The Beauty of Nature

It’s mostly raining today and I have been caught in a few showers.

I’m trying to mow the grass before I go away for a few days, but the rain seems to seek me out and the heavy downpours are making it difficult going. I have had to stop four times so far.

Oh well, hopefully I will get it done soon. Then I am going to sow some more seeds.

This morning I weeded the plot and will do some more on it tomorrow.

Must get on, the rain has stopped so I want to have a go at the grass before the heavens open again.

I had to borrow another plot holders hosepipe yesterday to fill my water butt.

As you can see I got soaked due to the hosepipe having holes in it. I think I watered myself more than the butt.

I finally decided to plant out the Asters yesterday, but I am not sure that anything will survive in this wind.

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Once I had planted them, I watered them in. You should always water plants you have just put in to give them the chance to bed properly.

I’m also not sure if the slugs like Asters. There are plenty up there – I must be feeding them.

Still I will put some slug pellets down and see.

You know those courgettes and pumpkins I put out last week? Well, they have not been doing too well in the wind.

From the video below you can see the windburn has got to them. I think I will reset the pumpkins as they are a lost cause, but the courgettes have faired better so I will give them time and see if they recover.

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I’m glad I grew at least two of each this time, not that it helped the pumpkins. I will stagger the planting next time just in case. But you can bet that next year the weather will be totally different again and I will encounter yet another, but different, problem.

Oh well, that’s the fun of gardening.

I put these beans in towards the end of April and feared they might not survive in the wind and unrelenting sunshine. I couldn’t get to water them as often as I would have liked.

However, as you can see below, they have survived and are flowering now. Phew!

The onions are doing well and have come on. These were planted early and are still some way from being ready, but look like they will be good.

I took this picture about two weeks ago. It might look sunny and warm, but the wind was terrible.

These are the courgettes finally going in. I had no choice really as they were getting pot-bound and needed putting into the ground.

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As you can see it was a windy day – when has it not been of late? However, at least the rain had come and we were having showers on and off all day. Amazingly the allotment soil seemed still dry on the surface as it was wind-blown dry quite quickly.

I only put two in as courgettes can get quite big and take over a large space. Also unless you are on a diet of courgettes, you will have too many to eat, freeze, give away or just compost. Remember to pick them frequently or they get too large and are not very tasty – though they make good soup.

I then put in the pumpkins. These will need a lot of space, so I have placed them on a spare part of the plot. I will also train then in one direction – if I can.

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As you can see, I have been able to get my hands on some horse manure and I have dug some of this in. This will give lots of nutrients, which courgettes and pumpkins need.

This is the first time I have grown pumpkins so I hope they do well.

Unfortunately this year I was a bit prescient with my planting of courgettes and cucumbers.

You can see in the video below that the are growing rather well indoors.

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Ideally they should be put out now, but the wind burn is so severe out there, that they will not do very well and I will lose the lot.

So on they grow by the patio doors.

On another note, here is a quick look at the sweetcorn (top of video) and chillies (bottom). I will take another video of the chillies outside tomorrow to show you just how bad the weather is out there at the moment.

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These ones here are doing well and growing fine, but if you look at the ones outside they are weak and small.

Hopefully the weather will get back to normal soon or I will be growing everything indoors!

These two pictures really give you a contrast with the recent bit of the plot that was rotavated. It doesn’t seem to have bothered the plants.

Anyway, you can see that I have put collars round the strawberries to stop slugs and also to keep them clean when it rains. Yes, that might not happen for a while if they are right about global warming, but you have to try. This is the first year I have really bothered with strawberries, so we will see how well they turn out.

Below is a better picture of the netting over the cabbage. It’s a good way to keep the birds off your plants. Of course the slugs still make for it, but the netting gives them a headache. I found a few slug trails on the netting and a few dead ones boiled in the sun. They had left trails as though they went round in circles until they gave up the ghost and just died.

You can also see how I improvised the hoops with wire.

Well, as you can see from the rest of my plot, I haven’t given much time to rotavating or getting too fine a tilth of soil. It’s not that I’m lazy, just that it is a lot of work to do with that and my garden at home. Yes, while it would be good to have a good fine soil, it is not always necessary. Also it kills worms down to a good depth and worms are good for the soil.

In an ideal world I would give it a double dig every five years, but the soil is good and I add manure, compost, hops, etc., so I don’t need to. I also leave different areas fallow year on year and follow the rules of crop rotation.

I didn’t rotavate last year and everything was fine. However, as summer has taken over spring and there has been little rain, if I didn’t get some of the soil turned over, it would be nigh on impossible later on.

So, I bribed someone with beer to do it for me.

As you can see, they did a good job. It will really help me to plant things easily as and when I need to.