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1 – 6 July
One of the major tasks has been to harvest fruit. Our soft fruit is producing a bumper harvest and it is difficult to know what to pick first. One priority was to pick the cherries before the birds managed to get to them. They do continue to ripen after being picked and so we have stripped as many as were almost fully ripe from the tree. There doesn’t appear to be as good as crop as last year so maybe the dry weather has taken its toll. Dryness doesn’t seem to have affected our berry fruit which once again are very prolific. See here for a full list of July’s harvest.
We have planted more sweetcorn and courgettes and have planted our leeks. If they all grow we will have enough leeks to feed an army. Planting holes are still being filled with water to give the young plants a good start in the dry conditions.
1 July
To provide a focal point in one of the borders viewed from our patio windows we decided on a new bird bath. This was collected today – we’re really glad that we hadn’t bought it earlier as there was 20% discount on it for a limited period so we saved quite a lot. Now we just have to decide what type of planting to have around it.
2 July
The indoor cyclamen that I am growing from seed had all germinated and so I decided the time had come to pot them into individual pots. I want to keep these under the indoor growing garden in a spare room. This way I can keep a close eye on them. They have been potted up into small fibre pots and are starting to grow more leaves. The new leaves are displaying the characteristic veined markings seen on mature plants whereas the original seed leaf was plain green. Amazingly every one of the eight seeds has germinated. To read more click here.
3 July
As an experiment we planted a mix of vegetables in one of the beds on the plot. We wanted to find out whether if we planted brassicas amongst other plants they would be less likely to be attacked by pigeons and caterpillars. So far it would seem that the pigeons haven’t been fooled. They have attacked cauliflowers, and both red and green cabbage but red and green curly kale is untouched. Maybe pigeons don’t like curly kale. We’ll wait to see whether the plants manage to recover and then see what the caterpillars manage to do. Other brassicas are netted against both pests. Read more here
We have a row of very old apple trees. They have lots of apple canker and we maybe should chop them down but they still produce lots of apples so for now they stay. One problem is that they get lots of woolly aphid. I keep an eye on this and try to deal with it when I see it. My organic method of destruction is to brush well with an old toothbrush. This seems to keep them in check.
5 July
The plants in the newly set out front flower bed are now beginning to flower and show promise of a really good display once the plants mature. A Michaelmas daisy has been flowering since it was planted out. It must be really confused as it should really flower late summer/early autumn. I wonder whether it will manage to keep flowering until then? A couple of plants could have done with some support so I must remember to get some in place for next year.
6 July
We picked our first lot of garden peas. The crop is a bit disappointing as really there just hasn’t been enough moisture for them to grow well. The dryness has also meant that there is quite a lot of thrip damage on the pods. This could also explain the reduced crop as thrips do damage the flowers too preventing them from producing seed. Read more here
7 July
We haven’t had too much success when growing spring onions directly in the soil on the plot so we have decided on a different tactic and decided to grow them in tubs in the garden. Hopefully this will also mean that our spring onions will be close at hand when we want to make a salad. When the onions grow well at the plot we tend to forget to pick them and bring them home. If they are picked for too long they also tend to become dry so hopefully being able to nip up the garden and pick them fresh will be the answer that’s if they grow.
9 July
Picking blackcurrants is a very time consuming and back aching task but someone has to do it! This year has been the first year that our newly planted blackcurrant bushes have given a good harvest.
We’re continuing to harvest lots of other soft fruit too – click here for details. The new strawberry patch isn’t producing lots of fruit yet but the strawberries that are being harvested are delicious.
The lavender which borders two sides of each of our fruit beds is now flowering and at its best but it seems that the butterflies and bees are late finding it. Usually the flowers are heavily populated by feeding insects. My intention is to take cuttings to produce more plants for remaining sides of the fruit beds. I have used French marigolds here in the past but I want to cut down on the number of half hardy annual flowers that I grow from seed.
I had some candytuft and escholotzia seeds that I hadn’t got round to sowing so despite it being well past the time for sowing I popped some directly in the soil. The seeds have germinated well so now we will have to wait and see whether they manage to grow large enough to flower!
The dahlias grow from seed are beginning to grow now but like everything else are suffering from a lack of rain. Flower buds are beginning yo form on plants that look more like bedding dahlias than the large varieties that they are.
10 July
The courgette glut has started – we just don’t seem to be able to stop ourselves from growing too many plants. I’ll be browsing the recipe pages for inspiration.
This year we have noticed at least three young robins frequenting our bird tables. They are now beginning to lose their speckled breasts in favour of the adult’s red plumage so no doubt shortly their will be robin wars as adults they are hardly likely to tolerate one another.
11 July
The buddleias on the plot are now flowering and their honey perfume is working hard trying to draw in pollinating insects. Just as with the lavender it seems that there are few butterflies and bees around to enjoy sipping from the flowers. Other than one or two, most of the butterflies spotted are the whites. In most gardeners’ eyes the least welcome species.
A second herb bed has been cleared and replanted mainly with parsley.
We’ve tipped out the last of the potato bags – these have been well worth planting up this year and have provided us with a supply of early potatoes.
