Sunday 08 June 2014
Felled Before Its Prime
Sunday finished up becoming the warmest day of the month as the temperature managed 24.5°C in the afternoon.
We had a busy day in the garden getting cucumbers and tomatoes planted into their final positions as well as sowing more French beans, sweet Williams and wallflowers.
The sunny one day and rainy the next scenario makes keeping the plants in the greenhouse watered correctly a bit tricky. They can easily finish up standing in water or ending up on the dry side depending upon the weather conditions after watering. Our aubergines in the greenhouse were a little on the dry side but it didn’t stop one being felled by a snail eating through the stem of the plant.
I had an inspection of all the slug and snail hiding places under pots and around the edges of the capillary matting but couldn't find the culprit. How did it know that this was by best aubergine plant. I’m on the lookout now.
It wasn’t wall to wall sunshine with plenty of clouds about and it tried to rain around teatime but that didn’t amount to anything.
Monday 09 June 2014
The Forecast Is Better -
We had a lovely start to Monday morning and a beautiful end to the day. Morning, late afternoon and evening had plenty of sunshine and it was pleasantly mild. It was a shame about the thunderstorm and accompanying rain through the middle of the day.
So Monday added another 4.4mm rainfall to the total which now stands at 33.6mm for the month and we are only into the second week. I’d like to think that the plot will start to dry out at sometime this summer.
At the moment the forecast beyond Wednesday looks far more promising. I’m hoping that the few fine days in the forecast aren’t followed by more wet weather over next weekend.
Tuesday 10 June 2014
Late parsnips
Tuesday was another changeable day as far as the weather went. Early Tuesday afternoon on the plot was sunny, calm and warm but suddenly from nowhere came some dark clouds; a gale force wind sprung up and the temperature fell quickly by about 10°C
Looking east it looked like a lovely summer afternoon but turn around and look west and it was a different story.
If you remember at the end of May I resowed some carrots due to lots of the first batch of seedlings being eaten by slugs. At the same time it became obvious that lots of our parsnips either hadn’t germinated or they had suffered the same fate as the carrot seedlings. As parsnip seeds are notoriously slow and difficult to germinate I thought we’d just cut our loses and settle for just the few parsnips that had survived.
I’ve read and watched videos on You Tube of the various techniques people have tried to get round the difficult germination issues. I’ve never succeeded in germinating parsnips in seed trays or modules and then planting them out. The parsnip top has grown well enough but it has not produced a parsnip root only a mangle of tiny white roots. Sue found a video of parsnips been sown on damp kitchen paper and then transplanted. We decided to give it a go as we’d have nothing much to loose.
The seeds were sown in a half sized seed tray on several layer of damp kitchen roll before being put in a polythene bag and placed in a warm dark room to germinate. Well the darkness was created by covering the tray with an old magazine.
The seeds have been examined each morning for any signs of germination taking place. I must be honest after a week of no signs of life at all I was beginning to think perhaps we had a duff batch of seed. I expected to see the seed swelling at the very least. Then after nine days there were the tiniest signs of life from some of the seeds.
By no means have all the seeds germinated but a decent number have. It looks like we’re going to have to give some consideration to how we plant these very delicate little seedlings into the plot.
To transplant the sproutlings into the existing parsnip row I made a little hole in the compost, suitably spaced between already germinated seedlings and popped a seed in. I carefully covered it over with a little compost. The process wasn’t as fiddly as I thought it was going to be. The seeds didn’t stick to the kitchen paper although they did stick to my fingers a little. They were much tougher than I had expected them to be. I didn’t have enough germinated seeds to do all our rows of parsnips but two rows are completed and the left over seeds are being left on the damp kitchen paper to see if any more germinate. They can then be added to some other rows to complement the existing parsnip seedlings.
It will be interesting to see if these pre germinated seeds grow and then if they do to see if they produce good useable roots. Now I have to be honest I haven’t got a method sorted out to tell the difference between parsnips planted traditionally and my pre-
Wednesday 11 June 2014
Coldframe Courtyard -
According to the forecast the weather is set fair for a few days and Wednesday was a lovely warm day with plenty of sunny spells.
