{"id":5970,"date":"2022-07-09T16:01:07","date_gmt":"2022-07-09T15:01:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ossettweather.com\/gardening2022\/?p=5970"},"modified":"2022-07-11T10:03:04","modified_gmt":"2022-07-11T09:03:04","slug":"battling-on","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ossettweather.com\/gardening2022\/susan\/battling-on\/","title":{"rendered":"Battling on"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

The pantomime in London that dominated our news channels last week didn’t depict the only battle that was going on.<\/p>

We are still battling to keep our crops going on the allotment. We still haven’t had any rain. Martyn, has a weather station in our garden and last week he told me that we hadn’t had a day when the rainfall reached double figures in millimetres since February. Martyn has posted more details about our lack of rain here<\/a>. We have also posted a video showing the state of our plot here<\/a>.<\/p>

We are trying our best to give plants enough water to keep them going but any watering that we manage can’t penetrate far into the ground. The wind and latterly the heat soon dries the soil. Watering is made all the more difficult as when there is more than one person filling a watering can at any one time, the pressure drops and you can only fill it very slowly.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>

Over the weekend it has been too hot to garden during the day and we have had to pop to the allotment to water in the evening when lots of people have had the same idea.<\/p>

\"\"<\/p>

A disadvantage of a large plot is that we have to prioritise our efforts and unfortunately our potatoes are having to go it alone. We just can’t provide them with the amount of water that they need. As you can see from the photo above the potato tops are giving up the fight.<\/p>

\"\"<\/p>

Our cauliflowers haven’t produced any heads worth cutting, The tiny curds are going brown rather than increasing in size.<\/p>

\"\"<\/p>

Parsnips are very slow to grow in spite of dousing them with lots of water.\"\"<\/p>

If the lack of water wasn’t enough to contend with, our second batch of broad beans have been ruined by a sudden plague of blackfly.\u00a0 We very rarely get blackfly on our beans so this was unexpected. It was amazing how quickly the plants were struck down.<\/p>

\"\"<\/p>

I doubt that the lone harlequin ladybird larva or the tiny adult ladybird will make much impression on the hoards of blackfly.<\/p>

\"\"<\/p>

We are trying our very best to keep our peas and beans going. Our first lot of peas have produced lots of pods which will need sufficient water if they are to swell.<\/p>

\"\"<\/p>

We have also sown more peas and dwarf French beans, These were sown in shallow trenches that had been soaked before sowing the seed. The hope is that this will keep in some moisture when the seeds were covered. The twigs and covering will hopefully deter the birds from using the bed as a dust bath.<\/p>

We are managing some harvesting.<\/p>

\"\"
4 July- Sweet peas, dahlias, lettuce, raspberries, strawberries, & blueberries.<\/figcaption><\/figure>

We picked our first dahlias from plants that are a fraction of the size that they usually are.<\/p>

\"\"
5 July – Mangetout, broad beans, sweet peas &sweet Williams<\/figcaption><\/figure>

The sweet Williams are going over now so these are probably the last that we will cut. Incredibly the sweet Williams have produced a brilliant display with no watering, Maybe the close planting preserved some of the moisture already in the soil.\u00a0<\/p>

We only have a few mangetout plants so the pods picked were a treat. Mangetout don’t freeze very well and so really we don’t need to grow large amounts.<\/p>

We picked just enough broad beans for the evening’s dinner. Maybe we should have picked more before the blackfly took a firm hold.<\/p>

\"\"
8 July – Sweet peas, jostaberries, blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, broad beans, mangetout, cabbages & courgettes<\/figcaption><\/figure>

We picked our first courgettes. The plants are producing lots of fruits but they are surprisingly slow to grow despite being treated to plenty of water.<\/p>

\"\"<\/p>

Netting the jostaberries has paid off. The birds have access to three of the bushes which are now almost devoid of fruit whereas there is plenty of fruit to pick from the two protected bushes.<\/p>

\"\"<\/p>

Our buddleia bushes are now full of flower so we await the arrival of the butterflies. Last year the bushes had a distant lack of browsing butterflies although the bees enjoyed the flowers.<\/p>

