Last Saturday became our warmest day of the year with the temperature reaching a very pleasant 24.9°C or 76.8°F. However, it turned out to be a one day wonder rather than the beginning of a heatwave.

Once again, the week went by without any real rainfall just more showers that did nothing more than dampen the surface of the soil. However, I’m writing this post on Monday 16 May and we’ve had a decent amount of overnight rain, although 6.4mm (0.25in) is nothing out of the ordinary. Maybe we’ll get more showers throughout the day. In any case, at the moment, it’s our wettest day since 07 April 2022.

The lack of rain hasn’t stopped us from making good progress both in the garden and at the allotment. The main job for me was getting our greenhouse tomatoes planted. Actually planting the tomatoes is the easy bit getting all the pots filled and a good support system installed are the time consuming parts. For the last couple of years I’ve skimped on the support for our tomato plants in both greenhouses with the inevitable result of plants collapsing when they are full of fruit. This year I’m making a determined effort to avoid having tomato plants flopping over the greenhouse paths. I’ve used a similar support method in both greenhouses.

The system relies on a couple of sturdy posts hammered into the ground. 

After many years of giving us excellent crops of grapes, I’ve cut down the Himrod vine in our home greenhouse. The grapevine has a habit of taking over the greenhouse in spite of my best efforts to keep it in check.

At the beginning of the growing season, my intention is to keep it under control but as the summer progresses the vine usually wins. For the last couple of years I’ve pruned the vine severely through summer but the result is a total lack of grapes and the vine still casts vast amounts of shade,  so this year the saw came out and the vine has been cut back to ground level. 

I’m expecting it to regrow from the base but hopefully our tomato plants will benefit from a bit less shade.