Glut

I've been neglecting the blog for a while - obviously I have been gardening and have hardly spent a moment inside... Actually it's just sheer laziness.

The runner beans have done really well and have grown like mad. The other day we decided to harvest the beetroot as they were all ready (we really should have planted in succession). The purple stems look lovely. Shame I don't really eat beetroot!

Toms

The tomato plants are starting to sprout tomatoes! As they were so small I found it quite hard to get any decent pics. We spotted the first one on saturday and today I found three more. I think this means that I have to start feeding. We bought some tomato feed although I am not sure if it is organic. In fact, when it comes to organic gardening, I'm not sure what to do with regard to plant food. Am I allowed to get the off the shelf stuff? What is organic plant food - surely feeding plants is automatic cheating, whereas organic gardening should be a "marathon not a sprint" approach. Ah who cares, this year I'm learning and I am allowed to get it wrong. All of the tomato plants are in pots which means they are prone to drying out. However advice is not to over water, which complicates things. I watered the plants yesterday evening but today we had really heavy downpours. So should I leave them a day or so to recover; although it is really warm (mid - 20s today) so the moisture has probably evaporated. Mmm I'll have a look tomorrow evening and see how they are looking.

Progress

It's great to see how far we have come. I took a picture of the veggie patches the other day to do just that. You can see how tall the runner beans are, how the sweet peas and dwarf french beans are filling out, just generally how everything is growing away. And that is despite the poor weather. I wonder how it would all look if we had a blazing hot summer. Okay we still have August to come, so fingers crossed for some uninterrupted sunshine.

Lemon grass

I've just been flicking back to the earlier posts and saw a picture of the lemon grass when they were little seedlings. Not much has made it outside (mainly because I sowed far too many seeds). There are three pots outside now. One got attached by slugs/snails but seems to be recovering. Another is doing okay although I'm not sure what stage it should be at. It has one tall blade and since feeding it the other day, more seem to be developing (the picture is pre - feed). I've been looking around on the internet and have found out that the seeds are supposed to be hard to germinate. Mine were fine - I'm sure 99% of them germinated. Although next time I wont sow so many so close together as it is very difficult to separate them later on. (Ok, I really should have thinned them out). However there is no indication of when they will turn into the large plants I have seen picture of, nor of when I can start harvesting for Thai Green Curry. I think this will be a much longer project than the vegetable.

Sweet peppers

Since putting the sweet peppers outside they haven't really done very well. I think I put them out too early as the weather really wasn't good enough. We've had a dreadful June - so much rain and I've been wearing my scarf to work. The plants have also been attacked by slugs and greenfly so it's all a bit of a battle. However as it starts to warm up I'm hoping that the things will recover and start yielding. A couple of them are doing okay and I have moved them to a better position in the garden - it's a bit more sheltered and it gets more sun. I've also put some of the tomato plants there which are already flowering. I've given them all a bit of general plant food so hopefully that'll kick start things into action. The one in the pic is one that I put outside a bit later than the others - only last weekend has it felt the cold outside air on its leaves. It looks so much more greener and lusher than the others.

Bees

We have bees! They are visiting the runner beans so hopefully the fears of a "bee shortage" are over exaggerated. The flowers on the runner beans are dying and starting to produce little mini - runners. They are curved and fluffy now, so it will be interesting to see them develop into full grown beans ready for eating.

Monster slugs

Monster monster monster slugs in the garden. I decided to clear up the border underneath the oak tree. It had been covered in leaves since we moved in last October - the leaves hadn't even begun to decompose as they are tough dry little things. As I got raking, I noticed these enormous slimy beasts. They were FAT - about the size of a clench fist (of a small child). Then one started to move (I had removed its home after all) and it looked like a small legless tiger. It must have been about 5 inches long. These things have been eating our veg.

What weather

The weather has been absolutely awful here at the moment. Cold cold cold and rain rain rain! I'd forgotten it was June. Last night we had some spectacular storms - beautiful fork lightning across the greyish yellow sky and deep rumbles of thunder. I was home alone so a bit scared, although nothing to worry about in the end as I was not hit by lightning as I made my dinner.

Anyway I tell you this because the weather means less sunshine for the crops. I'm not sure whether or not the sweet peppers or chillies will make it through to harvest. I've also bought some tomato plants and I am worried about them too. I've put them under a make-shift fleece covering, so hopefully that'll help, but we will have to see.

