Summertime

Well it seems to be here (after a bit of a damp day yesterday). Gearing up for the show on Thursday and the forecast doesn't look brilliant but it depends which forecast you look at!

I have been out with the camera (which I am afraid seems to be on its last legs; it will be a real pain in the neck if it packs up now).

A couple of lovely ones.

Garden jewels: If you only ever grow one type of tomato, grow this one, Sungold, it is beautiful and tastes even better. Those red ones seem insipid compared to the burst of sunlight and warmth and summer time you get when you bite into one of these little golden globes.

The bog garden: Slowly, slowly licking it into shape (but still a lot of weeds and docks and there is only a little produce growing now as a lot have been eaten!!!!!!). This winter we will put down black plastic (old silage covers) where we want the plots to be and leave the grass paths between, might even manage a few more raised beds, but have to watch this as even though this is very wet plot the raised bed dries out quickly. The blue stuff is netting to keep the hens off the carrots I have just planted out (a little late!)

In our old garden we had a grape vine, something called strawberry grape. It goes mad and grows everywhere, the English winters don't bother it at all. The grapes are dark reddish in colour and have the most amazing berry flavour, sort of a mixture of strawberries, blackberries and other yummy fruits but are not 'grape like' at all. We took cuttings several years ago and gave them to friends who are growing them up a trellis in front of their oil tank (not sure the trellis will be able to cope eventually but we will cross that bridge!). This winter I took about 40 cuttings and have 37 plants growing. Our friend has a nice sheltered, well drained south facing, gently sloping field so is thinking about trying to grow them on a larger scale (he also took about 40 cuttings last year, so we have almost 80 plants!). They will take time to mature and produce fruit and maybe ultimately some wine! This picture shows the cuttings together with an odd selection of marigolds and other flowers (no idea what they are or why I planted the seeds). The marigolds are there because they have been watered and will go back shortly to sit with the tomatoes to help ward off nasty bugs (marigolds encourage nice bugs that eat the nasty bugs, clever eh?)

Finally this is one of the old apple trees that last year produced a total amount of nothing. I gave it some TLC over the winter and a decent hair cut and now we have apples; hooray. Just have to get the other one producing now.

Must go out and stop working and enjoy some of this rare break in the clouds before the weather turns again tomorrow!