Glasgow Guerrilla Gardening

We’ll be meeting at Townhead on the following dates in August:

SATURDAY 6th August 11:30am

SUNDAY 14th August 1pm

SATURDAY 20th August 11:30am

SUNDAY 28th August 1pm.

We’ll be weeding, planting bulbs and picking litter and would appreciate any help you can offer. As ever we meet at our usual Townhead site outside St Mungos Primary on the lane that connects Strirling Rd and Parson St.

If you’ve a distance to travel and haven’t been before you can get any of the following buses to Stirling Rd which will drop you right at the site.  We’re just behind the bus stop.  If you’re not sure where you’re going just ask the driver to let you off at the last stop on Stirling Rd at the motorway.

First Bus- 12, 56, 56A, 15A, X1, X2, X3, X4, FX4, X5, FX5, X11, X15,  X37, X39, x85, x87

McKindless- X1, X2

Stagecoach- X19, x20, X25, x24

There are also a few buses that stop on Castle Rd at the Royal Infirmary. We’re just opposite the Royal Infirmary next to the motorway on the lane that connects Stirling Rd to Parson St in Townhead.

First – 38A, 38C, 42, 42A, 213, 11, 31, 36 89, 90

We next meet up on Saturday 25th June at our Townhead site. There’s lots to do -weeding, sowing, litter removal and general tidying up so we’d love to have you along if you fancy helping out. We have lots in flower just now with plenty of bees and insects coming to see us, so the site is well worth a look.

We meet at 11:30am on the lane that connects Stirling Rd and Parson Street just outside St Mungos Primary School in Townhead.

You don’t need to bring anything though I’d recommend gloves as a minimum. If you have a trowel or fork these come in handy for planting and are worth bringing along. If you have any plants or seeds to spare feel free to bring them along but it isn’t essential.

A big thanks to everyone who helped out today and I hope to see you all next week.

We meet for the last dig of February at 11:30am on Saturday 26th Feb at the side entrance of St Mungos Primary, Townhead on the lane that connects Stirling Rd to Parson St. As well as admiring all the early bulbs which are just coming into bloom, we’ll be continuing work on the site in preparation for the arrival of spring. If you haven’t been up in a while it’s well worth a look as there are over thirteen thousand spring and summer bulbs of various kinds set to bloom over the coming months.

As ever bring yourself, a small fork or trowel, a pair of gardening gloves and any plants you’d like to add to what will hopefully be a colourful display. If you haven’t been along to the site before or you have any questions, please get in touch via email.

A big thanks to everyone who came out to garden this morning. Despite the sporadic showers it wasn’t a bad day and we got lots done with a selection of perennials, crocosmia and seeds planted. The bulbs we planted over winter are still looking good. The crocuses are beginning to die down but are being rapidly replaced by Winter Aconites, Snowdrops and Daffodils.

Not much to report in the way of wildlife this week just one large Queen Bee, a Wood Pigeon and a gaggle of ordinary Pigeons.

We next meet on 10/04/2010 at 11:30am at Townhead to plant Crocosmia bulbs, continue removing leaves and sow nasturtium seeds.

A wet Wednesday in November might not seem like the most obvious time to be giving thought to helping out bees but like many gardeners I always have a beady eye on the next season.

There is a great deal on the internet about making your garden attractive to bees but much of tends to be long lists of flowers without much information on when they bloom and where is best to plant them. It’s good advice and well worth following however my attention for the time being is firmly focused on the bees lean season in the early spring.

Gardens don’t become a riot of colour, offering abundant nectar and pollen sources for bees until the summer but the poor souls still need a meal in the spring and hurrah for nature, there is lots to plant that will bring a bit of early colour to your garden and keep the bees well fed.

Crocuses and Snowdrops are a good source of early nectar and pollen and provide one of the years first signs that there might be an end to this terrible darkness, misery and cold. Winter flowering heathers should still be in bloom very early in the spring and provide another source of food. As indeed do my personal favourites the Hellebores which provide both nectar and pollen as well as treating us to flowers from winter to spring and beautiful, glossy leaves all year round.

To bridge the gap between early spring and summer Grape Hyacinths are a very pretty, easy to grow choice that will keep the bees coming. Grape Hyacinths are particularly impressive planted in vast drifts which if done properly will seem from a distance more like a mysterious blue haze hovering over the ground than flowers. Planted at fortnightly intervals from September to December these should be in bloom up until May after which the choice is endless for keeping bees happy.

There are of course many, many more varieties you can plant throughout the year. Nevertheless with very little effort you can keep our Bumblebees fat from Spring to Autumn. A little simple planning is all it takes to ensure you have a bit of early colour and the bees have somewhere to feed. This is one of the best online guides I’ve found for ensuring your garden has a wee morsel or two for the liitle gentleman in the striped fur coats.

Whilst we’ve always aimed to garden in a bee friendly fashion on all our sites and been rewarded with some very impressive bees. Next year we aim to do even better with all our fundraising and activity being directed towards establishing at least one new bee friendly garden in each quarter of the city as well as maintaining what we have. 2010 will be our busiest year since starting up in 2008 and there are lots of ways you can help out from propagating to planting to general garden stuff. If you’d like to nominate a site for a bee garden in your part of Glasgow or help out with our existing sites please email here for further details.