Autumn spiders!

I can definitely tell that autumn is here, the spiders are weaving webs all over the garden! Not that I have anything against them personally, but I HATE walking into a spider's web, and always worry about where the owner has ended up! There are so many, and they aren't small either.

Picking the runner beans is a fraught business, have I missed a web, and the spider has got onto me, or even worse, into my hair? The beans are coming to an end now, there are a few flowers still, but not many. What beans are still developing are really good, longer than most I picked in the summer. I think it is the amount of rain we've had recently.

However the sun did shine on the bride, my brother's wedding was well timed between showers last week, and everything went off really well. I'll post some pics once I've got them off the camera.

I was watching a programme which showed a local vineyard where most of the grapes had rotted on the vines because of the weather. Mine are looking lovely at the moment, although a few have split, probably due to the weather. They are eatable, but still a little sour. I'm hoping they will sweeten a bit more, but some sun would help. I've picked most of the blackberries, they have been very large, juicy and sweet. Next year, with two canes, I should hopefully have twice as many.

I have been cutting the leaves back on the tomatoes to help the air to circulate. The vines are stubbornly trying to produce more shoots and flowers, but it is too late for any new tomatoes to grow and ripen now. The cucumbers have finished, and I removed the old plants from the greenhouse today, bringing in the chillies from around the garden. I appear to have 3 types, the numex twilight that I grew, a long thin one that ripens red, and another long one ripening yellow. This makes sense, as I had plants from Nicola of the gardening club, and Noel from school, but I don't know who gave me what. As Daniel has now found a place to live at uni I need to get the chilli jam made so he can take some with him when he goes in 2 weeks time!

I planted up some prepared hyacinths today, they should flower by Christmas, but I need somewhere cool and dark to put the pot. I'm not sure where that will be so far. I have also got some tulips to plant, Queen of the Night and some white ones. I intend to mix the two in pots for the patio. I've got some tete a tete to plant as well, but didn't feel too good today, so they are still in their packets.

The weeds seem to have taken the opportunity to germinate so the garden could do with a good tidy so they don't over winter. I've also noticed a number of slug eggs around which I've tried to gather up and dispose of, besides applying more nematodes to slow the population explosion. Fortunately the snails haven't moved in yet! In the greenhouse I found some caterpillars on the tomatoes. I don't know the variety, but I disposed of them anyway as they were managing to eat into the ripe fruit.

The cobnuts have lost most of their leaves now, the nuts were ripe a week or so ago. We only had 5, but the bushes are showing a good number of catkins for spring, so I'll keep my fingers crossed for next year. It also looks as if the parsnips have done well, but I won't know if they are OK until I pull some. The celariac is still small, but I have taken off the outer leaves, as they had at Wisley. Hopefully they still have some growing time left. Finally the yacon seems to be growing too, but again, it seems a bit late, and I won't know if I have anything to harvest until I lift after the first frosts cut down the stems. I do know the beetroot have done well though, those can been seen easily as they grow proud of the soil.

I had some plants come from T&M finally, auriculas, which were ordered way back, but their stock failed. I need to get them planted up tomorrow, as I'm finding I'm very tired once we get back from school in the evenings. They look very healthy, so I'm hoping I have a good show of colour next year. The carnations should flower next year too. I have had very few flowers in the back garden, and none on the ones I planted in the garage garden. If it isn't raining tomorrow I intend to plant the rest of the lavender hedge, and consider where to plant replacement sage and rosemary bushes, as the orginals have got rather overgrown.

Flowers of a different type!

It's been a long time since I've posted, but with holidays etc, I just haven't got around to it. I've also been producing flowers of a different type - sugar ones.

My brother is getting married tomorrow, 6th, and I offered to make the wedding cake as their present. It's only the second wedding cake I've made, but I have done quite a few christening and anniversary cakes for friends over the years.

In the actual garden autumn is making its presence felt. The spiders are spinning webs across any space they can find, a face full of sticky web is most unpleasant. The new courgette plants have started producing, the old ones are no more, and the grapes have filled out, but still need a little more time to ripen properly.

I am back at work now, and the nights are drawing in, so the gardening will need to take place at weekends soon!

Baby Hedgehog

Although I've been off school for the whole month, I just haven't got around to posting as there's been so much going on. However today, around 7pm, there was a small hedgehog in our garden, trotting down the path. The cats were a bit perturbed, but didn't try to attack, He/she left quite quickly, but I'm hoping we might be on the food trail now, especially with the number of slugs around at the moment.

