LUT Hive Garden Journal 2026 #1
Last Christmas I was gifted a box of veggie seeds. With the weather starting to warm up a little, I can't wait to start my 2026 growing season and take full advantage of my new greenhouse that I bought at the end of last year. I talked about that in my last LUT Garden Journal in 2025.
Seedlings
As usual, I'm winging everything as I don't know if it's really the right time to sow seeds yet. I sowed 12 different seedlings including tomatoes, peas and beans, bak Choi, lettuce, and marigold. The marigolds did well last year keeping bugs away. I hope they will be equally effective this year. I plan to sow more seeds next month in case these fail. If they succeed, that's great, I can have a continuous supply of fresh produce.
This year I saw a lot of people talking about seed snails on the internet. You lay some compost on a strip of plastic, roll it up and then plant the seeds on top. It's supposed to save space and give the seeds enough space to grow long roots. I thought I'd give it a go and did three rolls. It will be interesting to see how the seedlings turn out with this method.
Easy gains to start off the season
Forgotten seedlings
A couple months ago I bought some citrus fruit that was very juicy and sweet. I thought I'd try to grow them from the seeds, wrapped a few in moist tissue and sealed them in a plastic bag. The problem is I forgot to label it, and now I can't remember exactly what they are. I just know they're definitely some sort of citrus fruit. Two seeds have sprouted first, and I've planted them in soil. There are two other seeds still wrapped up. Hopefully something will come out from the four of them. We shall see... maybe in a a few years time.
Lavender
Last year I got a lot of free lavender pug plants. I left them in the greenhouse all winter and luckily they have all survived, and are starting to grow new leaves now. Once they grow much bigger, I'll have to find somewhere to re plant them. I already have quite a lot of lavender at home, but they are really nice to have in the garden, you can never have too many.
Garden
In the past couple of years, I have had a lot of problems with my turf and the grass kept on dying after winter. Last year, I dug up the whole garden and returfed everything properly. The new turf has survived the winter and looks very lush. There are some small bald patches that I'll have to reseed, and finger crossed it will all become healthy in the summer and beyond. You'll notice the raised beds are very empty at the moment. I can't wait for them to fill up with nice fresh plants very soon.
In the meanwhile, I'm doing a little bit of maintenance. Last year I planted a salvia hotlips next to a lavender in my raise bed and it grew massive towering over my lavender. That's what it looked like on the left last year. Last week I cut back the salvia, you can just about see it in the corner now, I'm going to plant it in a pot this year so it doesn't go wild again.
Then I'm going to move the lavender to the ground in the corner of my garden. This area is in front of my greenhouse, and will allow the lavender to grow as much as it wants. Moving these two plants will give me a lot more growing space in my raised beds when my seedlings are ready.
Life in the garden again
It's very rewarding to see my plants have lived through winter and are waking up again. More importantly, it proves that I don't kill everything in my garden. Upwards and onwards for 2026!!
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STOPYay for not killing everything in the garden! It looks very organised and ornamental and swooshy :O
It does hey! Swooshy is a great word.
I do love nice swooshes and swirls 😅
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I can't wait to see how it transform in a couple of months time. Swoosh it on!!
It will look amazing :D
Still a bit too chilly to get things started in my neck of the woods, but I am thinking about making a little flower garden this summer. I will have to wait and see how ambitious I still am come Spring!
It's still mid 10s here, but the daffodils have bloomed, so bit of mixed bag of weather. I'm going to take that as spring is here.
Go big!! Then you'll bound to have something in your garden
I think we are still a bit away from the daffodils coming, but I am just eager to get the ferns out of my basement and back outside. I'm curious to see if they are going to recover from the long winter.
🎉🎉🥳 Congratulations 🥳🎊🎊
Your post has just been curated and upvoted by @Ecency , keep up the good work !
my bulbs have been flowering already , my mint plants for the wifes tea are also starting to show leaves again .
Thats quite early for the bulbs to flower! Doesn't the famous tulip season start in April?
My mint is also starting to grow some leaves as well, I expect they will go wild later. They always do
it depends on the bulbs you are using i have crocuses and dafodills tet a tet they flower both very early this was three weeks ago , they are already gone now :)
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Your backyard looks so neat and ready to go! Interested to see how the seed spirals go. I may try that too! I just ordered some watermelon radish seeds and black radish seeds. They grow so fast I always plant direct. I'd like to pickle some. I've also planted salvia and lavender... The bees love it. I was reading the other day that queen bumblebees can survive a week underwater! They burrow underground so if it's flooded they can survive it. So cool. I will also keep an eye on that citrus! I love watching small plants grow on Hive ... How is that fig of yours doing @akipponn ?
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I was actually inspired by how @akipponn took home a ripe fig and grow a fig tree out of it.
Radish has never been in my diet, and I'm not too big a fan of pickles. I plan to grow more salad this year, might as well eat healthy
Me too!
I do really like radish. I like fresh Korean style pickles.
Good Lords and Ladies. Still learning summink new everyday!
What these veggies? I thought similar with watercress.
I also watch seedling rools on trends on youtube. But now sure how the results. Because some plant have sensitive roots and they not really good grow together in small spaces.
Wait your update 🌸
Yes, these are watercress from last year. They do well in colder weather, perfect for us. I have to cover them up all the time in case any slugs or bugs get in making it difficult to wash. I harvested a few times last year, they grew as tall as the top of the bamboo, very pleased with it.
In Indonesia, watercress grow well in water. So I never try to grow them. Interesting to try to plant them after see your plants 😊
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You are so organised and it looks like everything isnspringing to life already.
I think that come June, your garden will be looking amazing.
Hope life is treating you kindly.
Still waiting patiently for warm weather to come. Had a couple of false start days, now it's raining again.
All good my end here thanks. And you?
All is well thank you! Wife's current obsession is roses. We have dozens of assorted bushes all over the place with abour a 60% 1 week survival rate!
Have great, green weekend!
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I’ve got the same problem — some plants have grown and I can’t remember what I planted. Perhaps it’s Flor de Jamaica — Hibiscus sabdariffa. Your garden looks very beautiful, so well organised… And I like that lawn there, it looks very healthy.
Good luck!
We need to get organised this year. Someone bought us a big box of seeds so we can try a few of those. We just got a potting shed that needs putting up so we will have space for lots of seedlings.
Oh the joy of seing the seeds sprout and grow! Good luck on growing thise seeds and may it being abundant joy and bounty