LBE Marches On

A couple of good afternoon's work have been done in the LBE.

Saturday saw the violas and hibiscuses make it into LB9.


I followed that up with weeding (yet again) the bottom foot or so of LB10, 11 and 12. LB10 has now also been planted up with alternating patches of the black and then pink ajugas, sourced from LB12 where they are now 2 years+old. These themselves were sourced from two plants that I actually bought and planted in LB1 the first summer we moved up here and are still going strong. They are garden thugs but are doing a fine job of edging the LBE, with very few other than the fiercely determined weeds now getting through in LB12. Not bad for an initial outlay of three quid!

I found this growing amongst the weeds in LB10. Not sure what it is but it doesn't look like a weed so I have transplanted and will await its development with interest.

The primroses that I transplanted in the spring seem to like their new environs and are now large enough that I am contemplating dividing them again. One is even flowering! I did divide one of the primulas that I bought from Edrom nursery earlier this year into three healthy looking plants.

I have also been experimenting with the sedum/saxifrage/antennaria that I bought in the spring. When I first got them I pulled of a rosette from each and just popped then into the ground. Similarly with an old house leek that I had brought up in a pot from Sandhurst. They all seem to have taken - indeed the house leek rosette is now a good two inches across.

The sedum now has three rosettes. So spurred on I have pulled off a few more and popped them into the dirt path, hoping they will spread and keep the weeds down. I just have to be careful to avoid stomping on them.

All the parents are doing well and if I am successful will hopefully provide me with a lot more plants - if not they should be big enough for me to divide next spring anyway.

Yesterday I got out there again after lunch - the sun came out after an unpromising morning.

More weeding of the middle section of LB9 and 10, and I then planted the salvia and the penstemons.

One of the penstemons had a stem snapped off as I got it out of the packaging, so I decided to take some cuttings from it. Now I have never done this before so I was not too hopeful. But I could see four reasonable shoots so I cut them off below a leaf joint at a length of somewhere between two and three inches, removed the lower leaves and popped them into a pot filled with a mix of compost and grit. Then I gave them a good watering and they flopped over looking very sad. I placed the pot in my little propagator on the utility room windowsill. This morning when I checked on them they were all looking quite perky. Having looked in one of my gardening books it appears I have done almost text book stem tip cuttings without knowing it - the example they showed was even a penstemon. Hopefully they should root in two to three weeks time, and then I need to pot them on and plant out next spring. This could open a whole new source of plants to me if it works :)

I then moved on to the trellis bed to divide the iris that Anne gave me a couple of years back. Armed with a fork and spade I eventually managed to remove a good sized clump of it which has yielded ten new plants. Back to the LB9 and they are now in. Penny arrived whilst I was replanting them. It still looks pretty bare in places but give it a year or two to see where I do need more planting. The narrow bed along the bottom of the wall, however, is filling in very nicely.

I had been planning on making a start on the bottom of LB8 but it was actually too hot to do anything too strenuous. So after taking the dogs out and having a coffee we relocated to LB1 to finish weeding there - discovery of a wasp nest had scuppered us the last time but a copious dusting of ant/wasp powder at the dead of night a while back seemed to do the trick.

And finally the joys of gardening

coming across this self-sown cyclamen flowering away - parent in pot long since disappeared. It obviously likes it more there than where I have unsuccessfully tried to grow them.

and to think I almost pulled this out in the spring thinking it was dead and it was getting in the way of my weeding

and the discovery of a new shoot on one of the ceanothuses that never made it in to the garden last year, and has looked to all intents and purposes dead since the winter.

Gardening Blues But Red Tomatoes

It has not been a good gardening summer.

On the whole it has either been too hot and the ground too dry or too cold/windy and/or threatened/half-hearted rain. On the days I have got out there I have been bitten to hell by midges. I am guessing midges as I can't think what else could 'reach the parts other insects cannot reach'...

Given that I spent almost as much time out there in April alone than I have in total since, the garden does appear to be coping extremely well. I am almost keeping on top of the weeds, although it does appear that the long bank extension is my own personal 'painting the Forth rail bridge'. Hopefully, I too will have it under control when fully planted by 2012! I do have a backlog of new plants waiting to be re-homed in there although still a drop in the ocean.

I dropped Paul off at the railway station this morning and then went shopping. I remembered to nip in to Aldi as Paul had mentioned they had hibiscus plants advertised for yesterday's special buys. So I now have a blue/purple one and a white one. Then on to Morrisons where I bought three penstemons and a salvia - I did forget the HP sauce but luckily for Jen and Poncho not the bonios. The violas that I potted on are also ready for planting now, as are the remaining half a dozen hostas. Looking at the forecast for the next few days it doesn't look hopeful although there may be a sunny interval tomorrow lunchtime!

So given the lack of sunshine it is a bit of a surprise that I am getting sun-ripened on-the-vine tomatoes on both my plants that are in the veggie patch. The man I bought them off of at the Paxton plant sale was sceptical when I asked about growing them outside.

New on to the veggie harvesting list are my Red Rum runner beans. Having seen how many are coming I am now doubting the wisdom of having grown so many plants.

On the plus (?) side the Sunbright variety are looking very decorative, having been flowering prolifically for some time now, but so far I have not spotted any actual beans coming.

I had kept up with the purple dwarf beans having found another outlet for some in the form of Reg and Diana, but saw that a load more are now ready...

And I Thank Goodness yet again that we bought another freezer last year.

So far a couple of pounds of goosberries, three pounds of rhubarb (still got plenty more growing away) and a pound of wild raspberries frozen, along with some de-pipped puree. I have actually picked over five pounds so far this year but have made one batch of jam (definitely the best variety) and have been eating the rest with Scotch pancakes and ice cream :)

Happiness is a New Back Lawn

We got three people to quote for the lawn.

