How does your garden grow?

[Freeranger]

It;s amazing how the things you don't need grow so easily, but the things you really want to have in your garden take all the effort!
Go and have a hot bath and a gin.

[Mo]

Go and have a hot bath and a gin.

I'm a bit old to need that sort of remedy.

[Mo]

Beans are now planted round the wigwam, but no sign of the pots in the airing cupboard sprouting.
Earthing up the spuds proceeds.
Pat kept me company, and did some earthing up of his own - I suppose it does look like a giant litter tray.

[Freeranger]

Just so i know, when will I be too old for gin?! Sounds like a disaster waiting to happen!

[lancashire lass]

Just so i know, when will I be too old for gin?! Sounds like a disaster waiting to happen!

[Mo]

It was the combination that made me wonder.

[Freeranger]

It was the combination that made me wonder.

Oh I |see|! Must be my sheltered life, but I hadn't even considered that
I just meant a hot bath for the aches and pains and alcohol for the memory of them!

[Mo]

No sign of any beans, maybe I should have bought fresh seed, or tested them for germination.
Putting the early spuds in a big pot may have been a mistake, one of the 4 was destroyed by ants and when I dug it up I couldn't get my trowel down to the level I planted the tuber, the stem broke off when I dug and pulled it. It had been bitten through and ants were crawling all over it. There may be some spuds lower down, we shall see when I lift the others.

[Mo]

Well, it hasn't been gardening weather. I really most get out with the secateurs soon or I'll be stuck inside forever - weeds, brambles and japonica are spreading across my doorstep from both sides. But when I do go out there are other urgent jobs.

The beans never germinated, but some friends came round on Sunday with a small seed-tray of yogurt pots each with a runner bean plant in. We managed to get a walk with only one shower, but after lunch it was WET so no gardening.

Monday - FIRST HARVEST - and I realised that planting the early potatoes at the bottom of a pot and then earthing them to the top was a mistake. I had to dig out and furtle through a lot of soil to lift the first root. Just enough for 1 serving. By the time I'd done that it was raining again, but later, between showers I went outside to try to unplait the runner beans which where well and truly knotted round each other. We'd put them on the slabs in front of the house, I took a stool out to avoid the dizzy-making bending and started the job of unknitting them.

Tuesday - I decided I really must plant the beans. So on with full walking waterproofs (jacket & trousers) + wellies. First dig up another root of spuds. Then plant more than a third of the beans. There are still 5 untangled and another 5 twisted together. By then my socks were wet (shouldn't have tucked the trousers inside the wellies) and I was very muddy. But 1 more job, I pruned the gooseberry branches that were laying on the path next to the fruit bed, and took them inside. The gooseberries seem to have swelled early this year. After I'd washed the mud off my hands I picked the gooseberries 2lb so some cooked for my pudding, some in the fridge for tomorrow, some in the freezer and a 12oz punnet to take for the choir bring & buy stall. I wasn't sure how much to suggest as a price, quite hard to find any online to compare - one fruit farm in Scotland had 300g for £3.75 (don't know if they were ripe eaters or cookers), another £2/lb, so I charged £1.50, but no-one bought them so I'll top & tail them for the freezer. Lat year my apples earned quite a bit for choir funds; almost enough to pay 1 of the musicians we need for concerts, we have a professional orchestra and soloists for some of our 4 concerts and although MU rates don't seem a lot for a day's work it all adds up.

Must get the rest of the beans planted and look to see how the orchard is doing.

[Mo]

I lied that the potatoes and gooseberries were the first harvest. I've been pulling the occasional rhubarb stem for months, though they've been quite spindley this year. Found a few thicker stems for my pudd on Monday.

[Mo]

Arghhh. By bean wigwam is surrounded by a moat. I went out to plant the 4 I'd untangled , which uses all the poles on the wigwam (if they survive). I think the others can stay as they are for a bit - potbound could be better than waterlogged. Or I might get round to potting them on. We shall see.
One encouraging sign. The hypericum that my grandson found as a rooted bit while he was pruning the plant that overhangs the path in front of the kitchen, has got a new shoot from the base and a few young leaves on the ends of the stems. It's been sat sulking since Feb when we planted it - leaves still green but somehow not lively looking. The parent plant has lovely big yellow flowers, so it seems a shame to cut them off, but they reach out to touch the hydranger on the other side of the path and I get very wet trying to get along. Next year, if the new one is happy i shall be ruthless.

[Mo]

It wasn't tempting weather yesterday, but after tea I put on full waterproofs again for a stroll round. Got through the long grass into the orchard and found that the Vic plum was badly in need of thinning. One small branch already broken off. The last couple of years I've not needed to, in fact hardly any fruit last year. So made a start on that, singling the fruit (the advice is to imagine plums as big as eggs and leave room for them. Quite hard to be that ruthless when they are like bunches of grapes, but best to try (little plums are all stone and no taste). There were quite a few dead branches and twigs despite me pruning in spring, and of course the one I cut too far down and threw away a side branch of plumlets. Done less than a quarter of the first tree, and there are 5 though I think the greengage doesn't need much. I went cross-eyed after 40 mins so stopped and went to see how much the pond had expanded in the rain. Don't know about the pond, the grass / nettles / brambles have all had a growth spurt, had to trample my way through.

[Freeranger]

That's the way to do it, Mo! Top to toe waterproofs and you can garden in any weather!
You must have needed it to prune your way into the tree.
It's amazing how things change from year to year, isn't it? We had loads of apple blossom in the warm spring but I wait to see what that translates to in terms of harvest because it's been so cool and wet since. Last year for me was wonderful for wild flowers, but this year very, very few.
Like you, parts of my garden could best be described as verdant.

[KarenE]

Yes it's another funny year isn't it? My cooking apple looks like it might have a decent year, although we'll see what's left after the june drop, but not a bit of blossom or fruit on my cox apple or my pear. I would love a Victoria plum but no space and they do seem a lot of work for variable harvests. Well done Mo for getting out into that drenched garden, you're more determined than I have been!

[Mo]

I've been busy picking and preparing and freezing the soft fruit (what I haven't eaten). It's a marvellous time of year - cherries & nectarines in the shop + the garden harvest.
I take my stool out and sit by the bushes to milk them.
1 of the 3 gooseberry bushes has very small fruits and the leaves have gone brown & crispy. No use leaving the berries on, they are dropping off as I touch a branch.
Not many raspberries again, but there are a few loganberries and a self seeded one in the hedge coming on nicely.
I'll have to tame the brambles though. they take over.
Nearly finished thinning the Czar plum, it doesn't look all that healthy either.
There were some cherries fattening nicely, but as ever the birds got them before they were ripe. Luckily the blackbirds prefer berberis to blackcurrants, though they get the ripe redcurrants before I do.
Something for everyone.