End Of August

I love this photo
Been doing what Alys Fowler does and grow a mix of plants. There is kale,summer savoury,cape goosbury, sweet pea and swiss chard all in a tiny space and growing very happily. The places i have done this successfully i have had hardly nearly no pests. And where I have done my rows i have had problems, from weeds to garden pests. Its been a very good experiment.

Crown prince growing well.
I have let the squash take over this year. I really love squash. And my leeks are growing really well with them and the carrots much better than they did when they were by them selves.

July

July has been good alot of rain had a good crop of potatoes, will grow them again. I am now focusing on squash it is the year fro squash. I will 8 different varieties growing and i really hope it goes well as last year was a disaster for squash. Varieties are: Pumpkin altlantic giant, Squash crown prince, butternut, munckin, baby bear, banana and two italian ones i don't know the name of.

Replacement tool shed my green homebase cheapy died from the last winter so we got this from garden heaven and its brilliant. And it looks so good.

That bushy plant is the summer savory I didn;t get one black fly. The broad beans are over but i have left the roots into feed the squash. And I have put straw where all the squash are growing to stop weeds and last year the littl squash kept rotting as it was on the soil.

No more herbs in this stone basin as my other never walked down to pick them. I have made a little alpine garden like the ones I saw at Hampton court this year.

I am having trouble with this bed I am going to drastically change it and get rid of the grass and gravel it. As its part gravel to begin with . I'll make the bed round the apple tree bigger and the flower bed bigger and just have gravel and iris and want the irises to spread. Or just make it a cutting garden and have lots of rows of flowers. Or make it a wildflower meadow patch . Havents quite decided yet.

So Exciting

My latest purchase an extremely tacky little statue, but I like it as it looks like Fred and it irritates my father as he thinks its an awful statue.
My daffodils have come out, looking tall.
Broad beans are coming on. I am growing summer savoy (I think that's the name) which is a herb which is meant to deter black fly.
May be early but already planted up my parsnips and a row of radishes in between.
Now this is the exciting part, first time seeing my asparagus. It looks good.


Got a willow gate in stead of my white stretchy thing I had. Which didn't go with the "look".

Spring Is Coming

Spring is coming and I can't wait. Every moment I get I go out check on my broad beans and rhubarb. What I also like about spring is that you get to see what has survived, and for me its a happy spring because the gooseberries that I thought that had died have got little green shoots on. My peonies are coming up after they survived a second move, as I had to move them as Lucas kept digging them up. All in all everything looks promising. I have also just sown thousands of plants from seed to fill my mothers new flower bed, I also managed to get some seeds in for my flower beds. Where the sleepers are I am having an orange yellow bed with slight hints of purple sounds odd but I think it will work. And where my actual flower bed is I will have all shades of purples and pinks. I also have sown masses of sweet peas and I am hoping they will do well growing up my fence.

Above are pictures I took in the greenhouse at the National Trust Lacock which is always a lovely place to go and it was quite magical with all its spring bulbs are out it looked like purple carpets or crocuses.

Sorting Out

Been sorting out my veg patch because last year it didn't function very well. main reason being that the paths were two narrow and the sections were made out of plastic so when I would accidently step on them they would break, so they had to go. This year I am going back to scafolding planks as they are easy to move around, when I don't think the layout is working. Because building and taking out paths are back breaking work, so I want to stick to something that is easy to move. Other things i did was to lay card board down on one side of the squash patch as thats where my early peas are going and the other side I soed the rest of my broad beans. I also took out old kale plants, but some of them are growind new leaves which is great.

Before

After

More Construction

While its winter I have been doing some heavy construction work. I have got sleepers in to replace my fathers "dry stone wall" which kept falling down. I think it looks brilliant and it will help with the plants that are there and give them some support.

I didn't get rid of his dry stone walling to quickly before I could say anything this has been put up at the end of the bed. I don't mind it as it will stop Lucas digging there and I am going to try to grow things in the gaps of the stone.
There was a left over beam which is in my squash patch because one side of the patch has the old iron prongs that have been twisted into the ground and I can't get them out and there is lots of rubble there and so I am making it a raised bed on one side.
My father also put up this to stop Lucas escaping. It looks much neater.
Bad news. My cottagers kale has died. But I live in hope I am leaving it there till the weather warms up to see what happens to it. Fingers crossed.