Growing My Own 2012

It hasn't really been gardening weather for most of April but I have been busy sowing more veggie seeds in pots - the sunroom is an ideal greenhouse substitute.

Yesterday I did a third sowing of peas and mangetout, a month after the first lot which are now having to take their chances in the veggie plot. The second batch are just about ready to go out, but frosts are forecast for the weekend so I am holding off.

I have leeks in the small container on the right.

 And lettuces growing away on the utility room windowsill.

Beans (runner, dwarf purple and French climbing) were also sown yesterday


The tomatoes and cucumbers have been potted on. So far only partial success with the cabbages, 5 out of 9. The seeds I collected from an unknown variety seem to be doing best!

In the garden itself the rhubarb is really taking off. It is doing so well that I picked some and had it stewed with some yoghurt for lunch today!

The fruit garden appears to be thriving.

I was a little concerned at how advanced the gooseberry bushes were when I eventually got around to pruning them last month, but they look very healthy at the moment, with a large number of flowers. I am inspecting them regularly as last year they were really badly infected with powdery mildew and I didn't bother to try to pick any fruit. The blackcurrants were already flowering so I decided against pruning them.

The new apple and pear trees are in blossom. I think I am supposed to remove the apple blossom this year but I can't quite bring myself to do it. I will just remove the majority of fruits if they get successfully pollinated to relieve the stress on the young trees.




On the ornamental side of the garden I am now reaping the benefits of all the work I got done in February/March of this year on the long bank extension. It is now a joy to walk past it every day with the dogs. And I have spotted a lot of other people taking a good look too :)

Waiting For A Bus - Part 1

Time passes and edible garden grows...

The mangetout are in full production - picked about 10 oz so far. Luckily we like them as we will be eating an awful lot of them in the coming weeks.


The peas, looking unamazingly similar, are beginning to fatten up. And still a lot of flowers on them. Just need some sun to go with the automatic watering system, aka as rain...


A few of the red onion sets I planted are now bulbing up nicely despite throwing up flower spikes while I was in Malta in May. A few of the flower spikes are now beginning to actually flower...


The onion seeds I planted are performing with variable results. I have precisely nine bulbing onion plants that have survived so far and are looking pretty pathetic.

The spring onions are faring a little better, but still nowhere big enough to attempt to harvest. I sowed another row which again have germinated quite well but that is about as much as they have done so far. They are now surrounded by the pak choi which I thinned and replanted. Having never eaten pak choi I just hope we like it if they all survive and thrive!

The pickling onions are the stars of my allium world. We haven't finished the ones I pickled last year yet, but they are very good.

The leeks are also doing okay - I have learnt from last year not to panic too much if they are not the size of pencils yet. Still plenty of time before they need to be transferred to the veggie patch to overwinter. The first-sown carrots are coming along well.

The dwarf purple beans are beginning to put on a spurt of growth and a few flowers can be seen. They were last year's stars of the veggie patch, along with the runner beans. Talking of which, I reduced the number of those that I planted from last year and restricted myself to the better of the two varieties grown last year, Red Rum. Inspection shows that a couple have made it up to about four feet up their supports, although one has decided it prefers to grow sideways into the mangetout...

I have lost two of the tomato plants that I planted at the back of the veggie patch, but I have gained one self-seeded one. So eight very healthy looking plants. I still have more than that 'surviving' in the sunroom - I think the time has come to plant them out or throw them out. Time is running out for Reg to get his polytunnel in place...

The curly kale that I never pulled out last year has come back stronger than ever. It is obviously a tough cookie, surviving the onslaught of the caterpillars last year, and then the two foot of snow over winter!

The rhubarb is gigantic. A couple of picks so far, but I really need to keep harvesting it. I just need to get to it!

The last, but definitely not least, of the crops in the veggie patch is the potatoes. Both those I planted and those that still keep coming up everywhere else. It's the same in the fruit tree bed. I have started harvesting those. This has given me access to tie the new growth of the fruit trees to their canes. At some point soon I need to get up my courage to prune the side shoots...


The salad crops in the raised planters are also cranking up after a slow start. In fact, the first sown rocket and spinach has bolted but the next sowings are coming on well. And a second sowing of radishes.

And the winter sown savoy cabbages are taking over the world...

Weeding Between The Lines

The air is alive with dandelion seeds...

The rain followed by several days of heat and sunshine means that weeds are thriving, growing almost as quickly as my peas did.

Time to sort out the raised planters again. Wasn't too much of a problem in the first two but in the third I had to try to distinguish my rows of seedlings amongst the chaos of the weeds. Hopefully all in order again now. Butterfly netting now over the middle planter which has more cabbages in it.

