On The Menu Tonight

Forewarned is forearmed. The 24-hour plus expected rain has started. According to metcheck 40mm today and another 10mm tomorrow.

But yesterday was lovely, and we both sprang in to garden action.

Paul cut the lawns and the verges. Then took advantage of the continued warmth and sunshine to give both the dogs a bath. They are both moulting like crazy, so a good going over with the grooming gloves once they had dried off has given the lawn a fur coat.

I got rhubarb picking. 5 pounds cleaned, chopped, bagged and now in the freezer.

And then I could get to the nettles growing at the back of them. Piled them on to the stairs to nowhere rather than struggling to get them into the rubbish sacks in situ. And then I had to clear all the nettles growing in the stairs to nowhere to get to them. And cleared all the other weeds and crud that had accumulated on the stairs. They now look better than they have ever looked before, and will get a good wash down now. Finished off with weeding the middle raised planter.

This morning, after the dog walk, out to pick yet more alpine strawberries. As long as I keep picking them they keep producing more... I have given up weighing them, but I must be getting a couple of pounds every week. And that doesn't include the ones I pick and eat as I walk down the garden. Even Jen has her own small patch that she sticks her head in and delicately pulls the ripe ones off!

And then out the back to pick the veggies for tonight's stir fry. A mix of curly kale, pak choi, onions, mangetout, peas, mangetout that are now peas, and the first of the purple dwarf beans.

And a few more sticks of rhubarb to stew up. That is probably the last of the year.

And then I spotted these...

I thought I had a rogue tomato plant amongst my potatoes.

But no, they are potato fruits!

Careful examination showed a few more. Just on the Maris Piper's.

Investigation shows that
1) They are highly poisonous - potatoes (and therefore tomatoes) are members of the deadly nightshade family.
2) They are the only way new varieties of potatoes are created as they do not come true to seed.

I do also have a few baby tomatoes coming...

Just need to make sure I don't muddle the two up.

And then on to the fruit tree bed. Now that I have cleared a large number of the rogue potatoes growing there I can get to the cordon fruit trees again. Armed with scissors and garden string I started tying in the new growth of the leaders to their canes. I finished off in the rain...

Izzy Wizzy

It has been a very busy week. And that without any gardening being done...

Last weekend was the NSC semis. The Scottish gang (Allan, Simon, Stu and myself) travelled down to Leeds together. Philips never turned up - nobody knew that he wasn't going...

I started well, winning the first four games and then crashed and burned for the rest of day 1. However, I thought 11 wins should still be enough to get to the final. I was right, but unfortunately it wasn't me but Mark Nyman who swept the board on day 2. We actually played each other in game 9, but the tile gods were definitely smiling on Mark in that game. I ended up 8-6, some damage to my rating but not too much. That is it for the domestic scene for me this year. Next stop JB at the start of December for the Causeway Challenge where I will be playing for the UK team.

The dogs had been put into kennels as Paul was also away that weekend playing bridge in Solihull. I retrieved them on Monday morning much to their delight. I am not sure how much Jen ate whilst away as I had never see her eat her dinner so fast. I then had to retrieve Paul from Berwick station in the afternoon.

On Tuesday evening it was the East District team secretaries meeting to arrange the fixtures for the coming bridge season. I met up with Reg and he drove us on an hour early as there was another meeting he was attending prior to mine. All I can say is that I was not prepared for the chaos. However, all the matches are now in the diary subject to cancellations/rearrangements with only one minor disaster which has now been resolved.

Wednesday and I started working on which of my team members I want to play for which matches. I just needed a couple of confirmations of availability/willingness to play (which I got last night). I now have provisional team line-ups for all the matches, hopefully keeping everyone as happy as possible with the number of 'caps' they will get - both where they want to play almost every match and where they only want to play a couple. Time will tell :)

Wednesday was also the first of the major veggie picking sessions. Given almost a week left to its own purposes with rain and sunshine the veggie patch had gone mad. Luckily I had thought ahead and stocked up on freezer bags and sent away for a blanching basket when Youngman's did not stock such an item.

So, three and a quarter pounds of dwarf purple beans picked. Some donated to Penny and the rest were washed, topped, tailed, chopped, blanched, bagged and put in the freezer.

