What a wonderful month, full of the promises of many harvests to come. Plants growing happily in the sunny and warm environment combined with long days for enjoying the outdoors. It was a very exciting time when we hoped to literally see the fruits of our labour.
The bench left by the previous owners had a make over and yes, M used up the rest of the green paint left over from when I painted the greenhouse staging. How lovely to see it nestled happily in amongst the Hazels in full leaf.
We were fortunate to find that we had quite a number of large and fruitful blackcurrant bushes and we tried our best to harvest as much as possible before the birds ate them all. However, sadly we missed out on the red currants as they disappeared overnight. Mum gave me her (award winning - 1st prize at her local fair) jam recipe and so I made a batch of blackcurrant jam, M used some to start off some hedgerow wine and the rest were destined for the freezer.
In the first week we made the journey to go and collect our pigs. Full of enthusiasm and a little anticipation we set off and a little while later home came 2 very cute and funny little animals. It was a bit like when we first got the chickens and we couldn't help but watch them explore their ark and enclosure. We also discovered that they love to be petted and scratched. In a bid not to get too attached we decided to call them Ginger and Spot, just to be able to tell them apart.
The first onions were harvested and to our delight we had some reasonably big broccoli which miraculously survived the slugs and caterpillars.
We tried lifting a couple of potato plants to check if they were ready and were disappointed to find that they had been attacked by some kind of animal, slugs or worms or strangely wasps. So we lifted the whole crop to try to save the best of them. It was really disheartening to have to chuck about 50% of the harvest and next year we would have to rethink our potato growing. Our squash also failed miserably, mainly due to slugs so that was another crop which would need to be relocated.
In the middle of the month M had gone out to do some jobs around the woods when he came back to say that there was a deer caught in the barbed wire fencing which separates us from the neighbouring farm. The deer had caught his hind leg between the top 2 lengths of barbed wire which had then twisted like a tourniquet around his leg so he was on the ground (on our side of the fence) with his leg in the air. M managed to get over the fence to the farmers field and cut one of the lengths of wire to free the deer. Sitting well back on the quad I watched the poor animal try to run away but dragging his back leg. Worried about the condition of him we called the SSPCA who arrived really quickly. Despite searching our woods we could not find him and presumed that it probably had a dead leg or pins and needles and once the feeling had returned he had probably run off. A happy ending - hopefully.
Despite all the important jobs to be done we were pretty fed up with the sad looking little Wendy house in the yard. Before we could start painting M spent some time re-felting the roof, adding a bit of flashing along the roof line and replacing a few rotten boards at the back. Then, after much deliberation over colours, we painted it lavender and stone. It strangely gave us a real sense of achievement and joy to see the little house looking all new.
Well into the month it became apparent that there was an issue with the tomato plants as some of the leaves had started to turn yellow. I researched the Internet and all our gardening books but was convinced that it wasn't blight. The plants looked awful but started to set flowers so rather than chuck them we thought we'd just see how the fruits got along. After all the seed sowing, pricking out and potting up it was pretty demoralising to see these sad looking plants deteriorating every day. The baths were brilliant and kept us in carrots and a wide variety of salads through the whole summer. M even managed to make them less ugly by giving them a coat of grey paint.
Despite the numerous sunny days we were often surprised at how changeable the weather was and how inaccurate the weather app could be. It was hard to believe that these photos were taken on consecutive days; it was fortunate we always had warm and waterproof clothing to hand. Oh and these were the best of the onions we harvested from the onion sets, the seeds I sowed were a bit too late and didn't really have long enough to develop so in the end we had lots of little ones.
We made sure we still had plenty of walks at the seaside where we were able to enjoy the bright, clear days and of course on the not so nice days we had the Olympics to watch.
September 2016
Fully immersed with harvesting, preserving, saving seeds and taking cuttings we knew that as the summer drew to a close that we would remain pretty busy.
The pigs were starting to grow and were such a wonderful sight squealing and oinking for their food. We also discovered that they loved the apples from the trees as an afternoon treat. M built a little shelter for their feeder as we anticipated the onset of wind and rain.
