Hurry up beans

Midsummer already. Hurry up beans - I'm sure they're slower than usual in growing up their poles. It hasn't been reliably warm yet this year and it's definitely been dry. I expect that's why they're still sitting there at the bottom of the poles looking like this.

However, I spent all day yesterday feeding, watering and transplanting and although I say it myself, it's looking great up there. The broad beans are fantastic, the artichoke is producing more tender young globes than we can eat, the spinach beet has been delicious and the potatoes and garlic are almost ready. I'm just waiting for the beans to climb up their poles before I can say it's truly summer.

So, with the usual silly timing, instead of sitting back and enjoying all this lovely summer produce and spending time just chilling with a beer and a barbecue, what do we do? Yes, we pack up the camper and head off into the sunset on our holiday and come back just in time to start all the weeding and strimming again. Nuts, really.

Happy gardening (and happy holidays)

So far, so good

All this fecundity! I've been far too busy planting, weeding, and watering my allotment to have any time left over to write about it. It's all looking damned peachy out there at the moment.

I think the modular system has been really successful in providing small, intensive growing areas that are easy to maintain. Taken as a whole, the plot resembles a patchwork quilt of these little modules with their varying vegetable occupants, but the one quality they share is that so far, touch wood and all that, all the modules are producing abundant, healthy plants.

So far this year we've already cropped radishes, pak choi, lettuces, rocket, spring onions, turnips, spinach beet, spring greens, broad beans and a couple of strawberries. Oh, and there was a fine crop of rhubarb earlier on. I forced it under a broken incinerator and the stalks were particularly tender and pink.

We're not remotely self sufficient, but we certainly grow enough to make a huge difference to the quality of what we eat because it doesn't come any fresher than this, does it?

Happy gardening

Remorse

It looks as though the bug spray's worked. Now I feel bad that I didn't use an organic one, but previous experience has been that organic pest spray is pretty ineffective. This aphid infestation was really serious, I didn't feel as though I had time to experiment with gentle pest control - I had to nuke them before they killed all my plums. However, now that my (shrivelled) leaves appear to be only harbouring dead aphids, I am feeling ashamed that I turned to chemical warefare so easily.

It's difficult to know where to draw the line. Normally, I use natural pest control, with a bit of help from washing up liquid sprayed onto persistant bugs such as black fly on the beans, I buy organic peat free compost as an addition to home made, I get my seeds from an organic supplier but the one thing I've never been able to do without is blue metaldehyde based slug pellets. We'd never have any produce if I didn't. So, where does that leave me now? A not very organic gardener. With organic intentions that got washed away with the first onset of a problem.

It's very easy to sit in judgement of the agrochemical industry but at the moment I'm uncomfortably grateful to it.

Happy gardening, whether you're deep dyed green or wishy washy green, like me.

Plum under attack

Only a week or so ago I was feeling really pleased with the plum tree's progress this year. Tons of blossom, all looking very healthy and lots and lots of tiny new fruits.

This week we have had a dramatic aphid attack, the leaves have curled over on themselves and the undersides are quite covered in the wretched things.

I've sprayed the leaves as much as I can with bug spray. It's very difficult because of course the leaves are all curly now but I'm hoping I've caught it before all the sap gets sucked out of the tree. I don't want the tree to lose all the young fruit.

Goodness, gardening is such a mixture of elation and disappointment, just like the rest of life!


Happy gardening (bug free, I hope)

Why a May Day celebration?

The 1st of May. So we all have a day off work and celebrate with a barbecue and don't stop to remember that the holiday is really about the coming of summer and fertilty for the crops. It's not a surprise that so many of the old customs and festivals are connected with fertilty, our ancestors depended on the land or the hunt for their survival.

I believe modern mankind has almost forgotten that we still depend on growing crops and tending animals. It's as simple as that.

This Beltane I'll be raising a glass to the smallholders, the beekeepers, the gardeners and allotment holders, all the lovely low impact dippy hippies of the world, anyone, in fact, who is quietly living in a responsible way. Stick together guys, we need you.

Happy gardening

Walking the plank

The fruit cage is in a bit of a mess. The grass has become entangled in the netting, making it very difficult to strim around the base of the cage. Consequently it's been cut with hand shears but some roots have grown through the netting and we've never dealt with it properly until last week. We unpicked all the roots, rolled the netting up and are in the process of slotting planks into the base to make a strimmer proof edge. There were a few old planks at the allotment that we'd started to use but yesterday, on the way to the bread shop, J noticed a skip with a pile of very long planks resting against it outside neighbour Bill's house. Last night we walked the plank (well, two planks) up to the allotment. They were about sixteen feet long so there was a long gap between us and we had to shout to hear each other speak. Crossing the road was interesting. However, we made it, and when we got there we headed straight for the fruit cage and the planks turned out to be an exact fit. Amazing! J's up there now, doing a quick bit of plank installation while I write this. What a brilliant find. Thanks Bill!

Happy gardening

Potatoes in the news

I've just got back from planting some Maris Piper potatoes in rather an experimental way. I read somewhere recently that it helps keep the potatoes free from slugs (and we grow a lot of slugs) if you line the trench or hole with newspaper. So I've just put six nicely chitted seed potatoes into their bed with the travel section of last weekend's Guardian. I hope they don't decide to go off somewhere exotic.

Six potatoes may not seem many but there's another twelve waiting at home and the salad potatoes (Charlottes this year) are going into those large pop up bags or any other container I happen to have free. I started one bag off at the weekend and it will just sit in our tiny garden. The growing plants need more attention in containers, but they're also more likely to get it, being right outside the back door.

Happy gardening