Reg had given me a bag full of plums, apples and cooking apples on Tuesday evening. So yesterday was baking day. A quick search on the web and I decided on an apple pie (I had a couple of blocks of pastry in the freezer) and a plum cobbler. I had just over two and a half pounds of plums and that seemed perfect for Delia's recipe. I got Paul to help with removing the stones. With the left over pastry from the apple pie I made marmite rolls, which I ate hot from the oven.

In the evening I played bridge with Reg at the club . Our first ever partnership but I will be playing with him in a couple of the league fixtures so we need to get some practice in. No disasters, but none of the system changes that Paul has made for me over the summer (transfers, Michaels, unusual NT) came up. I was pleased to remember that Reg's overcall of 2C over a 1NT opener was for the majors and respond correctly. It must have exhausted me as I slept in this morning until 11.40!!!

This afternoon was the first session of runner bean processing. I had also sent away for a runner bean slicer on the recommendation of both Jean and Penny. I picked four pounds from just one of my wigwams - must have at least as many again ready on wigwam number 2 and still loads more coming. Paul was in charge of the bean slicing and me on the blanching/bagging. Two (prepared) pounds now in the freezer, some put aside for us/Margaret - those that were too fat for the gadget.

Bridge again tonight in the Borders v Edinburgh match. I am playing with Paul...

It'll Be Chickens Next

Paul had wanted me to throw out my mum's old jam pan. Okay, it has sat in the cupboard unused for years but I really didn't want to throw it out. And now I have found it a perfect use...


I did a 'double' batch - 6 pints of water. And I was right - this produced about one gallon of elderflower cordial. I really hope the campden tablets work. It has had the thumbs up from Anne. I still need Penny to try it - I have tried hers which is a lot sweeter than mine.

My diet survived the visit of Gerry, Jane, Charlotte and Charlie intact. I have now lost half a stone - over half my target with 5 weeks to go.

The veggies are continuing to grow and I picked my first Purple teepee dwarf beans yesterday - about 40 pence worth I reckon. Went very nicely with some more of my 'free' rogue potatoes and a salmon fillet. I have been given a scientific explanation of why they turn green when they are cooked...

I have now dug out all of the rogue potatoes from the tomato bed in the veggie patch - but more plants still keep popping up in various places. Have now harvested over 12 lbs and haven't started on the ones I actually planted...

I thought I may have had the odd carrot ready for pulling. But unfortunately the size of the carrot didn't live up to its promise or my expectations. About an inch and a half of tasty goodness.

Similarly with the pea pod I popped a few days ago. They are getting there but not quite yet...

I did pick a pound and a half of the rhubarb and make a large crumble last week for our visitors. It all went in the one sitting.

26 radishes picked so far, including a few whoppers. It seems to be the case that two or three are ready every few days.

Yesterday I picked the gooseberries. Not a good year compared with the last couple - only 5.75 lbs and way down on quality. They had been badly hit with mildew and took forever to clean, top and tail. Next year they are going to be sprayed! I am thinking of trying to make gooseberry chutney with some of them. Quite inspired with my new books...

Now that we are well into summer the weather has decided it doesn't like it. Absolutely peeing down again. I know we wanted rain a few weeks back but I am getting bored of this now. My seed sowing regime has broken down. The curly kale needs transplanting.

The violas I ordered arrived last week - and there I was getting drenched as I potted them up. The long bank extension really needs weeding and the potted-on hostas are waiting to get planted in there. And all the time the rabbits are trying to make burrows and undoing a lot of what I do get done.

On a positive note I have almost convinced myself that some of my leeks may be large enough to transplant by the time we get a day of good weather...

This and That

It was the UK Masters last week. The toughest event in the domestic scrabble calendar - the top 16 players in the UK are invited and then down the ratings list for the reserves. So no easy games unlike in Swiss paired events where if you lose a couple of games you are likely to get a much lower rated opponent.

