I think it's fair to say most bags of compost sold these days are rubbish, or at least 50% seems to be bits of twigs and other uncomposted rubbish. I am using a 120lt bag of Verve multipurpose compost from B&Q which is 58% peat and I have been impressed by it. Unlike most composts that I have u...

Hi guys - a long time since I last posted. Not doing as much gardening as I used to. But on Friday I shall be going to a talk on peat free composts. Doing a search I found a comment by Johnboy from a couple of years ago which basically said they were still rubbish. So I wondered what the latest thou...

Thanks Geoff

I have a kept a grass heap for years - it takes me around 3 hours or more to mow my lawn/meadow so quite a lot of grass cuttings - and this year I decided it was time to use some of it. So I have stacks of what could be best as sorta peat like on what will be my runner bean, courgette and squash pat...

I bought 2 lots of 12 Runner Beans from Marshalls - Whiteflowered Moondust and Red-flowered Firestorm. If we had relied on the latter we would have had just enough for the 2 of us. As it is I have been picking almost a basket full of beans from Moondust and feeding all the neighbours for the past co...

Sounds a bit like my experience! I tried Cash this year. Ok but nothing special and only a few pickings.

When I was looking after allotments in Hemel Hempstead many years ago, one of the allotmenteers always used to have these lovely rows of Peas. They were Hurst Greenshaft and growing them this year down here in South Wales they have convinced me that they are the one main crop to grow. But I have yet...

I have 3 plants of the Winter Squash, Sweetmax which I bought from Marshalls. These were potted on in the greenhouse inquite large pots to get as big a rootball as possible and avoid any late cold or windy weather. Planted out they are doing quite well. Advice is to stop the main shoot after they ha...

1976 was longer. And records really don't go back that far. "In the Central England Temperature series 1976 has the hottest summer for more than 350 years and probably for much longer. The average temperature over the whole summer (June, July, August) was 17.77 °C, compared to the average for t...

Primrose - the method of counting bats is to find the exit point, position yourself comfortably and count them as they come out. They started at 9.38 pm, a few minutes later than usual, and finished at around 10.23pm. Previous counts were 23rd June 2012 - 231 22nd June 2013 - 61 2014 - no survey 20t...

I counted 227 bats last night which is good. They are the 'normal' Pipistrelles, not the soprano ones. A maternity roost so maybe double that number with the youngsters. On Friday we have the bat experts in so am hoping they will find more elsewhere. Previously we have found Daubentons and others. A...

Primrose - tonight I do my annual bat count at the National Botanic Garden of Wales. Numbers do vary widely. Two years ago only 61, last year 282. Will let you know tomorrow. Could be a good indication of insect numbers, or maybe not.

I have been helping with a research project regarding honey bee pollination for the last 3 years. One of the results so far stresses the importance of hedgerows rather than meadows, brambles especially and native trees and shrubs . In my patch, which is essentially grasslands, I haven't managed to s...

Despite having the windows wide open during this very hot weather and various lights no Moths have come in. I mentioned this to a number of friends over quite a wide area and their experience is the same. 20 years ago we would have been inundated with them. But the birds and bats seem to be finding ...

Surely stopping depends on variety? Some are determinate so stop themselves. And yes, I doubt whether that induces ripening. Depends on temperature, humidity, etc.