May Adventures

Today is the first day of Winter and despite the clear, frosty morning I thought it was about time I put my fingers to the keyboard and caught up with the past few months of activity on the smallholding. Here I go now all the way back to the warmer days of May.

The flowerbeds loved the early spring heatwave and were filling up nicely. The Forget-Me-Nots self seed every year and never fail to give us some spring colour.

M decided to extend the side flowerbed to include the area around one of the trees in the garden. I'd love to be able to name the tree but despite examining the fruit each year we have failed to identify them, maybe this year we would succeed.

We bought this little crab apple tree at our local nursery which was an incredible find. It was not your usual garden centre, no café, no gifts, no toys just lots and I mean lots of plants and trees.

The crab apple blossom at the beginning of May was plentiful and such a gorgeous pink.

M spent the day tidying up the main path through the woods, another day of chipping provided a fresh layer to hopefully keep the weeds at bay.

The long, sunny blue sky days gave us the opportunity to keep up with grass cutting in the orchard and trimming around the trees and veg beds.

Another trip to the local nursery and with a car full of plants we had our work cut out finding homes for them all. The woodland garden was filling up but there was room for a little Mecanopsis.

A white Viburnum found it's place in the white garden. We made the decision not to surround it with any deer defence but only time would tell if this was wise or not.

This was a further addition to the white garden, I can't remember the name but it was such a pretty flower head. It had a slightly pink tinge to the white but from a distance it was white enough to warrant its place.

We bought a few ferns started a small fernery at the end of the main path in the woods. Over the past couple of years I had also collected some small ferns and they were also big enough to be planted out. M found a few old tree stumps so this is the beginning of what we hoped would multiply over time.

Every year I've tried to work out what is my favourite season. I think Spring is probably top of my list but I have always seeing the greenhouse full to bursting with seedlings and young developing plants, not yet ready for planting out but with the promise of an abundance of flowers, fruit and veg to enjoy.

We had a little experiment this year with our onions. As usual I sowed some onion sets in cells in the autumn and overwintered them in the greenhouse before planting out in the veg bed. As a comparison I also sowed some onion sets in a similar fashion in the spring. The first 2 rows on the left were autumn sown, the rest were spring sown. Even at this early stage it was clear to see that the spring plants were much larger and healthier than the autumn ones.

I always seem to order too many potatoes and yet again this year, once the coffins were full I had to plant some in the plastic buckets.

I even had some more left over seed potatoes to fill 3 of the canvas pots. They were against the byre wall where they captured the sun during the day and were also protected from the worst of the rain.

By the middle of May it was time to get the tomatoes planted up in their grow bags in the greenhouse. Of course this involved clearing out a lot of plants to make some room.

 

Despite the high temperature in the greenhouse I managed to get the first 4 growbags of tomatoes planted up.

During the sunny days the grass moving and weeding often seemed unending but so satisfying to see everything all tidied up at the end of the day.

We moved our little Gogi plant to a new position as it had been struggling for the past 2 years and had hardly grown at all. It made me laugh when I saw it advertised in the nursery as 'easy to grow'. Hopefully the new location would give it a boost.

The beans and peas were flourishing in the polytunnel although this year we were experiencing an increase in greenfly. I was hoping that the presence of some marigolds would help to control them.

The seedlings in the greenhouse were growing well and were ready for transferring to the pots, baskets and planters around the garden.

We made a determined effort this year to grow pumpkin and squash. They had been growing vigorously in pots in the greenhouse until we thought the weather was suitable to plant them out. M cleared an area in the old winter pig pen and erected a frame/trellis to support the fruits. Unfortunately they only lasted about 3 days before they all succumbed to slugs. With time running out I sowed a few more seeds to try again.

M built a huge framework out of hazel sticks for the peas. We were hoping for a good harvest this year.

We have very few pictures of the back garden to remind us of our work there but it always looked good when it has been tidied and the grass was freshly cut.

A favourite of ours has always been Lupins but in the past we struggled to keep them alive. Another go this year in a different location would perhaps prove successful.

Making the most of the decent weather and I got the 'white garden' strimmed although the distinct lack of white flowers was not through lack of trying but mainly due to constant presence of deer and rabbits.

Approaching the end of the month the weather turned but as we sheltered in the byre we took the opportunity to plant up the simmer pots.

They looked a bit sad in the rain but we hoped they would improve as they filled out and the flowers appeared.

What a glorious way to end May, a beautiful walk at the seaside with M and the dogs, one of our favourite places in any weathers but especially on a sunny day.

More Hot and Sunny Days - July

Sitting here on a dull, drizzly, wet and windy day the wonderful warm and sunny summer days seem a very long time ago. August disappeared in a flurry and now I find I've got all of July and August to catch up on. So, taking one month at a time, this was July:

The wonderful warm and sunny weather from May and June continued right on into July. While we loved wearing shorts again (probably the first time in 3 years) and spending so much time outside we found it was quite a task to keep up with all the watering. Indeed we sometimes had to water twice a day. It had never seemed possible that we could empty our 6 water butts but yes, they ran dry.