In the past it has been a straight round robin, but this year it was decided to add on another three games after the round robin stage. Which was a real bummer for me - for the first time in many years of trying I was leading after the first 15 games. The title would have been mine for the first time, after coming so close so many times before. I won the first of the extra games against Paul Allan so Lewis Mackay and I were two clear of the field with two to go. My spread was well ahead of Lewis so essentially I just needed to win one of our two matches. But the tile gods decided to abandon me. or to be more accurate smile on Lewis. So I lost the first match by a heart wrenching two points. Don't panic - I could still do it. But our opening racks set the tone for the decider - I had AEEIRRU, and Lewis was blessed with two Ss and a blank. His responding bonus to my opening dump of URAEI blocked my GROOMED bonus and so the game went, in the end me losing by thirty something.

Things are going better in the veggie garden...

Jean called in on Paul while I was away and told him the potatoes looked ready to her. So I have started harvesting them now, beginning with the rogue ones in the veggie patch from last years missed potatoes, potato 'pips' and spade-sliced-off sections of potato. I had been removing most of them when they appeared in the wrong places but left two patches to their own devices. So I have now cleared the area around the runner beans and have started to dig up the ones by the tomatoes. Jen has decided that the ones in the fruit-tree-bed-to-be need excavating too - luckily also the spare ones that I transplanted into the last gap. She knows she shouldn't go in there but makes a bee-line for it almost every time I let her out the back. I did a Basil Fawlty on her yesterday with the broken off potato plant which just ended up with her covered in dirt and giving me an equally dirty look.

Jen is actually my biggest garden pest. She seems to think my raised planters are her vantage points. The middle one is safe, with the hoops and butterfly netting but RP1 has paw prints in it - luckily the seeds seem to have taken it in their stride - npi. RP3 is the latest victim - we let Poncho and Jen out the back on returning from food shopping and I watched her run and jump straight in it. Luckily it is only half planted and just a few carrots squished before I dragged her out.

So on to the veggies.

Life In The Raised Planters:

RP1:
My first sown surviving carrots appear to be maturing - how do you know when they are ready?
The lettuces are overtaking us now. I have picked a few of the small romaine ones to let the others (another dozen) reach a good size and the salad bowl ones are growing faster than we can eat them. And I have another sowing of the romaine variety on the way in here.
More spinach and rocket coming up too - one of my severed spinach plants re-sprouted. And another row of radishes...

RP2:
The cabbages I left in there are pushing up the butterfly netting. Another half dozen need transplanting.
A second sowing of kale is doing well but will need to be moved as they are being swamped by the cabbages. Not sure whether to just move them into the veggie patch as they are still very small.
And another row of radishes...

My pickling onions seem to be thickening, as are the bulb onions.
I am still concerned about the leeks...

RP3:
Yet more lettuces. Lucy has suggested making lettuce soup which I had no idea existed - I will definitely give it a go.
I have been harvesting a few radishes every couple of days - almost finished the first sowing. I had a go with the radish-top pesto after a trial run with the last of the first sown rocket. It was okay but I think I over-seasoned and garlicked it - the rocket was better. And I have another row of radishes coming...
More carrots - Jen permitting, kale and spinach - although only three plants germinated.
And the red onions that I just bunged in are now about to flower...

Life In The Veggie Patch:

Just over 6 lbs of 'free' potatoes so far, although some of these are the Jen ones.
The first of my peas have flowered and pods are appearing.

My runner beans are flowering, and the first wigwam has been covered. The second wigwam is well under way with one plant ignoring it and making a dash for freedom. The first obelisk is also very colourful, although they have only climbed about half way so far.
The dwarf beans are flowering away merrily. Another batch have been planted free-standing as the first ones don't appear to want to climb the netting.

I have transplanted the three surviving first sown kale plants and they seem to be appreciating it.
The cabbages are thriving. The first transplanted cabbages that survived the slugs and snails are now bulking up. Another dozen winter cabbages are now in the veggie patch.
I have now counted 11 baby tomatoes.
I am also tempted to pick some of the rhubarb - all three crowns look exceptionally healthy an it seems a shame not to have any home-grown rhubarb this year.

On the fruit front I have already picked as much weight-wise as I have potatoes! This is one of four main patches. And they will keep coming for the next couple of months. One batch of jam already made.

