A battle against the wind

We've had some cold and very windy weather this last week. The poor tomatoes are so laden with fruit (which are taking far too long to turn red) and therefore so heavy that I needed to, once again, tie them up as best I could to stop the wind pushing them all over. They are on a section of earth that catches the gusts of wind as it hits the side of the conservatory - I won't plant anything tall there again! The problem now is that the fruits are mainly at the bottom of the plants and the vines are trailing in the earth which is rather wet and obviously a haven for tomato munching insects and plain old rot. I've trussed them up and off the ground for now.

The wet weather, however, has done wonders for the lettuce which are blooming nicely and the pumpkin which has stopped growing, I believe, and is now turning a wonderful autumn orange.

Peppers continue to grow longer and a tiny bit fatter. Having not grown these before, and having purchased these as tiny plants from a local grower, I don't know how big they are supposed to get. I've had to pull off a few that have gone bad so I guess I'll just have to watch and see.

We continue to pull our first lot of carrots. As we thin them out this way, the remaining carrots are having a chance to grow much bigger in the soil. They are a joy to eat, and we're all pretty proud of them. I'll probably continue to grow our carrots in pots from now on. The ones sown in the ground have not done at all well - we still only have two small bundles of carrot leaves!

These cold evenings (most of which I've spent in front of the open fire) have been great for browsing the seed catalogues and reading much needed growing tips in some of the veggie books I have. The best one I can recommend so far was given to me by my b-i-l and s-i-l; "Grow your own Veg" by Carol Klein - easy to follow and nicely written. So, I'm planning on getting some onion sets to sow over winter - I'll let you know how I get on.