The polytunnel was difficult to keep watered sufficiently as the daytime temperatures soared to 40⁰C. Whether it was the increased temperatures, our more managed watering schedule or a combination of the two, we have had quite a few successes with (of course) the occasional failure.

While the greens, spinach, chard and kale have grown superbly, our young lettuce, spring onions and rocket struggled to germinate in the heat and those which did grow bolted and went to seed before we could harvest them.


The majority of the tomatoes have absolutely loved the heat and sunshine. The plants in the growbags were growing strong with one main stem and all side shoots removed. Sadly the tomato plants in the green canvas pots (on the left) struggled. It appeared that they dried out really quickly in the heat and I was slow to realise that watering once a day was insufficient. For the first time ever we had some Blossom End Rot which we believed was due to the extremes of temperature and lack of water to allow the plant to take up calcium. I managed to increase the watering schedule and in the end only two plants were really badly affected.


As expected, the Sweet Peppers and Jalapenos also thrived in the heat and sunshine producing a mass of flowers and tiny fruits growing quickly. Again I was extremely careful that they had plenty of ventilation and didn't dry out. I was especially pleased that the Jalapeno we had nurtured indoors during the winter had beautiful green leaves and signs of flowers appearing.


I was feeling quite proud of our healthy looking little pepper plants and couldn't wait to see some fruits growing.


The first potato harvest was the Extra Earlies. It was a small crop but so tasty boiled, or as mash and occasionally chips.

We noticed a increase in deer activity during July, they were getting closer to the house, mooching around the yard eating flowers and quite happily lying at the back of the midden. Although it was lovely to see them, especially with their new foal, we hadn't quite been prepared for the damage they could wreak.

   

We didn't just have to contend with the weather conditions but also the extreme pruning by the local wildlife.

We set up the camera just to check why all the fruit trees seemed to be suffering and to identify the culprits. Unfortunately I couldn't get all the video to download but this video from June made it pretty clear who was to blame!!!


We were able to keep the baths watered throughout the hot days and enjoyed some early carrots. I was so impressed that the purple ones grew, they were all extremely tasty, much better than any shop bought carrots.


This dahlia was a cheap plant bought in the sale section of a garden centre a few years ago. It spent the winter in the greenhouse before going outside in June. I was thrilled to see some large blooms appear in the bright sunshine.

In previous years we had seen this clematis growing up a tree in the garden but this year it obviously enjoyed the warm dry summer and produced the most beautiful display of deep red/crimson flowers.


In fact the flowers around the garden survived the drought and all the pots and troughs were overflowing with colour.


The best thing about July is the start of harvesting, this was a little meagre offering to begin with but brimming full of flavour and colour!

  

Sometimes it seemed like we were in the midst of a continual game of ready steady cook. We would go and collect the fruit and veg ready for picking and then try to design dinner around the ingredients. Not always a successful combination, we were certainly doing well in our quest for 5-a-day fruit and veg.


We were blessed with another few cycle rides and days out at the seaside, it was just a shame I developed a cycling shorts/t-shirt tan.


Halfway through July we decided to cut our losses and harvest the rest of the garlic. Sadly the early onset of summer must have coincided with the main growth period and with a serious lack of water the bulbs failed to swell as we had hoped. There were lots of garlic bulbs but they were extremely small. Thankfully they were flavoursome but I doubt they will see us through the winter. Still we'll have another go next year.


I took another photo from the gate so we could compare the changes in the orchard throughout the growing season. The trees from this angle looked quite healthy despite the hard dry ground.

Our little fig tree entered it's second season and decided to fruit. Sadly it split due to the heat and irregular watering but we are hoping for even more next year.


By the end of July the main veg bed was starting to look quite full with the onions flourishing and only a few starting to produce seed heads.


We had planted 2 different varieties of broad beans, one red and the other a dwarf green. They were both gorgeous and so we'll probably do both again next year. The brassicas on the far side of the beans were pushing up their netting so we had to take that off and keep a close eye on any caterpillar activity.


After the harvesting of the early potatoes this part of the main veg bed was starting to look a bit empty but the peas (foreground) and the French beans continued to grow well. That was until the deer decided they liked the taste of peas. Unfortunately we lost a lot of our produce to them, time for a rethink for next year.


The garden looked great with the grass freshly cut and the flowerbed edges trimmed. It was wonderful that we managed to sit and relax and enjoy the flowers and nature around us. One big bonus of the dry weather was the lack of midges, one thing I was not going to complain about.


Finally a delightful flower to finish off. Our Hemerocallis finally flowered this year, in fact it produced at least 4 large stunning blooms, such a beautiful sight after it's poor performance last year. It may seem like a long time ago but we had a glorious summer with much to be thankful for.