One sunflower has yet to burst into bloom, but this one's brilliant and looks into next door's bedroom window.
Here's a smaller sunflower, from a bunch of roots pulled from my Mum's garden. Loving this sunny yellow in our garden this year.
Tuesday, 18 August 2009
Sunny sunflowers
The seed packet said they'd reach 10 feet tall - I think they may be right!
One sunflower has yet to burst into bloom, but this one's brilliant and looks into next door's bedroom window.
Here's a smaller sunflower, from a bunch of roots pulled from my Mum's garden. Loving this sunny yellow in our garden this year.
One sunflower has yet to burst into bloom, but this one's brilliant and looks into next door's bedroom window.
Here's a smaller sunflower, from a bunch of roots pulled from my Mum's garden. Loving this sunny yellow in our garden this year.
Wednesday, 22 July 2009
Tomatoes, Runners, Garlic and Chilli update
Yesterday and today I had the joy of cooking a meal using several veg harvested from our own garden - fabulous.
Here's a photo update:
Here's a photo update:
Thursday, 2 July 2009
Summer flowers, broccoli and carrots
Aren't they lovely? All these in the picture have been given to me as cuttings or seeds by my Mum. Looking forward to harvesting some seeds from the marigolds, they are such a lovely cheerful colour.
Really glad I didn't rush to put these purple sprouting brocs in the ground in May. I repotted them in slightly larger pots and waited, as the packet states. They're going in the ground in the next couple of days.
Carrots - love them and so easy to grow, especially in large pots. This is the first wave and all doing nicely. The netting is to keep off unwanted, nosey hens!
Really glad I didn't rush to put these purple sprouting brocs in the ground in May. I repotted them in slightly larger pots and waited, as the packet states. They're going in the ground in the next couple of days.
Carrots - love them and so easy to grow, especially in large pots. This is the first wave and all doing nicely. The netting is to keep off unwanted, nosey hens!
Garlic, Spring Onions, Pumpkins, Runner Beans ...
... all coming along really well. Have picked lots and lots of peas (the more you pick the more you get) and have started picking runners too now.
These are the type that wind themselves round the bamboo poles right to the top (and now wanting to go higher) - lovely red flowers. The dwarf variety are at the front of the poles and have pretty pink flowers.
I've harvested all the garlic now. I wasn't too sure when to actually start taking them out of the ground; the book stated when the stalks start to yellow and begin to bend over. They certainly were going yellow, but not really bending. The reason I pulled them was that a few I did pull had mildew on them and definitely weren't healthy. Once the sun came out for a prolonged period I decided to dig up the rest. Have a huge crop with just a small amount of dud ones. This fabulous hot weather has been brilliant for helping them dry out (on a garden bench); they're now hanging in an equally hot spot in the conservatory kitchen to finish off the process.
Spring Onions in the pot and in the ground have grown so fast this year and are all more-or-less ready for use. Have noticed a bit of "rust" on a few and the cats seem to enjoy laying on them too!
I can certainly vouch for whoever said to grow pumpkins in last years compost (Monty Don I think) - they're going berzerk! Under all those lovely large leaves there's alot of gorgeous flowers and alot of mini pumpkins beginning their new lives. Hopefully we'll be able to get at least two out of that lot for Halloween.
These are the type that wind themselves round the bamboo poles right to the top (and now wanting to go higher) - lovely red flowers. The dwarf variety are at the front of the poles and have pretty pink flowers.
I've harvested all the garlic now. I wasn't too sure when to actually start taking them out of the ground; the book stated when the stalks start to yellow and begin to bend over. They certainly were going yellow, but not really bending. The reason I pulled them was that a few I did pull had mildew on them and definitely weren't healthy. Once the sun came out for a prolonged period I decided to dig up the rest. Have a huge crop with just a small amount of dud ones. This fabulous hot weather has been brilliant for helping them dry out (on a garden bench); they're now hanging in an equally hot spot in the conservatory kitchen to finish off the process.
Spring Onions in the pot and in the ground have grown so fast this year and are all more-or-less ready for use. Have noticed a bit of "rust" on a few and the cats seem to enjoy laying on them too!
I can certainly vouch for whoever said to grow pumpkins in last years compost (Monty Don I think) - they're going berzerk! Under all those lovely large leaves there's alot of gorgeous flowers and alot of mini pumpkins beginning their new lives. Hopefully we'll be able to get at least two out of that lot for Halloween.