The salad crops seem to be doing well although the slugs do like a nibble. I have resorted to buying so-called "organic" slug pellets to kill the buggers, but I feel like I have lost my green credentials as a result.

Most of the spinach and all of the pakchoi have now been pulled up. The pakchoi had run its course and the spinach had gone to seed (started to flower) so time to make room for new crops. Mr is in charge of these and he plans to sow some more pakchoi, possibly leeks... Mmmm leeks are good for risotto, pasta dishes, fish..!

The runner beans have begun to flower. They are bright red - you can see them from the kitchen through the tree!

However the shortage of bees (the flying buzzing things) may mean that they don't get pollinated. I have seen a few flying around so hopefully it'll be fine.

Runner beans

The runner beans are doing very well. At first we were a bit dubious about getting a crop especially after an attack of aphids, wind damage, nosey foxes and all sorts, they have recovered. They've quickly clambered up to the top of the canes and are winding themselves around each other and back over adjacent canes.

However, in order to actually get the plants to produce runner beans we need some bees. Bees, which I am coming round to the idea of, are very very important flying beasties in the garden. They pollinate the flowers - remembering the old GCSE knowledge. However there are stories which say that the bee is in decline. What can we do to help boost their numbers again? (A question I never thought I'd ask - I've even looked up "bee nesting boxes". However the word "colony" sends a shiver down my spine). It's too late now as we should have put a bee box by now. Maybe next year, when I have also invested in a bee keepers outfit.

Ladybirds

Over the last week we've had our first sighting of ladybirds around the garden. This is brilliant news - these gorgeous little beetles eat aphids. Aphids attack the green beans and stunt their growth, so I am happy as murder at the hands of ladybirds will shortly commence. We had planted marigolds to encourage ladybirds - so hopefully this is what has brought them along to our patch. Either that, or it is ladybird season. Either way, who cares.

The ladybirds love it so much, particular on the runner beans, that they have taken to making sweet love (and baby ladybirds we hope) on the stems. If you look carefully in the darker picture, you can just make out the outline of the happy couple. How voyeuristic, but lovely to see nature in action. Mr's new camera lens captures them very well (if I may say so myself as it was his birthday gift from me).

More harvest

Look at our beautiful salad. I feel like a proud parent as I munch on the leaves. And it all began from some tiny seeds. We've been lucky - the aphids and slugs haven't touched this stuff. I think the pak choi has proven to be too much of a distraction for the slimy beast. How could they resist the large leaves; perfect slug food.

Harvesting

At last, we can eat! Salad, spinach and pak choi have been on the menu so far as it's too early for anything else.

After musing what crops to pick and how to pick them, we just dived right in and started pulling away. It's bizarre but great to actually start using the plants for what we used them for in the first place. Look at how green the pak choi is! And it tastes much better than the stuff you get wrapped in cellophane from the supermarket.

We've taken the netting off the crops now, and the spraying (of organic killer - if there is such a thing) seems to have done the trick. However the slugs are breeding and seem to be feasting off the pak choi. However as there is so much of it, I think we can live with it. Although I really want to buy some slug pellets and wipe them all out.

We made the mistake of putting woodchip paths between the vegetable beds. A mistake because it proves to be a breeding ground for the slimy horrible things. If there is a frost, I have to turn the woodchips over and that'll kill most of them off. One blog also suggested going out to mow the lawn at night as the slugs come out to play in the grass i.e. this would chop them up and stop them eating my food. Gosh, it's amazing what a murderous person gardening makes you. I'm feeling particularly aggrieved because the slugs or snails had a go at my pepper plants, eating their leaves and making them look poorly. Furthermore, the stupid baby foxes have squashed a marigold plant (which attract ladybirds, which eat aphids) and another pepper plant. Why can't nature stay out of my garden?!!! I've been out at 7am a couple of times to chase the horrible four legged furry things out. I hope the neighbours haven't seen.

Protection

In a bid to keep the nasties off of the veg (having discovered that the ants crawling over the runner beans were farming the aphids and thus protecting them!), we've decided to use extra-fine netting. Now, when we look out the window it looks as if there are three white ghosts residing on the lawn. The big leaves which you can see are the spinach plants. I think we've left them for too long and should have harvested them a while ago -especially as they have started to "go to seed" i.e. flower. Once that happens they could be sprouting up everywhere!!