For the first time ever we managed to successfully grow runner beans and had a huge harvest (despite the best efforts of the wasps to eat them all). Thankfully Debbie, from Hidden Valley Pigs, had given me a wonderful runner bean chutney recipe which I couldn't wait to try. (We spent 2 wonderful days with Debbie and Simon learning as much as possible about smallholding before our house move.) The rest of the beans were chopped, blanched and frozen for the winter months.
I had mixed success with the germination of my tomato, Jalapeno and pepper seeds and ultimately ended up with loads, 26 tomato plants, 10 Jalapenos and 9 peppers in total. Lesson for next year, a family of 2 don't really need that many Jalapenos. However, not to waste them I cut them in half, stuffed them with a mixture of cream cheese and grated cheese before rolling in egg and breadcrumbs. These Jalapeno poppers went in the freezer for later as there were loads more on the plants. (NB Some of the poppers were mild and some were hot and there was no way to tell by just looking!!!)
One of the biggest jobs which we had been putting off was to paint the outside of the house including the barn. As I pootled off to see mum for a few days M spent the time preparing the walls and then giving them a fresh look with bright white and painting the wooden doors black. It looked great afterwards and on my return I did help with some bits when I wasn't trying to preserve and freeze fruit and veg.
Despite the appalling state of my 26(!) tomato plants we had a huge harvest and I managed to make about 12-15 pots of passata along with 3 pots of tomato and chorizo soup for the freezer.
M made the most of the change in weather by making another seat (not sure it can be called a bench) from some pallets. Yet again we had some left over paint and so this one matches the Wendy house. It looked wonderful and being near the pig pen meant we could sit and watch them in comfort. He also put some cuttings of willow in a semicircle around it which he hoped he would be able to make into a willow fence next year.
Throughout the month I collected as many of the tomatoes as possible, making lots more passata. I even made some green tomato chutney with the last of the fruits which were not going to ripen. But I was so glad when, at the end of the month, I was eventually able to clear out all the dreadful tomato plants and condemn them to the incinerator, not the compost bins as I was worried that maybe they had some kind of disease. It was time to tidy up the greenhouse and get it ready for winter.
We were fortunate to have 2 of our own small freezers and 2 left by the previous owners but this month we bought a chest freezer; it was something we had always hankered after and would be invaluable with the amount of produce we now had. Especially since I had also started to make and freeze cottage pies, apple & blackcurrant and apple & blackberry crumbles.
In preparation for next year we managed to bag a really good deal on a bunch of perennial plugs but oh they were so so tiny. As least there was room to pot them up and grow them on in the greenhouse. Our 2 olive trees had outgrown their large pots, although they were pretty they never did have any olives so we thought we'd give them a chance in the garden. In they went with the usual 'they'll live or die' caveat and we just hoped they would survive the coming winter.
By the end of the season the veg patch had been cleared of crops but was in dire need of weeding, digging over and generally tidying up but that was going to be a job for next month. An unexpected bonus was the sight of apples on one of our newly planted trees, we didn't think we would get apples for a few years and they tasted gorgeous. It was a good time for us to reflect on the successful and not so successful (failed!) crops to help with our planning for next year. The list of poor crops grew to include potatoes, squash, cauliflower, red cabbage, sweetcorn, peppers, beetroot and Swiss chard. Whereas the list of why did we grow these included turnip and cucumber. The biggest successes were the peas (loads), beans (runner and broad), carrots and despite their overall small size we did manage some garlic and onions.
The glass on our front door was quite pretty but unfortunately I discovered that I could see daylight at the side of the door and so we took the decision to replace the door and sadly the window would have to be replaced too. We hoped the new door would be fitted before Christmas and maybe before the really cold weather started. Still, it would be interesting to see what M could do with the glass when it was removed.
And so we reached the end of first year, we had achieved much more than we had ever dreamed of. It was an education in many ways and lots of hard work but overall we had an immense amount of fun and satisfaction from our efforts. (Shame I couldn't find a better photo) Here's to many more years of fun.
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