Published: 4 May 2026 - Watch on YouTube
Hello and welcome back. It is the early May bank holiday weekend here in Chichester, and my plan was simple enough on paper: get the veg patch ready for everything that is about to go in it. As it turned out, I managed roughly half of what I set out to do, and one job in particular ended with something snapping in my hands. Some days in the garden are just like that.
I started with the dahlias I have potted up. The bottom rows are new ones I bought this season, I believe from Farmer Gracie, and the top row are tubers from my older plants that I accidentally divided when I was lifting them out of last year's pots. Going along them, I have Sweet Nathalie and Sarah Raven, both from Sarah Raven, and two pots of Cafe au lait. Every one of those is showing a little bit of green, so they are alive.
The new ones cheered me up too. Totally Tangerine and Rhubarb and Custard are away, Polka has been a long time coming but there is a browny shoot in there, and Golden Scepter has a fresh splash of green. Dark Spirit, White Aster and Salmon Runner are all going, although the Salmon Runner had slug trails all over the top and a shoot that had clearly been nibbled. Only Sylvia is holding out, with no visible shoots yet, but there is no rush. Overall I would call it a good success.
The bare root Achillea I repotted a few videos ago, after they sat waterlogged and were on their way to rotting, are settling in and needed a drink after a lovely warm and sunny week. Only one is showing signs of life so far, but since I ordered a pack of four and six actually turned up, even if just four come good I am getting exactly what I paid for. The two extras are a bonus. The squash Patisson Sunburst all germinated from the five seeds I sowed, and I have already passed two young seedlings on to a friend.
The petunias were my own fault. My newly bought Bubblegum and Snow arrived in a box and, for various reasons, I did not get them out for about two days. When I finally did they looked pathetic. The Bubblegum seem fine and have all survived, but about half of the others are either not going to make it or will hopefully bounce back, because with petunias the liveliness really lives in the roots. I buy them every year for the flower border with my roses, and the slugs eat them to the core, yet they often recover anyway. Since slugs have plainly been walking about on my dahlias, I may move these into the shed or the mobile tomato greenhouse to give them a better chance.
The main job for the day was the raised bed. I mulched it again with a peat-free multi-purpose compost with added John Innes that I had just picked up from the garden centre, partly to level the soil back up because it had sunk quite a bit over winter, and I fed it with some fertiliser. That gets it ready for the tomatoes and whatever else goes in there. The horse manure was for the other borders with the trees and flowers, so those get nourished as well.
It is a good compost and it does not disappoint. This corner ended up looking messy while I worked, but that is just what happens when there are jobs that need doing. Much better by the time I had raked it over.
A couple of lovely surprises. The eucalyptus I grew from seed two years ago, which I was convinced the cold winter had killed while it lived in the shed, is alive and pushing out new shoots at the base. The main stems are dry with only a few leaves left, but there is fresh growth at the tip too, so I will give it some support rather than cutting it right back. I am genuinely proud of that one.
There is also a plant I put in as bulbs last year that never flowered. Its roots had grown straight through the pot and into the ground, so when I ripped it out it died down and I assumed that was that. But the leaves coming through now are new and fresh, and the thick orangey, spaghetti-like roots inside are alive. I will cut back the dead leaves, water it, and eventually give it more room at the allotment. The verbena nearby took a knock over winter as well, but there is fresh green in there, so there is hope.
The clematis is looking really lovely and is flowering more than it ever has in the three years I have had it. It started life by the camellia against the fence, but that spot was far too dark, so about a year ago I moved it to this sunny corner and it has clearly been much happier. It just needs tying in so it can climb all over the fence.
Then, as I was putting my rake away, I spotted a common enemy: a raspberry root, still there, still viable, still with the power to throw up new stems. Not what I was meant to be doing today. I also brought the sweet corn and the Big Max pumpkins back into the greenhouse, because the sky went overcast all of a sudden and I did not want them drowning if the forecast rain turned heavy.
This is where the day fell apart. I went to set up the arches over the raised bed and the first one snapped as I pushed it down. No wonder, really: they are the cheap ten pound kind, rusty all over, and they have done their two-year lifespan. Up here on the top of the hill we get very strong winds, and the arches stick out well beyond the fence, so once they are loaded with beans and cucumbers they would catch the wind and most likely snap under the weight and take everything around them down too.
So I made the call to dismantle them, take the wire off, and put the rusty frames in the bin ready to buy new ones. Looking at the state of them, I think it was the right decision. By then it had started to rain, so I laid the second arch flat on the surface for safety, since it was not set up properly and a gust could have collapsed it, and I will finish taking it apart when it is dry. One down, at least.
So that was my bank holiday: half a plan finished, one arch in the bin and the rain seeing me off before I could do the rest. It was a fairly unfortunate gardening day, but the dahlias waking up and the eucalyptus coming back more than made up for a couple of broken arches. It is what it is, and there is always the next dry morning. If you have found a garden arch that actually stands up to strong wind, I would love to hear about it. Thank you for watching, and I will see you in the next one.
Tags: #GardeningFails #DahliaSeason #WindyGarden #WestSussexGarden #VegPatch #MyWindyGarden