I have decided to branch out and make some elderflower cordial, in competition with Jean and Penny. So I went on the web to find recipes. You are spoilt for choice, but I was left a little bewildered trying to work out how much by volume the recipes actually produce. So if you use 3 pints of water and then add three pounds of sugar how come you still only get 3 pints. So I asked Penny - and she says it makes more as I expected. And on further questioning I discovered hers sound more like syrup with the amount of sugar she uses. Anyway I thought I would try this recipe. So I then scoured the web looking for citric acid, campden tablets and a suitable container and found all that I needed here. My package arrived this morning.

And then I branched out again as whilst looking I had come across the Collins Gem Food For Free book and that sounded rather enticing. So on to Amazon and I ordered a copy. And a couple of books on jams, chutneys and preserves. Awaiting my next package with eager anticipation.

Back to more mundane things and I have made a start on cleaning and tidying the house. Gerry and family are coming next week for a few days. So the sunroom is now looking a lot better with the dead flies hoovered up from the window sills.

And finally I have disproved the old adage Red Sky At Night as it peed down starting in the early hours and continuing on until late morning...

First Harvest of the Year

It was spinach picking day today - flower buds had appeared over the last few days with the warmer temperatures. I had been taking a few leaves most days for the last couple of weeks, along with the rocket which has now bolted. Fresh sowings of both were made last week. So I have pulled one row out completely and have experimented as per my RHS veggie-book-bible, and cut the other row back to about an inch above the ground to see if they re-sprout. I may have left it too late. I made a spinach, onion and cheese omelette for tea tonight, a few leaves are in the fridge and should keep for a couple of days and the rest (about 250 grammes) have been put in the freezer.

My dwarf beans are indeed dwarf having hardly made it up to the netting I have provided them. However, on inspection this morning there appear to be flower buds so hopefully beans will follow. I seem to be a voyeur of insects mating lately - not sure what these are (zoom in on photo) but they did not seem at all concerned with the intrusion of my camera.

The two tomato plants I bought at Paxton now have some tiny tomatoes on them and more flowers. I need to stake them up now. I don't know whether they will ripen outside - may be another use for the sunroom window sills. In the same family the potatoes are also starting to flower.

My peas seem to have survived the trauma of their transplantation. I am now sowing more in situ at about 10 day intervals. The first batch are growing nicely and I can see signs of the next lot breaking through.

The runner beans are varying in how well they are doing. The first Red Rum ones are climbing up their wigwam nicely, but the next lot don't seem to have quite got the hang of it yet. One is trying, but has stretched across to the next plant's pole. The Sunbright ones were a little slower to get going, but now seem to realise what the obelisks are for and have put a spurt on.

I am extremely pleased with my lettuces. I have been picking occasional leaves from the salad bowl variety, and the Romaine ones are looking very healthy. They should be ready for picking in another week or so.

I am having mixed luck with my cabbages. Currently a 60% survival rate with the ones I transplanted to the veggie patch. Hopefully they are now large enough to survive the occasional slug or snail grazing on them.

However, the ones I kept in the raised planters are looking a lot better. The second sowing of both summer and winter cabbages that I made a month ago have almost all germinated and now have at least one pair of true leaves. I had almost given up on the first sowing of curly kale but three plants have started putting on real growth now.

The third raised planter is also getting in on the act, being used for second sowings of lettuces, spinach, carrots and kale. The radishes and replanted onions are also in here.

Not everything in the garden is rosy though.

The Amsterdam forcing carrots in raised planter one are down to maybe one or two plants if I am lucky. The Supreme Chantenay carrots are faring better and hopefully I will get a reasonable crop - the tops are now a reasonable size. I think my idea of replanting the thinned plants was not worth the effort though. I am not sure what the problem is - I am guessing a combination of slugs/snails/voles and Jen. Paul has put mousetraps in planter two as vole holes and little tunnel/mounds of soil have appeared in the last week or so.

My onions and leeks are also not progressing as well as I would like. I guess there is still time for these to thicken up.

Know Your Onions

Almost overnight the trees around us have come into leaf. Everything is starting to go mad in the garden so time for a progress report.

I have been doing daily inspections of the raised planters to check on progress of both the seeds and the vole. Luckily the vole appears to have been inactive of late. But today the onions have made their debut appearance...as have the carrots.