Like all good construction projects our coldframe courtyard has more than one phase and I thought it was about time I got started on phase two. If you want to catch up on phase one Sue posted about our new coldframes here.
Phase two will involve moving our old aluminium cold frame down to the plot and after rearranging the layout of the path and a good tidy up the area will be covered with bark chippings. This will make way for our new Woodblocx raised bed.
Our new coldframes are already in full swing as plants are moved in a never ending procession out of the greenhouse into one of the cold frames before their final move to the allotment. This part of the coldframe courtyard is now looking neat and tidy but that’s only half the story.
This is the area in phase two. Our coldframe has been overrun by thuggish plants from our neighbours’ gardens. The coldframe was extracted from the vegetation with some difficulty before it was dismantled ready for its trip to the plot. It’s amazing how many more pot holes there seems to be in the roads once the car is loaded up with panes of glass. Fortunately they were transported the four miles without any breakages.
Once the coldframe was out of the way all the vegetation was chopped up and loaded into the green waste recycling bin.
There’s still allot of work to do cutting back more vegetation and clearing rubbish away. This little corner of the garden had become a bit of a waste collection area. At least I’ve made a start and with the weather set fair for a few days I’m hoping things will soon start to look much better.
Thursday 12 June 2014
Bempton Cliffs & Flamborough Head
Thursday was a glorious early June day with plenty of sunshine and with the temperature nudging into the low twenties centigrade it was just right for a trip to the RSPB reserve at Bempton Cliffs to see the nesting seabird colonies.
As you wander down to the cliff edge from the visitor centre at Bempton Cliffs you smell the sea birds and hear the kittiwakes calling before you even see any birds.
The gannets make for fantastic viewing as they soar along the edge of the cliff top before finding a spot to land next to their mate on the rocky outcrop. You can’t help but wonder if it’s possible to bring up a family perched on a spot that this kittiwake has chosen.
If you’re lucky its possible to spot puffins peeking out from the cliff tops too.
After takings lots of photographs at Bempton we made the short journey to have a look around the cliff tops at Flamborough Head.
We still had time to call in for a refreshing cold drink and a cake before setting out on our journey back home.
Once all my photos are processed and tagged I’ll post a collection on Flickr with a link on my blog.
Friday 13 June 2014
What Happened to the Sunshine?
Thursday’s sunshine didn’t last into Friday which was a cloudy, warm and muggy sort of day. There was the threat of a thunderstorm all evening as thunder rumbled away in the distance but avoided us and it remained dry for a third day in a row.
I managed to erect our old aluminium cold frame down on the plot. Although I put all the old nuts and bolts in a container as I removed them at home I still ended up a couple short down on the plot. Funny that and I haven’t any idea how it happened but fortunately I had a couple of spare nuts and bolts in my toolbox which finished the job nicely. I now need to sort some sort of roofing out to give the tomato and pepper plants which will be planted out in the cold frame a bit of extra protection.
Saturday 14 June 2014
Wrong Type of High Pressure?
Saturday was a cloudy muggy day. The cloud was thick enough in the morning to give spells of drizzle and light rain. Our weather at the moment is governed by a high pressure and weather forecasts happily tell us this is bringing more settled dry weather. Unfortunately it’s not bringing much sunshine.
As we reach the mid point of June it’s been a wet and warm month so as a gardener I shouldn’t be complaining too much but I will nevertheless as the amount of rain has prevented any digging down on the plot.
The average temperature for the month stands at 15.8°C, warmer than the last three years but not as warm as 2010. Rather strangely we arrived at this through slightly higher than average temperatures rather than exceptionally hot days with 10 of the first 14 days of the month managing 20°C or above. As for the rainfall although the month has had a wet couple of weeks with the rainfall amount standing at 35.4mm (09:00 Sunday morning) I’m hoping we don’t get anywhere near the 131.5mm of June 2012.
Sunday’s plan was for an afternoon down on the plot getting our coldframe planted up with peppers and tomatoes but once again the day has started off dull and cloudy with light rain falling in the morning.
Some high pressure similar to that which produced such a lovely day on Thursday when we visited Bempton Cliffs and Flamborough Head would be much appreciated.
More images of our visit to Bempton and Flamborough Head can be found in my Flickr album here,