Rain, rain, go away
By franl155
7 comments
I don’t believe it. it’s raining again.
I’ve not been out in the garden (except for quick dashes to empty the tea-bag bin into the recycler or to check if the squirrels have been at my plants again) for over a week.
We did have one dry day, but dammit, I had to go out that day, so the lack of rain was pretty much wasted. Though there was just enough daylight left when I got home for me to go out and sweep the puddles of water off the table-tops.
Oh, if only I could add some guttering to the tables edges and run it to a container! I’d have enough to fill a fairly small pond by now. (sigh, to think of all the trouble I took to get them level! Now I’ve got to un-level them a bit, just enough that water won’t pool around the pots.)
I know I’ve said that gardening is like going camping – anyone can do it when the sun’s shining, the test it to do it when it’s chucking it down. I wouldn’t mind moving and sorting my plants in the rain (much!) – if I had somewhere at least fairly dry to work. I want to repot a lot of plants and add bark topping, but I’d rather the compost didn’t get saturated before I even got it in the pots. And moving about in the rain is different from standing still in the rain – feels a lot different, anyway. And I’d need windscreen-wipers on my specs.
I did want to put a length of transparent plastic between the wall and the fence on the short side of the garden (had to be transparent, I want to keep the rain out, not the sun); not only would I have a dry work space but I could get my washing out from under my feet.
Sadly, I checked with the council whether this would be ok – and it isn’t. It needs planning permission (£150 – and they want surveyor’s drawings, which would cost an extra £???) Annoying this is, if I’d chanced it I’d probably had got away with it, transparent plastic is hardly going to be an eyesore even if I had neighbours close enough to see it and object – but I can hardly plead ignorance now.
I can’t believe that some places further north have been reported as having near-drought conditions because of lack of rain. They can have as much of this as they like.
12 Jun, 2011
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Comments
nods, so did I! I also asked about getting a gate in my fence so I could get into the locked-off green - I thought that'd be the problem, but I don't need planning permission for that, so long as it's under 2 metres tall.
I can't even put a gazebo up without planning permission: I'd found a 2-metre-square one that would just fit, even though the green roof would cut out light - but no go, sigh.
The council did say that if it was very temporary they'd not take *too* much notice, but I'm not sure of their definition of "very" - once it was up, it'd be up most of the time, even if only secured iwith hooks in the walls, it'd be beyond me to get the ladder out to keep taking it down and putting it up. I might try it and see how far I can stretch "very" ... it's not as if I planned to get rigid roofing that would need proper intsallation (though I did want a bit of that outside the back door, that'd add to my resolve not to smoke indoors!)
I wanted water butts - that and a composter were the two things I determined to buy as soon as I got a garden - but there are no downpipes on my bit of wall to tap into. (Another virtue of a "roof" would be that I could then try channeling the runoff, as I could do with the tables).
Ah, I suppose I'm in a bit of a mood because of the constant rain; if I went out in it I'd probably be okay after a minute or so.
12 Jun, 2011
ps - did - and am!
12 Jun, 2011
Oh if thats the case and you know somebody who could do it for you then I`d give it a go, you then might be able to collect some water as well, with your ability to adapt things I`m sure you`ll come up with a solution.
We all get moody sometimes especially if stuck indoors, I`m terrible sometimes but I come on here and usually cheer myself up browsing through the blogs, it starts me off wanting more plants sometimes though, lol...
12 Jun, 2011
lol I'd run out of "get to it"ness without realising; thanks for your post, it recharged me. I love eading blogs and seeing pics, always gets me itchy to do stuff.
I just looked outside - none of the flats that I can see has any downpipes, I dunno where the water goes! it never occurred to me that any flat that had an outdoor space wouldn't have downpipes; probably just as well I didn't buy any before I checked.
I've looked up "mini-guttering"; 7.5 cm wide, for sheds and stuff, it says, but no reason why it can't have other uses. I thought if I could tilt the tables slightly and fix some to the back edge, I could run it down into some container - same with my work table, but that tilts forward slightly so any guttering would get in the way, need to tilt it backwards. - at the moment, every pot and tub I have that doesn't have drainage holes is pointing upwards, to catch what it can.
I don't know if I'll have room for a proper water butt, even a small one, but I've got one of those water-cooler bottles - 15 litres? - and think I can scrounge a couple more from where I souvenired this one - normally the company wants them back, but I found some lying in a cupboard at the local disabled charity office, all lost and lonely.
i think a lot of my mood was waiting for the post! bought some stuff on eBay for my tabletop garden, and I can't really do much till it arrives. ah well, any day now, she said with her fingers crossed
12 Jun, 2011
There you go, I said you would come up with a solution, its surprising how much water will run off a table and every little helps, I know you don`t have much room from your photo`s, sounds as though your batteries are getting a recharge now, lol....
12 Jun, 2011
grinzzzzzz, unless they make a long wide flat model that will fit under the table! hmm, maybe I can design a "hideaway" water butt, bound to be a market for it ...
12 Jun, 2011
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Oh dear Fran, I`m ecstatic here because its raining and has been most of today, I`m out every hour carting water from the house to waterbutts down my garden, saving as much as I possibly can, even my frogs are happy and having a wander around the garden, very amusing to watch....
Shame you have already checked with the council, you probably would have been ok but now they might jump on you if you do erect a cover, I always thought it would be ok if not considered permanent but obviously not with your council...
12 Jun, 2011