The lettuces are still coming through but don't seem to be growing quickly. Or am I just very impatient? Should check when I am supposed to thin them...



Similarly for the spinach and rocket...



On the potato front my old second earlies are well on their way, almost all now having come through. The main crop are also beginning to sprout above ground amidst the thousands of weed seedlings. Still no sign of the first earlies. There was a set back with the far corner where Jen decided she wanted to dig a hole...

I planted the first of my runner beans and French beans into pots on Wednesday and they are now sitting in propagators on the sunroom windowsill. I have decided it is still a little too cold for the peas, but hopefully when I get back from Malta mid-May.

I had a trip to Lamberton nursery on Tuesday. I had mentioned to Anne a while back that I would be going sometime soon and I would let her know when if she wanted to come. I wasn't expecting James to come along too - Paul's car was in the garage so he had to squeeze into the back of mine. No list with me - I had free rein:

Sedum pachyclados - a few straggly bits that I pulled off the main plant and have put in various cracks and crannies in th path. May take...
Antennaria 'Alex Duguid'
Dianthus Pikes Pink - a double
Primula juliae
Daphne mezereum 'Bowles White'
Paeonia veitchii
Bellevalia ciliata - a member of the hyacinth family. I had enough bulbs to split into 6 small clumps
Saxifrage hostii
Rhododendron 'Arctic Tern'/'Shamrock'/'Patty Bee'


and my star buy -Salix nakamurana yezoalpina. A big name for a small plant. I'm not sure the photo does it justice - the leaves are so tactile. It shouldn't get much taller but will spread horizontally to a couple of feet or more.

All got planted except for the rhodos amidst light spots of rain in the late afternoon.

It was back to LB9 yesterday. I started at the bottom, digging out the clay and placing the cobbles and worked my way up towards the middle. The previously placed stepping stones were removed as they were not up to the job and Paul helped me get a new one in that I had managed to shuffle across but could not lift on my own. Then back to the top and working my way down. Another day or two to finish it I reckon, but Paul is away playing bridge this weekend and there is no way I can get the next two earmarked rocks in place on my own...

I occasionally wonder why I am doing all this and then I see how good what I have already done is looking and my heart lifts...

Last year's Edrom nursery plants are all doing well. Having survived this winter they should be able to cope with anything.


In the last few days as I have noticed the most divine perfume as I have been working. I have tracked it down to this daphne that is knee high to a grass hopper, currently about two inches tall. Another variety I bought last year has grown considerably and is covered with buds.



The snakeshead fritillarias that I planted in the autumn are also now starting to flower.



And not to be outdone, the viola that Jean gave me is putting on a show.

Trials and Tribulations of a Veggie Grower

A bit of a disaster in the middle raised planter.

I took off the covers yesterday and could see soil disturbance, mainly around the edges but also in a few places in the middle. And a tell-tale vole hole. However, I can see a couple of rows of, hopefully, cabbages coming up amidst the chaos.

The first raised planter is looking a lot more successful. Definite rows of lettuces, rocket and spinach coming through.

No signs of any of the root vegetables yet in either planter...

The cloche in the third planter did not fare well in the wind and hail stones last week. The dowels have snapped on two of the hoops. I thought the one in the veggie patch had also failed its first test. Two of the obelisks had fallen over onto it (Paul hadn't pushed them in firmly enough) but when I picked them up it was fine.

Not much done in the garden last week - too cold. I did, however, manage to transplant a dozen wild primroses from LB1 to LB11/12 and pot up a lot of self-seeded plants from the rose bed (two pampas grasses, three cotoneasters and a spirea) and some pulmonarias (lungworts) and polemoniums (Jacob's ladders) from the trellis bed. I have also decided to give up on the trellis bed and relocate the plants I want to keep elsewhere and let the wild strawberries take it over.

But the sun was shining yesterday. And the tulips opened :)

A good session on LB9. Paul helped me get a mega-rock foothold in place at lunchtime - I couldn't move it, Paul could just about shuffle it along to the hole I had excavated for it. Penny came over in the afternoon to help. She has forked the stretch along the edge of the wall while I was digging over the garden side of the path. By the end of the afternoon we had almost completed the definition of the path up to the end of LB9. Time to get the weed killer out for LB8 - again...