Kitchen Garden Forum

...and the day I started to cut down and fork through the borders then it decided to rain....and be as dark as November.

Clive.

Hi OH,

It's always a shock just how quickly the mornings get darker and darker isn't it. Let's hope the winter is a short one

Beautiful moonlit morning here in Hertfordshire.

Much better weather today to make some border progress....it turned into a lovely day with much blue sky and the ground dried on the top once more.

It remains that we are very dry really, with the pond 2ft lower than normal,...but the rain of Tues/Wed had made the top soil quite claggy.

Clive.

Lovely sunny day here too, but we could do with a drop of rain, it's been a long time since we have had any amount of rain.
A natural pond in one of the gardens i do, has been dry for about a month now. And a lot of the plants in another garden are really struggling for moisture.

Funny old year, all in all.

Not much sun here - but some promised for today.

A treat last night - the first picking of tender young French beans sown 4th August in the polytunnel.

A bit of a surprise here this morning, as the sun was rising higher, the grass was getting whiter, a real sharp frost and five degrees lower than forecast.

Your beans sound good, Alan.

oldherbaceous wrote:Your beans sound good, Alan.

Hi OH

The sound was that lovely squeak on the teeth - the taste was even better

...and I was wondering who would report the first frost.

Had a load of well rotted farmyard manure delivered and started to spread it on my plot and within 30 minutes it was covered in flies. Where they came from I've no idea there was no sign of them when it was delivered.Stopped spreading as I didn't fancy a bite from a horse-fly!!

Just finished shovelling yesterday's council delivery of "leafmould" off the main track next to my plots.
Completely blocked the track & only found it had been delivered when my plot neighbour collared the wife yesterday evening as she walked daughter to run her brownies. I was in the bath!

Half a wreath, assorted sticks, one grave edge stone, assorted elephant turf clay lumps, strimmer wire, some cans, bottles, police tape and enough fat juicy bindweed to fill a 25kg dog food sack.

It was free though.

I've often wondered who on earth would want the council 'compost'. I send all my weed seedlings, bits of broken glass, stones, wire, discarded dogs bones, etc etc, to the tip for a reason. I certainly don't want it back!

No, no, no!

Town Council = Cemetery and Town Park plus some open space, mowings, leaf sweepings, dead grave-flowers etc.

No dustcarts involved. :

Was on the plot yesterday, three strawberry plants have flowers on them.

Gorgeous day today - took down a ten-year-old bean frame (the wooden uprights were rotting). Dug over a large bed, including the soil under the frame, and will now spread on manure and compost. Also put about ten long sunflower stems through the shredder before putting the 'shreds' in the compost.

I was surprised how well the soil had drained after the recent rains.

Good afternoon here,
A couple of heavy showers that I had to shelter in the car but
first bed dug over, I found a rusty key and a pedal from a bicycle
Just hope I don't find the rest of the bike