In the garden cold frame slugs and snails have been a problem. We’ve lost lots of seedlings courtesy of their night-time feasts. We are trying a barrier of copper tape stuck around the sides of the trays which hold the seed trays to see if that keeps the slimy pests at bay.
The osteospernums that I grew from seed are beginning to flower. When they were put in the tubs the plants looked quite straggly but they are thickening up and now several buds have opened. The varieties are orange and yellow shades. Next year now that I know they are fairly easy to raise from seed I’ll try and find some other colours.
12 July
When digging out the second of the allotment herb beds we rescued a root of mint which has been planted in a pot and brought home. We’ve also sown some coriander seeds in a tub. It’s good to have a few herbs in the garden as we often decide we need some when we have none gathered from the plot.
15 July
Life on the plot has now settled into the routing of harvesting and generally tidying up. We still have some beds that need completely clearing but could do with some rain to soften the ground before tackling them.
One or two weeds were popping up in our new strawberry bed which needed dealing with. Although we have covered the ground with a biodegradable mulching fabric some weeds still manage to find their way through the holes next to the strawberry plants. As long as these are removed whilst still young it hasn’t been a problem. I’ve also been cutting off any runners so that all the plants vigour could be directed into building up a strong plant which will hopefully give us a bumper strawberry harvest next year. The plants, however, are just too fast at producing new runners and I am struggling to keep up with them. The result was that some runners had already developed baby plants. It seemed such a pity to waste them so I have potted up some of each variety. If they grow successfully they will provide back up for any plants that don’t make it over winter.
We dug the first of our ground planted potatoes. This year the potatoes hadn’t made a lot of top growth which died back faster than expected so we were anticipating failure and were pleasantly surprised by the decent crop.
21 July
This week we had a trip to a clematis nursery in Doncaster to pick up an order of clematis. Unfortunately one of our choices Andromeda had sold out so we will have to wait until new stock arrives. The four varieties Dawn, Fuji-Musume, Snowbird and Alpina Willy have now been planted against a willow screen in the shady bed under our crab apple tree. For more detail click here
22 July
This year the potato tops have hardly grown and some varieties are already beginning to die back. Being prepared for disappointment we decided to dig up a row of Red Duke of York. We were pleasantly surprised as we actually dug exactly the same amount of potatoes as last year which is amazing considering that since the potatoes were planted we haven’t had much rain at all. Now we are left to wonder how other varieties have fared – we just have to hope they have performed as well.
The onion tops are just beginning to bend over. The onions seem to have not suffered from the lack of moisture and in fact look as good as we have ever had. Let’s hope it stays that way and we have a good harvest unlike the pathetic garlic harvest.
One significant event was the picking of our first red tomatoes – only two but it’s a start. Click here to read more.
The osteospernums grown from seed are now flowering well. They have been far easier to raise than I had imagined so I’ll definitely be trying a different variety next year. This year’s variety produced flowers in a range of yellow and orange but next year I will go for the colours more associated with osteospernums – purple, pinks and white.
23 July
The copper tape stuck around the sides of the trays in the cold frame appears to be working but we decided that we would add a second line of defence. On the Internet we found some fabric that is coated with a copper based product. This doubles as a weed suppressant and capillary matting too so a sheet has been laid in the base of the cold frame. Hopefully one way or another we will manage to literally shock the slugs and snails into submission. Click here to read more
24 July
We had our first cucumber but not before something had nibbled the end. The prime suspects are slugs or snails. At this rate we will need to cover the entire garden in Slug and Snail Shocka Fabric. As only the very tip of the cucumber had been attacked there was plenty left for us.
Our plot activity was limited to harvesting. We gathered most of the broad beans the Crimson Flowered variety and headed home to prepare them for the freezer. The beans are much smaller than those produced from our other varieties so we have to avoid the mistake of leaving them too long in expectation that the pods are not fully grown. Our complete harvest list for July is here
25 July
Another job that started out small and has escalated is the intention to make one of our borders more interesting. It’s viewed from one of our house windows and so it needed a focal point that was provided by the additional of a new bird bath. This has now turned into a total redesign. We now need to decide what plants we need to add to the ones already roughly planted (they will need rearranging but for the meantime are planted out so they can grow on). We had a few plants – heucerella kimono, and a couple of aspleniums -that had outgrown their position in another part of the garden and so these have been lifted and added to the border.
26 July
On visiting the plot to harvest, water and do a little weeding we found that one of the seed raised dahlias had a flower, a lovely orange, yellow. Others although still small have buds, so it looks as though we will have some flowers this year.
We don’t think our carrots are going to produce much of a harvest this year so more seeds have been sown in the empty potato sacks. This way we can lift them into the greenhouse and hopefully give them a slightly longer growing season.
28 July
The plums on the Oullins gage tree are beginning to turn yellow and so we felt it was time to try a few. They’re not a large as usual but at least the flavour didn’t disappoint.
29 July
We visited the walled garden at Clumber Park and were gratified to see that there plants too are suffering from the dry conditions. It’s comforting to know that the professionals have trouble keeping things growing too.