We've also planted magnolias as their flowers encourage other insects such as lacewings and ladybirds which will eat the aphids. The four we have planted look a bit pathetic - tiny little things amongst the climbing beans. But once they start flowering they'll be the kings of the patches!

We've put three new runner bean plants in as, for the first lot, it all became a bit too much. So rather than let them struggle on and not produce good food, we got rid of them. Hopefully the new ones will grow quickly up the 6ft canes we've put in, and come summer, it'll be beans galore.

I've taken a picture of the horrible bindweed that is everywhere. It looks like it is being attacked by slugs. So they are good for one thing at least. Nasty stuff:

And we've also discovered that we have mint in one of the borders. I looked away for about 30 secs and it is now about 2ft tall! It can be invasive, so I'm going to prune it to keep it in check. Either that or let the bind weed smother it.

Let battle commence

The aphids are out eating my blackcurrants. The slugs are out attacking anything with large green leaves (most of our salads and the pak choi). However as organic gardeners, we can't resort to chemical spraying which is a real shame. Instead we have unleashed nematodes into the vegetable patches. Give it a week and they'll be eating the slugs causing death, destruction and mayhem to the slimey buggers.

Lemon grass and basil

The lemon grass seedlings are getting on okay. They seem to be growing quite slowly, and I have to confess, I have no idea what they will look like as "adults". Reading the veg book, I now know that they can grow up to 1.5 metres tall which is pretty big. However they do better in a greenhouse, which is why I repeat my claim that I think we need one... Or we could get a shed that doubles up as a greenhouse....? Mmmmm. I'll have to do some research.

The basil looks like it's struggling a little. Only one of them has had a good spurt since being repotted in the newspaper pots. However as you can get basil everywhere, I don't really mind if they don't make it.

The pic shows the basil in the background and lemongrass in the foreground. Lemongrass, funnily enough, looks like grass.

It has been raining quite hard here for the last two hours and I popped outside in my waterproofs for a potter around. The onions in the veggie patch look a bit sorry for themselves having taken a bit of battering from the wind. I also think that the runner beans have a case of halo blight - a lethal bacterial infection which requires digging and burning!!! The blackcurrant bush is fighting a losing battle against the aphids. I really need to give it a good going over and pick them all off. Although it's a bit of a big job!

Chillies and sweet peppers

I think I am in love with my chilli plants (and the sweet pepper ones too). They look so strong and healthy! Apparently they are one of the easiest plants to grow from seed, but that doesn't stop me from getting great satisfaction from seeing them get taller. They are doing very well in their little handmade newspaper pots.

I'm not sure when to put them outside. We bought a cold-frame, but typically there was one pane of glass missing so we're not sure whether to kick up a fuss or make do with a plastic pane borrowed from a cheap picture frame instead. I also think we need to invest in a greenhouse - at the moment our dining room is being used as a nursery for the seedlings, but that isn't really what it was made for! The table is covered in compost and newspaper and we haven't got round to painting that room yet as a result.

Bean bean beans

Mr has planted the first of his young outside. I am a bit worried as they haven't experienced the cold as we've kept them indoors since birth. Maybe they need a blanket?

Anyhow, the runner beans and dwarf beans are now outside coping all on their own. Mr has built the runner beans a couple of cane supports (which are like 1-dimensional tepee's made out of canes. Bear with me as my camera is broken so I have no pics). They seem to be doing well although they look eerily like the horrible bind weed that is threatening to take over the rest of the garden. In fact I have become slightly obsessed by weeds and find myself googling for hours various threats to our "land". In particular I am fascinated by "Japanese Knotweed" that takes a vigilante campaign of three years to get rid of! Mere weedkiller is not enough; you need a three-pronged attack of black bin liners, weedkiller and strong boots to stamp out any new growth. Wow. I've seen this knotweed - a lot of it grows by railway lines (it's a fast grower and helps prevent landslides onto train tracks) - and I can now spot it from a distance of 50 miles.

In fact the last few weeks have been spent waging war on unwanted green beasties in the garden. I've been undecidely un-green using weedkiller (not on the veg mind) to kill off the weeds. Whenever I pop out to check on the plants, I like to utter the odd "Die!" in the direction of the little critters. It seems to work. However I am at a loss to know what to do with the green fly that have infected my blackcurrant plants. (How DARE they). I've wiped them all off and covered the leaves in vegetable oil (as per the guidance in the gardening book). None have come back since I did this a week ago, but the leaves have gone a bit see-through - a bit worrying. And now there are black flies getting stuck in the oil. What is a gardener to do!