Quote 1) Man was very nice but it did seem very finger-in-the-air estimating the amount of soil we would need, working on the principle that as little as possible was good. We did sort of agree on the area of grass needed, but he didn't measure anything so that was more that he took our estimate as his.
Quote 2) Border Aggregates. Much more impressed. Man measured the area with one of those wheel-on-a-stick measuring things - area about what we had estimated. Agreed that it would be advisable to break the ground up a bit first, and even went as far as discussing levels to determine the amount of topsoil needed and the best approach to laying the turf itself.
Quote 3) Man measured the area with a tape. Came up with a much lower area than us. Didn't seem to think the ground needed any preparation - would be a good hard base. Wrote me a quote on the back of an envelope as he had forgotten his pad. I wasn't sure if this included labour and on trying to get clarification was none the wiser.

Quote from Border Aggregates arrived in the post a few days later. I was pleasantly surprised. Quote from man 1 arrived a few days later. It was less but was also for a much lower quantity of topsoil. If we upped that to match Border Aggregates the quotes were about the same. So, Border Aggregates won the business hands down.

So on Tuesday we got a phone call to say they would be coming in the afternoon. This was really to drop off the mini digger and just ascertain exactly what was to be done (different two men from the one who had originally come to do the estimate). They would be back first thing the following day to start work. We ascertained that allowing for the drive in from Kelso this would be 7.30 a.m.






Now it needs to be watered every day for the next 3 to 4 weeks, and given a feed after a couple of weeks. Minimal walking on for a month so the dogs are going to have to wait before testing it out as a race track...

The War of the Cabbages

There are battles being fought in the veggie garden...

I had never noticed that many cabbage white butterflies in the past...

But now that I am growing cabbages they seem to have made a beeline to my back garden.

I have started an egg and caterpillar removal patrol every couple of days. I am learning the tricks of the caterpillars. They curl up and drop to the ground when I try to squidge them. So now I have a cup waiting to catch them. This is today's crop. Whilst I am doing this the butterflies are continuing to flutter around on the other side of the cabbage patch.

However, I have had some unintentional revenge. The cabbages in RP2 have a double layer of netting as I had originally cut a length to cover the whole of the planter but now the onions are getting quite tall I have just folded it back over the cabbages. Several butterflies have been tempted by the large healthy plants and have made their way under the first layer only to find themselves trapped.

I transplanted my leeks yesterday. I have got three good rows and two wimpy rows but I decided that I wasn't going to faff about - it was all or none. Inspection this morning showed evidence of dog (my money is on Jen) stomping over some of them. I pulled up and replanted about half a dozen.

I also got around to a better attempt at staking up my two tomato plants. I spotted in my fruit and veggie bible that they were vine tomatoes which are normally grown up a single tall support and sideshoots removed. Too late for that, but I could tidy them up from their sprawling on the ground. They are still fruiting well and there are loads more flowers on them.

I picked my first good-sized carrot (Amsterdam Forcing) on Tuesday, followed the next day by one of the other variety, Supreme Chantenay.

The peas are now also being cropped and I can hardly keep up with the dwarf beans now. And don't even mention lettuces although I have found an outlet for some of them in the shapes of Penny and Margaret.

I have found a use for some bright raspberry pink wool. I have been tagging runner beans, dwarf beans and pea pods to keep for next year's seeds. Adds a bit of colour.

I haven't completely neglected the rest of the garden. Penny came over last week and helped me to weed the LBE. I then sprayed several outbreaks of bindweed. I have since planted over a dozen hostas, a rhododenron and nine surviving carnations from J parkers, and two platycodons and rhodohypoxises that I thought were reasonably priced in Morrisons. It still looks very empty in places. I have my eye on several plants in other parts of the garden that can be divided in the autumn...

I am also back to planning the fruit tree bed to be. I think I have found a very good site to source my apple trees. And will probably get my pear and plum trees from J Parkers. Still undecided on cherry trees...

Sugar and Spice...

A trip into Berwick yesterday to buy the basics for my new adventure into pickles and chutneys.

Brown and white pickling vinegar. Four bottles of balsamic vinegar. Light and dark brown sugar. Onions, ginger, chillies, coriander and mustard seeds.

On my way back to the car I spotted Youngman's had a display of Le Parfait preserving jars in their window display. Dumped the shopping and went back - two 1 litre and two half litre jars purchased along with a couple of jam cover sets.

A trip into Duns this morning to get some muslin from Penny. Then into the deli - what a cornucopia of spices. The last two on my list where mace (not ground) and allspice berries - no problem. It then occurred to me that Youngman's may also sell muslin (hadn't thought of it yesterday) so I went in and asked. Yep... So back to Penny's to return hers.

Right. I had everything I needed... Just needed to get the kitchen in order first...

Jars washed, rinsed and into the oven to sterilize.

Ingredients weighed. Onions chopped.

Spices selected and tied into a small muslin parcel.

Gently simmer the onions in half the vinegar for 10 minutes.

Then throw everything else in.

Stir continuously until the sugar has all dissolved.

Turn the heat up to a steady simmer, stirring occasionally.

Start worrying as it takes forever to thicken up...

Turn the oven off as I won't need the jars for a long time yet.

Hmm. What exactly does the consistency of a thick jam mean?

I think it's getting there - the gooseberries have broken down.

Turn the oven back on.

Is this the right consistency?

I have to decide at some point that it is ready and this is it.

Remove muslin parcel and bottle up...

The recipe said it should make nearly 4 lbs if using apples. I think I have got about 3. My other recipe book expects yields to be much lower than the weight of the ingredients so I am not worrying yet. Probably depends on the water content of the fruits used.

Am now supposed to leave it for at least a month to mature...

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...