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Garden Diary – I thought the tulips were over, then 2 princess’s came along
It’s been an amazing tulip year, thanks to the weather playing ball for a change. But all good things come to an end, at least I thought. Just as I was feeling a bit sad the season was nearly over I found a pot hidden behind some larger pots and it was full of little orange tulips called ‘Little Princess’, what a lovely surprise! Then in the woodland border I found a couple of ‘Princess Irene’ tulips had popped up. So the princess’s were making a fashionably late arrival. The garden continues to produce sentimental blooms, coming from the dicentra which I took a cutting from an elderly friend donkeys…
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Garden Diary – Moving from early spring into late spring
The grey cooler weather last week did at least allow me to get some gardening jobs done, and the rain was extremely welcome for the dry borders. I managed to get the dolly tubs planted, with Begonias in the middle, and around the outside, Anemones that I’d started off earlier in the year together with Mexican Fleabane that just keeps spreading… They’ll take a few weeks to really get going but it will be worth the wait. I finally got some of the raised vegetable beds weeded, with help from the under gardener. The red onions were planted last autumn and are now growing well with the warm weather. As…
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Garden Diary – Cherry blossom means, fruit’s on the way!
This is the week when the apple and cherry blossom came out fully. Even more exciting though, I planted the tomatoes in the greenhouse! I love that day, but obviously not quite as much as the day the first fruit ripens… Even more tulip varieties started to bloom and the foliage is bushing up in the borders full of the promise of what’s to come. It’s hard not to think of spring as the best season of all, as the garden literally comes back to life. Including a pieris shrub that we thought we may have killed by moving it, but hey presto, it’s survived! Talking of which, the tadpoles…
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Garden Diary – Started in the pink, ended with thunder bolts!
What a week of contrasts! After last Sundays big downpour we actually had a good week with plenty of sunshine, but Saturday was the loudest thunder I’ve heard in a very long time. And some poor soul not far from here had their house set on fire by a thunder bolt! I’m pleased to say no one was hurt but the poor lady escaped just with the clothes she was wearing! It’s hard to imagine loosing all of your possessions. I’ve always said that after saving the ‘acting head-gardener’ and the cats, it’s my photographs that I’d want to save. I feel most other things are replaceable. Before the storm…
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Garden Diary – Two new Cat Faces in the garden!
I learned something new about mis-shaped tomatoes this week. The larger ones quite often have slightly strange bottoms but one of them had the strangest bottom I’ve ever seen! I posted it on my three social media platforms and just one person came up with the answer. The name for this strange contortion is ‘Catfaced’, which takes me nicely into a new feline friend I made this week. I was minding my own business watering the greenhouse when in strolled a new young cat, with a rather interesting cat face! Back in the greenhouse one of the new varieties I’ve grown this year ‘Indigo Rose’, finally had a single ripe…
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Garden Diary – Finger Licking Raspberries hands, wave goodbye to the Rhubarb
The finger licking raspberries obviously realise that September has dawned and as ‘Autunm fruiting’ raspberries it is their time to shine. They do get confused every year and start fruiting in mid summer, but only a few at a time and they are pretty small. But they have now gone into overdrive producing huge berries that need picking everyday. The acting head garden has been busy with his new found talent for baking, moving on from blueberry cake to rhubarb cake and now raspberry cake. I’ll be putting weight on! He’s made the last rhubarb cake of the year as it was time to stop picking and let the plants…
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Garden Diary – Tomato bonanza, there’s even enough for soup!
It’s the peak of the tomato season and those of you that have followed the gardens progress will know my dream before moving here was to grow enough tomatoes to make soup. Well this years tomato bonanza is certainly providing enough for soup, sauce, salad and anything else we can think of that uses tomatoes. The raspberries are starting to ramp up and we’ve had another first of the season with the first ripe pear. My hand was dripping with pear juice as I peeled it ready to share. I think the acting head gardener has eared the right to share the first one! It was a pretty good weather…
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Garden Diary – Alfresco cooking with aliens lurking
With the beans up to full production now, the ‘acting head-gardener’ has been making lots of bean curry (half a freezer full!). And as the weathers been reasonable he’s taken the portable hob outside for some alfresco cooking. I’ll bet the neighbours thought it was an interesting smelling barbeque lol. At this time of year the garden can provide breakfast, lunch and dinner, and quite often does. With various fruits starting the day, tomatoes and cucumbers or soup at lunchtime, then plenty of veg to make dinner. The plums were finally ripe this week, and despite not being that many they were incredibly delicious and as you can imagine, didn’t…
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Garden Diary – Insects and harvests
So just like in lockdown the garden and the weather are helping to keep my sanity as I struggle doing nothing whilst my back fractures heal themselves.Ironically I have spent rather a lot of time sitting and lying on the hammock I tripped backwards over, that put me in this situation! As the pain has lessened and I’ve been able to concentrate again, I’ve rediscovered the joy of reading. So catching up with the last three Brunetti books by Donna Leon, I’m transported to Venice where her books are set, whilst sitting in the sunshine with bees, butterflies and mating ladybirds – finally more numerous – flying around me. Trying…
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Garden Diary – Blue skies at last – but dragons on the horizon!
There I was lapping up the good weather, we were having sunshine and blue skies at last! The garden at its fullest, bursting with colour, the insects finally appearing in larger numbers, although still not as many as usual, but getting better. We were at the beginning of maximum harvest season and I’d already defrosted one of the freezers in readiness for all the cooking sessions ahead. And then…. On Tuesday 30th July I fell, whilst walking backwards carrying a radiator. Now this might sound like a funny thing to be doing, but not at our house! After spending all those years landscaping the garden we are finally getting on…