I planted out my gutter-sown peas last night. I think I was a little over ambitious in my length of guttering - they were not as easy to slide out as my fruit and veggie book implied. Slightly easier after I gave them a good soaking and they do all appear to be standing, albeit slightly more squashed together.

I noticed that the number of cabbages planted in the veggie patch is going down. A couple of little stumps and fat slugs/snails somewhere :(

A couple more rogue potato plants dug out. Some more peas sown directly into the ground along with a few more dwarf beans. Another row of radishes as the old seed that I tested seems to still be viable. I noticed one of my red onions from last year that was too small to eat had started to sprout so I have planted it too.

A slight panic last night when I thought I had lost one of the plants from Lamberton nursery. I couldn't remember buying let alone planting a diascia. So this morning I went out and counted the plants I had planted. Hmm... seventeen. All present and correct and not a diascia in sight. It was another dianthus not a diascia as misreported in the earlier post (now corrected).

Action-Packed Weekend

MIL and FIL arrived on Thursday afternoon, Colin and Maureen on the Friday.

On the Friday evening MIL, FIL, Maureen and I went to see The Resurrection Man at Coldingham village hall whilst Paul and Colin went into Duns to watch the rally stage through the town. The original two nights of the play, written by local hero Mike Fenty, had been when I was in Malta. They had sold out so this extra performance was to satisfy local demand. A good time was had by all.

On to Saturday with fingers crossed. The weather forecast had been for heavy rain but the morning dawned as overcast, not too cold and, most importantly, dry. There were two planned stages past us, one in the morning then another mid afternoon. There was enough time between the two to allow people to get to us for our planned barbecue and get away again if they didn't want to watch the cars. As it turned out the morning stage was a damp squib - early in the running there was a bad accident with one of the cars around Billiemains and the stage was stopped. The barbecue, however, was a great success. And perfectly timed - we were just packing up and people thinking about heading home before the roads were re-shut when some light rain started to fall. Reg stayed on to watch the afternoon session - a good view from our patio and easy to dive back in to the sunroom if the weather deteriorated.

What could we do for entertainment on the Sunday? I had been planning an afternoon out with MIL and Maureen to Edrom and Lamberton nurseries but the rain had set in. However, it stopped late afternoon, the sun came out and a glorious evening followed on.

The question being asked was 'Have you seen the hole?'. Margaret had asked Paul so he had gone to look a few days earlier. The previous evening Paul and the dogs showed Colin. So Sunday evening we all had an expedition to take a look. Through the field just before the bridge and then turn left towards the river.

The first photographs I took could not convey the size of the hole, but this one gives an idea of the scale. We don't know what happened but are guessing that the river/burn backed up here when it flooded and then just carried away the soil when it receded again.

Colin and Maureen were going home the next day. I suggested to Maureen that we reschedule the garden nursery outing to the next morning, weather permitting, followed by a late lunch here and they depart in the afternoon. And so it came to pass...

We three set off around 10.30 a.m., with lunch scheduled for 2 p.m.

Edrom nursery first. I had never walked around their woodland plant garden before, but we were drawn in with the rhododendrons putting on a magnificent display. Then a browsing of the rockery and scree beds before on to the serious business. One slow walk around the plants and then the second pass with basket.

Plants bought, a drive across Coldingham moor to the A1 and back towards Berwick. All was going well until, rounding a corner, and traffic jam. Luckily this turned out to be road works/traffic lights - replacing a section of crash barrier - and we weren't held up for too long. Turn off shortly afterwards towards Lamberton. Some more purchases and enough time to explore the garden there before setting off for home over Lamberton moor. We had timed it to perfection, pulling up into the drive with a couple of minutes to spare.

I carried my first box of plants up to my bench, and Maureen brought the second one. Colin 'She's not bought all those plants has she?'. I quite truthfully replied that they were mine... her's were already stowed in their car :)

I couldn't get around to positioning/planting them yesterday. The latest excitement is that the Duns/Preston road was shut for resurfacing yesterday and the same appears to be true today. As a result the road past us is the diversion route! More than making up for the lack of cars from the rally. We even have a number 34 bus going past on a regular basis...

To get over my gardening withdrawal symptoms I weeded the herb bed yesterday evening. Oh what joy when I discovered baby lavender plants hiding in amongst the weeds. And the garlic chives that I sowed and had given up all hope of germinating were hiding in there.

The other ongoing entertainment has been the progress of my peas. I am now up to 31 germinated out of 36 sown. I don't think the missing 5 are going to come through now. But on the whole the ones that have made it are growing rapidly. They should be ready for planting out before the week is out.