One of last week’s meals was a broad bean and chicken pilaf<\/a> which made use of some of our broad beans. The recipe also incorporated some of our garlic and over wintered onions. I didn’t shell the broad beans – life’s too short. If the beans are harvested young enough the shells are not tough anyway.\"\"<\/p>

We also had a turkey and vegetable casserole that used our frozen leeks, peas and French beans. It was served with some of our new potatoes.<\/p>

\"\"<\/p>

We managed a visit to Nostell where all the cygnets were developing their preening technique. Their wings are still very small so the flapping wasn’t as impressive as that of their parents. There is a short video of the cygnets here<\/a>.<\/p>

\"\"<\/p>

It was a sunny afternoon so we kept to the shade of the wooded areas. I think we may have to change to morning visits if the weather stays as warm as it is now.<\/p>

As always keep safe and well.<\/p>

Once again I am linking to Dave’s Harvest Monday on his Our Happy Acres blog.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The pantomime in London that  dominated our news channels last week didn’t depict the only battle that was going on. We are still battling to keep our crops going on the allotment. We still haven’t had any rain. Martyn, has a weather station in our garden and last week he told me that we hadn’t […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5965,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_eb_attr":"","ocean_post_layout":"","ocean_both_sidebars_style":"","ocean_both_sidebars_content_width":0,"ocean_both_sidebars_sidebars_width":0,"ocean_sidebar":"ocs-susans-post-sidebar","ocean_second_sidebar":"0","ocean_disable_margins":"enable","ocean_add_body_class":"","ocean_shortcode_before_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_after_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_before_header":"","ocean_shortcode_after_header":"","ocean_has_shortcode":"","ocean_shortcode_after_title":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_bottom":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_bottom":"","ocean_display_top_bar":"default","ocean_display_header":"default","ocean_header_style":"","ocean_center_header_left_menu":"0","ocean_custom_header_template":"0","ocean_custom_logo":0,"ocean_custom_retina_logo":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_height":0,"ocean_header_custom_menu":"0","ocean_menu_typo_font_family":"0","ocean_menu_typo_font_subset":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_size":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_unit":"px","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_line_height":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_unit":"","ocean_menu_typo_spacing":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_unit":"","ocean_menu_link_color":"","ocean_menu_link_color_hover":"","ocean_menu_link_color_active":"","ocean_menu_link_background":"","ocean_menu_link_hover_background":"","ocean_menu_link_active_background":"","ocean_menu_social_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_links_color":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_color":"","ocean_disable_title":"default","ocean_disable_heading":"default","ocean_post_title":"","ocean_post_subheading":"","ocean_post_title_style":"","ocean_post_title_background_color":"","ocean_post_title_background":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_image_position":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_attachment":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_repeat":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_size":"","ocean_post_title_height":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay":0.5,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay_color":"","ocean_disable_breadcrumbs":"default","ocean_breadcrumbs_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_separator_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_hover_color":"","ocean_display_footer_widgets":"default","ocean_display_footer_bottom":"default","ocean_custom_footer_template":"0","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"ocean_post_oembed":"","ocean_post_self_hosted_media":"","ocean_post_video_embed":"","ocean_link_format":"","ocean_link_format_target":"self","ocean_quote_format":"","ocean_quote_format_link":"post","ocean_gallery_link_images":"off","ocean_gallery_id":[],"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5970","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-susan","entry","has-media"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/ossettweather.com\/gardening2022\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/DSC09367.jpg?fit=1000%2C563&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ossettweather.com\/gardening2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5970","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ossettweather.com\/gardening2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ossettweather.com\/gardening2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ossettweather.com\/gardening2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ossettweather.com\/gardening2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5970"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/ossettweather.com\/gardening2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5970\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6142,"href":"https:\/\/ossettweather.com\/gardening2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5970\/revisions\/6142"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ossettweather.com\/gardening2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5965"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ossettweather.com\/gardening2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5970"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ossettweather.com\/gardening2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5970"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ossettweather.com\/gardening2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5970"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}