too squashed together and was watering from above with abandon in the hottest weather. Spacing them out, keeping the soil moist and the leaves dry has not reduced the spread at all, so I consulted the meconopsis oracle at Dunham Massey and have dusted half the plants with Yellow Sulphur. If the plants don't mind the sulphur I'll dust the rest, but some plants don't like it so I'm being a bit cautious.

A young meconopsis plant with powdery mildew

posted by Sue Beesley @ 1:21 pm