Another week has passed without significant rainfall for us. Rain keeps appearing in forecasts, but as the allotted day draws nearer, rain disappears from the radar. We had some dampening of the roads at the weekend. It only measured 0.5mm on the rain gauge in our garden.
The photos below show the state of the ground on a vacant plot.
We are giving everything as much water as we can, but this is made more difficult by the abysmal water pressure on our site. If two people are trying to access water at the same time, the flow on both taps is reduced to a dribble, or one tap has no water at all. This is causing a huge problem, and we can only wait for the council to send a plumber to investigate.
I mentioned in my last post that our potatoes were recovering from the damage inflicted by frost. They were growing well until we had another frosty night, which clobbered some of our other potatoes. In one bed, the frost damage seemed worse on some varieties of potatoes than others, which led me to do a bit of research, and apparently, some varieties are more susceptible to frost damage. This explains why the potatoes are untouched on other plots and also why our dahlias survived the frost. We do tend to try out less common varieties. That said, we haven’t been hit by such severe frost damage before, and we shouldn’t be experiencing frosts so late in May.
Watering is consuming much of our time; however, we have managed to fit in some planting.
In the past, parsnip seeds have been very temperamental. To try and ameliorate the problem of poor germination, we now start parsnip seeds on damp kitchen paper. The container is kept in the house as a drop in nighttime temperature can impede germination. 
After about seven days, when tiny roots appear, it is time to sow the seeds.
To sow the seeds, narrow, shallow trenches were created. As the ground is so dry, we filled each trench with two cans of water before filling it with multipurpose compost.
The bed was then thoroughly watered before covering the area with twigs. This will hopefully deter any bird activity. The bed will need to be kept well watered
We didn’t have enough sprouted seeds to sow all four rows. The seeds that hadn’t sprouted were discarded as they may not be viable, and more seeds have been set to germinate.
Given the condition of the ground this year, I am not expecting a great parsnip crop, but you have to try, don’t you?
I planted out some beetroot plants that had been raised in our garden greenhouse.
While I did that, Martyn erected the poles in readiness for our climbing beans
It seems that most of our allotment is covered with something to give some protection from the creatures that treat our plot as a fast food outlet. Last week, we netted the remaining fruit bushes,
We picked a few more strawberries and also pulled some rhubarb. There were two varieties – Raspberry Red and Timperley Early. I think it is pretty obvious which is which.
I also cut a small bunch of sweet Williams
From the garden greenhouse, we picked a few bits of salad for lunch.
The tomatoes have been planted out in greenhouses and outdoors, both at home and on the plot.
Away from gardening, the Nostell swans have hatched six cygnets. Fingers crossed that they all survive and don’t grow up to be as demanding as some of the last brood.
We paid a return visit to Hardwick Hall. We were interested to find out whether the area marked out in a pattern of squares and triangles was a vegetable bed, as we had suspected.
It was, in fact, a mixture of vegetable, fruit, and flower plants. It’s in the early stages of planting, so a later visit is in the diary.
Of course, I had to take pictures of the rest of the garden too.
A large area had been covered with hessian, which was intriguing.
I asked one of the gardeners about it and was told that they are trying to combat a bindweed problem. We could commiserate with them.
After a walk around the garden, where Ruby had to be kept on a short lead, we headed along one of the walks.
This gave Ruby a bit more freedom and plenty of sniffing opportunities.
Unfortunately, there were lots of steps along the route. They always seem to make the risers a bit too steep for someone with short legs. That’s me and not Ruby, who bounds up and down with no problem.
After a walk, we found an open grassy area where we could let Ruby have a ball game.
The views were beautiful.
It was amazing, as when we left, the man who was manning the entrance said that he recognised Ruby. That wouldn’t have been all that strange except he wasn’t there when we arrived, but we had chatted with him on our last visit at the end of March. He must have remembered Ruby from then – she certainly makes an impact.
That’s all for this week so as always stay safe and stay well.
This week I am linking to Harvest Monday on Dave’s Our Happy Acres blog
I really enjoyed our visit to Hardwick. Bess was such an interesting woman in history.
I’m not sure which is worse – too much or too little rain! Our early brassica seedling have rotted in the bed. Here’s hoping things go better for both of us.
I don’t have veg to water but the girl who helps me with odd gardening jobs has potted up far too many pots and I can’t manage them. I’ve used up all the water stored over winter in two big drums, and I just had a 300lt water barrel installed but it is empty after three weeks, however as it is currently tipping down here, I’m hoping the barrel will fill and the pots won’t need water for a week or so. It is dire, and may be time to reconsider what we are growing!