A week or so ago we went up to Yorkshire to take Matt to his student house, and took the opportunity to stay over and look around a bit. Unfortunately it was very wet, but we did manage to go to Harlow Carr, the RHS garden. It was interesting to see what they had done in their veg bed, there was a lot of companion planting, although slug damage was plentiful. Due to the weather we could not make the most of the opportunity!

We also visited Wisley in Surrey yesterday. Being a member I have been to this garden a number of times, but it is always interesting to see what they are improving and replanting. I bought some bulbs, and a number of house leeks to plant along the gravel edge near the garage. The glasshouse is looking very established now, and despite the negative comments I heard about the artificial rock, I think now the plants are growing, that it looks very good. There were some amazing plantings of red begonias to mark the shape of chinese dragons to commemorate the Olympics, and the formal pond contained a number of lovely water lilies in bloom. I always think it a shame to see the veg unpicked in the veg plts there. Some I am sure, is used, but there always seems to be stuff past it's best left in the plots.

In my garden, the courgettes are suffering from powdery mildew, and have stopped producing at the moment. The 2 new plants are coming on, and should be fruiting in a couple of weeks. The runner beans are still going strong, I have frozen more packs for the winter. Tomatoes and cucumbers are still plentiful, and I still have beetroot to pull. I have also been picking the homegrown blackberries and a few last straggling blueberries. The grapes are doing well, but won't be ready for at least another month. I am now thinking about what needs to be done for next year. Lack of space is so frustrating!

August Already!

Time has flown by since my last post. I have been off for a week now, it's been very hot and we've had a couple of thunderstorms. These have filled up the water butts, but I do need quite a lot now that everything is producing.
The runner beans have been doing very well, but the climbing french ones have tailed off over the last week. Next year I will have them on seperate wigwams, as I think the french have been overwhelmed by the runners. Still, I've frozen several packs of each one, so hopefully these will be a nice change in the winter. I blanched them, as this kills bacteria and lengthens the freezer life.
The courgettes are still prolific, but some of the older leaves have powdery mildew. I've been cutting these off, which doesn't seem to have affected the plants. I am keeping them fed and watered, especially as they are in pots. Today I have just potted up my follow on plants. Only 2 made it, due to slug attack. There seems to be quite a few in the greenhouse!
In the greenhouse the cucumbers are going mad, I picked 8 the other day, and another 6 yesterday. I do pick them when they are still quite slim as this keeps the plants producing, and the flavour is better. I am picking tomatoes from both the Tigrella and the Sunburst plants, but the Tigrella are definitely more advanced. I am feeding at least weekly, and have removed some of the lower leaves to let the air circulate.
The blackberries on the garden are ripening well, I'm going to pick some to eat fresh tomorrow. I have been out and picked some wild ones, they make ice cream to die for! I obtained an ice cream maker from Freecycle last year, it's small, but I don't use it often enough to warrent getting a new one. I stew the blackberries without water or sugar, and pass them through a sieve to get rid of the pips. The fruit pulp is then sweetened to taste, well a bit more than that , because the cold dulls the flavour, so it needs to be quite sweet really. Then I just add cream, chill and make into ice cream. One batch did us 5 small servings, but it's a luxury product, so you don't need (get) much!
The grape vine is going mad, I seem to be out there every day cutting back the shoots, but the grapes are doing well. I wondered if I'd left too many, but they are a small variety, so I think they are on track. They won't be ripe enough to eat until the end of September.
I've now harvested my red onions, some are very small, but I have a few decent sized bulbs. As I wanted them for use in salads, the size is not so crucial, I can just use a couple at a time. I have some more coming on from a later sowing. I think I will leave these in the seed trays to form small sets, and then plant next year to see if I get bigger bulbs. I did that one year and it worked, so fingers crossed.
On the flower front, some of the carnations are now in flower, I did wonder if I'd get any this year! They are quite small, not much bigger than pinks, but very pretty. I let the pot marigolds get ahead of me, I didn't dead head them enough, so most of them have stopped flowering and set seed. I should get a number of self sown ones next year though, perhaps enough to try out the hand cream recipe!
The roses keep sending out new blooms, I have been keeping them deadheaded, and the summer flowering clematis is looking good. One of my 'large double' fuschias appears to be Mrs Popple, or a simaliar variety, a single, red and purple flower. It is covered with blooms, and looks very good, but what with white instead of purple petunias, and some plants dying off on me anyway, I am going to stick to my resolve not to buy plants by mail order next year, as these were from a reputable mail order company!
I have a pot containing a dahlia, a sweet pea and a fushia, all are doing well, I've had loads of flowers on the sweet pea, again essential to deadhead to keep it going. There is a little mildew on the leaves, but I'll leave it unless the flowers stop. They have a lovely scent.
Every time I go to sit in the garden, I see something else to do!