This evening I went out to visit the plants and still had my ipod on from the train journey. What a surreal experience to be stroking the onion leaves, yanking out shoots of brambles whilst listening to Bohemian Rhapsody.

Garden furniture

We had a whizz round ikea and homebase this weekend, mainly to spend hundreds on a lawnmower and other garden stuff, but also to look for garden furniture. (We got a lawnmower - an electric one, after deciding that the petrol ones were too pricey even if they are more practical and powerful. Anyway).

Why is garden furniture so expensive?? Ok, why is decent garden furniture so expensive? We had a look in ikea, and saw a table and chairs which were a possibility, but even for ikea I thought they were a bit much. In the end we settled on a couple of lounger chairs in black and white plastic. They look cool but I don't know if they'll last outside. Our shed isn't big enough (yet another expense). Maybe we should hold off on the furniture - it is only April and the sun might be shining now, but give it a couple of weeks.

Sowing the seeds

The sowing has begun. Now we put the veggie beds to use. So far the weather has been very dry - we haven't had any rain for weeks so the soil/manure is looking pretty dehydrated. We'll have to help the seeds along then (hopefully they wont introduce a hose pipe ban). In fact this is pretty freaky weather at the moment.

Mr made little trenches in the beds and tried to sow the seeds "thinly" as per the instructions. Yeah right - easier said than done. These things are the size of dust particles. We're only using beds 1 and 2 - the 3rd will be used for the runner beans, french beans and sweetcorn (which will be started in doors).

Beds 1 and 2 contain onions (spaced according to how large we want the onions - bigger spacing = bigger onions), spring onions, beetroot, broccoli, pak choi, rocket, spinach, salad leaves and many more things I can't remember.

The indoor seeds (chillies, sweet peppers, basil, mint and lemongrass) have been getting on quite well. But the basil, mint and lemongrass look quite crowded as I didn't thin them out earlier. I have grown attached to the little seedlings and didn't want to kill them off. So now I am paying the price as it makes it difficult trying to re-pot the seedlings without "hurting" them.

However I have managed to separate out 5 chillies, 5 sweet pepper and 4 basil seedlings into their own homemade pots. I am quite proud of these pots as I made them out of newspaper (following the instructions onhttp://www.wizer.co.uk/?p=29) . I have learned the hard way that the best size newspaper to use is the "G2" supplement section of the Guardian followed by any tabloid size paper (such as the local rag or freebies you get on the tube in London). Anything bigger falls apart when you put the soil in.

The idea is that the seedlings establish themselves, then you can pot them straight out (still in the pots) without disturbing the roots. The newspaper breaks down in the soil - recycling at its best.

A pic of my raspberry plants (before separating out the canes). Doing quite well after being home for 3 weeks. I've covered it in netting - although I don't think I need to as there are no fruits for the birds. However we have a lot of squirrels and foxes which are nosey so I like to keep them away. (The squirrels had attacked the bird feeder - prising open the metal in order to get to the seed!).

Fruity

I've decided to grow raspberries and blackcurrants in pots on the patio. I'm a bit dubious because I'll have to protect the fruits from birds, make sure that they get support etc etc. But hopefully I can pull it off.

We bought the raspberry canes and blackcurrant bush from a garden centre in February and I left them outside wrapped in bubble wrap in order to acclimatise them (although I don't know if I needed to as they were already outside when we bought them). Then I transferred them into large 30cm deep pots. However after reading the gardening book I realised that I needed to separate the canes (of raspberries) as each one was a plant. How was I to know - the label didn't mention it and there were no signs of shoots! The raspberry plant(s) had got used to the pot so I was a bit nervous about rooting them out again and separating them - but it had to be done. So now I have two pots of raspberries and so far (after a day) they haven't died of shock. But we shall see... I have erected a make-shift "post and wires" support system for the raspberries. Basically two canes, one in each pot, with parallel wires joining them. As the raspberries grow, they'll be supported by the wires. Mmmmm.

Unwittingly, I have chosen a summer flowering raspberry - which don't look as pretty apparently (because they need wires for support). Well we will just have to see how they turn out.

In order to stop the pots of fruit drying out, I've put a layer of bark chippings on the top of the soil. It hasn't rained much lately so they need all the help they can get. I also mixed some manure (not fresh!) in there too (before potting).