Potatoes
Strangely the four bags of free Potato Council potatoes never made it to the flowering stage. It seems we were not alone! Having received a (late) email from them saying it was time to harvest, we went ahead and empty two of the bags. Unfortunately, we won't be able to take part in the big weigh-in competition as the labels had come off making it impossible to distinguish beetween the two different varieties.
So contents of two bags and one small pot which contained a home sprouted spud from the cupboard. Not bad - will do for a couple of family meals. Just love new potatoes. The other two bags will be harvested in due course as we had just bought a whole load a new pots from the supermarket - typical!
So contents of two bags and one small pot which contained a home sprouted spud from the cupboard. Not bad - will do for a couple of family meals. Just love new potatoes. The other two bags will be harvested in due course as we had just bought a whole load a new pots from the supermarket - typical!
Wednesday, 17 June 2009
Quack!
I'd like to share these lovely photos that Katie and I took yesterday of the ducks that live across the road from home.
There's been four sets of ducklings born so far this year although sadly one set didn't really make it past a few days. The second lot are more-or-less adult sized now and very, very cute. You can tell them from the adults by their yellow legs (adults have orange).
2 days old
This new lot of ducklings arrived two days ago and belong to a calling duck we named "Mental". We named her this when we first moved into the house as she makes an awful lot of noise (as calling ducks do) and has serious "mental" moments chasing other ducks around quacking at them furiously and often crash landing when she flies around the place! She's not a particularly good mum either and often abandons her little ones when there's a potential bread snack around or when she decides to have one of her "moments". Hopefully these ones will do better than the last lot.
"Mental"
There are plenty of "Mental" style ducks in with the pack, but somehow we can always distinguish the real "Mental"!
Veggie update - lots of progress
Tomatoes (indoor) and Chilli plants are beginning to flower. I'm amazed at how much taller the tomato plants are indoors compared to the two planted outside, even though the weather has been glorious lately.
We also have the distinctive mauve flowers on our self-seeded potatoes which have taken over the onion plot so much now that I have to part the leaves in order to find the onions. The potatoes grown in the black bags from The Potato Council are still flourishing although I've had to water them up to three times a day during the hot weather and there aren't any flowers on them yet.
The onions are looking fine, but small. I didn't have much hope for them from the start as they'd taken so long to get going, but they should be OK. Small is beautiful (and flavoursome).
My pride and joy is the peas. I'm so glad I decided to plant them and have actually sown more (having watched the River Cottage program recently where he liberally sowed peas rather than carefully spacing the seeds out like I'd done). I read somewhere that eating the peas once the pod has been popped is one of the biggest pleasures of home grown foods - so right. I think doing this is higher up the enjoyment stakes than digging up potatoes. I wasn't sure when to actually harvest the peas and didn't want to pick them too soon or too late. Having Googled Kelvedon Peas I read that it's best to harvest them sooner rather than later as the peas are much sweeter. This seems to be true in my opinion. I discoverd some very fat pea pods and found the goods rather bitter compared to pods that are plump but not bursting.
I've also plucked up the courage to try growing sweetcorn again - hopefully I'll do better than last year. The reason I've found some spare space in the veggie plot is because the little cabbages I grew went to seed and then promptly got eaten by the chickens! Nevermind, I'd rather have sweetcorn than cabbages.
We also have the distinctive mauve flowers on our self-seeded potatoes which have taken over the onion plot so much now that I have to part the leaves in order to find the onions. The potatoes grown in the black bags from The Potato Council are still flourishing although I've had to water them up to three times a day during the hot weather and there aren't any flowers on them yet.
The onions are looking fine, but small. I didn't have much hope for them from the start as they'd taken so long to get going, but they should be OK. Small is beautiful (and flavoursome).
My pride and joy is the peas. I'm so glad I decided to plant them and have actually sown more (having watched the River Cottage program recently where he liberally sowed peas rather than carefully spacing the seeds out like I'd done). I read somewhere that eating the peas once the pod has been popped is one of the biggest pleasures of home grown foods - so right. I think doing this is higher up the enjoyment stakes than digging up potatoes. I wasn't sure when to actually harvest the peas and didn't want to pick them too soon or too late. Having Googled Kelvedon Peas I read that it's best to harvest them sooner rather than later as the peas are much sweeter. This seems to be true in my opinion. I discoverd some very fat pea pods and found the goods rather bitter compared to pods that are plump but not bursting.
I've also plucked up the courage to try growing sweetcorn again - hopefully I'll do better than last year. The reason I've found some spare space in the veggie plot is because the little cabbages I grew went to seed and then promptly got eaten by the chickens! Nevermind, I'd rather have sweetcorn than cabbages.
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