Harvest

Courgettes galore and other stuff

It's that wonderful time of year when anyone who grows their own veg begins to really reap the benefit. My courgettes are producing, on average, one fruit every 2 days. With 4 plants on the go, the harvest is mounting up. I made a lovely vegatable curry the other day, with virtually all my own produce, courgettes, runner, french and broad beans, vietnamese coriander and garlic. To add make it more of a main dish, I added a tin of red kidney beans. Dan loves curry, but the number of veg in this one was too much for him and he wouldn't even try it! A shame because I'm sure he would have loved the taste. The new courgette seedlings are through, but one has got eaten by a slug!

The garlic tops were beginning to yellow, a sure sign it was time to dig them up. If they are left in the ground too long the bulbs split into individual cloves and begin to re-grow. The first autumn we moved in, 4 years ago, I bought some cloves from the garden centre. Each year I have selected the biggest to re-plant for the following year. I am really pleased with the results this year, the bulbs are generally bigger and looking good. At the moment they are drying off, and I will plait them to hang in the garage. Hopefully they will last us most of the year.

I picked the rest of the cherries last weekend. Unfortunately a lot were split due to the high rainfall, but after sorting and stoning them, the 4 of us that like cherries had enough for Sunday dessert. Hopefully next year will bring a better crop as the tree matures. I also picked the blueberries that were ripe, and in an effort to give everyone a taste, decided to make some blueberry muffins. The recipe I picked was not the best, we were a bit disappointed with the results, but they got eaten anyway. The grapes are beginning to swell, and dropping out some of the graplets that didn't pollinate. It looks as if we should get a reasonable amount, but the lone plum has dropped off, so we wait until next year for our first one.

The runner and climbing french beans are doing well, I need to pick them every day or two so they do not get too large. I'm particularly pleased with the climbing french ones as I've never grown these before. They are lovely. It's a shame I lost one of my sowings of lettuce as we have a bit of a gap now. We haven't resorted to buying yet as I left the stubbs in from the last lot and we are picking the smaller leaves that have grown, but I don't think we will have enough to keep going much longer.

The second sowing of radish was a bit of a disaster, as they got cabbage root fly and were inedible. I have pulled them all up, and will try again when we get the next wet patch of weather, which according to the forecast could be today. I do wish I didn't have to waste time going to work, but only another week to the holidays! It won't be long until I pull some beetroot. Matt will get to eat some fresh before he goes back to Hull.

I find it takes about 30 minutes to water all the pots in the garden and greenhouse now, but it's worth it. I have been picking delicious cucumbers, and I have a few tomatoes showing orange. A few more days should ripen them off nicely. The peppers are not doing so well, I have some fruit, but tiny green caterpillars have eaten a lot of the leaves, and there have been holes in some of the fruit, so I cut them off to divert energy into growing new ones. In the garden I had several celeriac bolt (begin to flower). Once they do that there is no point in keeping them, so I used them to make some soup. With plenty of thyme and marjoram the flavour was lovely, and at least I felt I'd got something from them.

I must find some insect repellant though. I sat out in the garden with Dan the other evening and collected bites all around my ankles. It's a bad year for mosquitoes (or good, depending whether you are a human or mosquito). We are using the plug in mosquito killers you buy to take on holiday inside the house, which work quite well, but as I was only outside for a relatively short time, I didn't bother to light the citronella lamps in the garden. Regrets now!

The sky is beginning to lighten, its 4.45am, so I'm going to close now, get dressed and go out to water my pots and perhaps enjoy a cup of tea, looking at the results of my labours. It's the best time, so quiet and peaceful!

Cherries!

This won't be a long post tonight, but just wanted to post the fact that I picked 4 cherries today. Lovely! Sweet, juicy, almost black, I'll see whether all the others are ripe over the weekend. The beans are doing well (runners, french and broad), and I'm picking courgettes almost every day. Picked 2 cucumbers today, but still waiting for the tomatoes to ripen. The courgette seeds I planted over the weekend are not up yet, but it hasn't been long yet, maybe by the weekend!