The third vegetable bed

It was a dry day on saturday, so we spent the whole afternoon in the garden digging and weeding.

Mr dug the third raised vegetable bed and did a very good job too managing to get most of it done in a matter of hours. He cut the grass first to make the digging easier (a 12'x3' bed is a big job).

As you probably can't tell from the first picture, it is very hard work and the digging is actually quite methodical (I would have just dug in any old fashion). Mr used the "single digging" method. It would be better to use a spade with a wooden handle and wear gloves to avoid tearing your palms to shreds.

So after marking out the bed, cutting the grass, doing the single digging, the next stage was to put the gravel boards down (which we used as edging). The longer 12' edges were made from two 6' boards hammered together with a shorter off-cut. The shorter 3' edges were ingeniously made from one 6' board cut in half (which is why we chose 12'x3'). The boards were joined at the corners by posts about 6" long driven into the ground by a mallet. After trialling different methods of putting the boards in on the first two beds, Mr settled on nailing the posts to each end of the longer boards, hammering them into the ground and then nailing the shorter boards. The next step will be to mix in the manure and it is pretty much ready for planting (we think). Luckily Mr had had two chances with the other two beds - his dad came over and taught him the art of digging. Very impressive it was too!

Seeds!

The seeds have germinated and they are popping up through the soil which is exciting. When they were put in the sun, they went mental (ok, they didn't turn into full grown plants), so we have decided to move them from one room to another depending on where the sun is.

The top pic is of the lemongrass, basil and mint. The other pic is of the"Spring Marchen" flowers, sweet peppers and chillies (from top to bottom). This is after about two weeks. We used Suttons seeds for all apart from the Marchen, which are Mr Fothergill's.

We used compost especially made for seeds, which seems to be working. The "propagators" are very basic, but again, they do the job. I've not had to water them yet as the compost was very wet. There seems to be a lot of condesation on the inside of the lids, so every now and again I wipe it off to make sure there is plenty of light getting through.

The seeds that came up first were the flowers (Marchen) and the basil. The lemongrass seeds have been doing really well - I may have to thin them out! The mint, chilli and sweet peppers have taken a little bit longer but they are now well on their way.

The next step, once they are stronger is to transfer them to modules, then to the pots in which they will finally be growing. I'm going to use 3" pots for the chillies and sweet peppers and bigger pots for the basil and mint. I may even put the mint into the ground (but within its own pot as apparently it can get out of control). The flowers will go into our border with the shrubs. I'm going to be doing some research for cold frames as I'll need one into order to harden the seedlings (introducing them to the outside world) as I'll be annoyed if they die off!

The garden

In my haste to get this blog going, I have forgotten to describe the garden.

Well it is big. We live in a flat and this is a mammoth garden - even for a house. It is about 70x50 feet with a large patio and area of trees at the bottom end. There is also a lot of lawn, one large bed in the corner and some narrow beds along one end.

We've decided to grow some vegetables and have dug two of the three beds already. We went for the raised option after doing some research and have mixed in some manure (which was very mature and didn't smell a bit). Using "gravel boards" (wooden boards), we were able to create low rise beds and have even carved out a path between the two. The beds are 12x3 feet which sounds big, but once you see them laid out it doesn't seem so crazy after all. Mr is in charge of the veggie patches, and I am in charge of the rest (fruit, herbs and flowers). (Mr is my other half, my garden pal, my housemate).

It's a sunny day in March and we look forward to sunny days in the summer when we get to enjoy the fruits of our labour.

Seed planting

The garden is huge. Where do we begin? Well today I finally planted some seeds in the cheap propagators from a garden centre (see pic).

In two propogators, I have planted:

Basil
Lemongrass (which is temperamental so I sowed a lot of seeds)
Mint (invasive so I will restrict its growth by keeping in a pot)
Chillies and
Sweet peppers

Once they become seedlings I'll move them into their own pots and decide whether to put them straight in the ground.

I will plant the rosemary straight outside (although I may use a pot for ease) in April.

I also started to tackle the corner bed - which is huge. It is also difficult to decide what to do with it because of the tree stump (complete with many roots) which is near enough bang in the middle. I planted a choisya Sundance and some lavender although I think I put them too close together. Once they mature, they'll have to be moved.

In the garden we have loads of worms. Loads. Which I hear is good. The lawn is covered in wormcasts which shows that they have been busy. We also have loads of bees which make me jump (and run whenever one comes near).