Summer 2018

June
So, it is now officially summer but no-one has told the weather.  There was a ridiculously warm week in May but since then it has get wet and chilly. Wet is good in a way, I have not had to water for ages, the seeds have all germinated, I have loads of lettuce and everything else is doing well. Everything is later this year because of the cold winter and whilst rain is useful a bit of warm weather to ripen everything would be nice.
The two swallows who arrived in March stayed on their own until this weekend and now there has been an influx, they are preparing nests again.
August 24th
Summer finally arrived this month, along with the usual influx of visitors, it is so noisy.
On the whole everything has done well though I reckon about 2 weeks behind normal, but looking back I seem to have said that before so maybe it is normal.

All growing well!

Cherry tomatoes just ripening

My neighbours courgette!

People here don't reckon much to my cherry tomatoes but at least mine are ripening! The beans and the mange-tout are now at the end of their season. I've been lucky with my courgette again, it is staying in one place and producing at an acceptable rate! The only thing to have done very badly this year is the plums, and then only the green ones. There are not many plum trees in the village but none of the green ones have fruit whilst the tree with 'plum' coloured fruit is loaded.

Spring 2018

March 22nd
We have had the coldest and wettest winter for years. The sun is shining today but it is going to rain again tomorrow, but I have taken advantage of today's sunshine to start clearing and digging. Now, as I sit here and look out I can see two Swallows, or are they House Martins, I never know, but I am sure they do not normally arrive so early. Maybe summer is on the way!!

Summer 2017

This June has been and is the hottest in 36 years, we have had a few days of rain but really not very much. The vegetables are doing well.

I have been eating lettuce and new potatoes since the beginning of the month and I have loads, so different to last year. I planted more potatoes this year and I hoped to have them all summer and maybe in to autumn but I've just discovered that something has attacked them and dug up the majority. It doesn't look like the work of a boar so I'm not sure what.  I have been eating raspberries for a couple of weeks, there are just enough to get a helping every day but I doubt I will manage to freeze any this year as many of the flowers in the bottom plot got frosted, again a real change from last year! I have managed to have some cherries, it is strange that some trees have no fruit and some have done quite well so I have had some from neighbours.

The courgette is not doing very well, I didn't water it enough and it got unhappy but it looks better now so, hopefully, I will have some soon.

July 5th

Well I think it was a boar and it has been back a couple of times to make absolutely sure that all the potatoes are dug up!

I am just coming to the end of the raspberries, they have lasted all month and I have managed to freeze a bag full so it was better than I expected.

 The beans and mange-tout are flowering so I hope to start harvesting in a couple of weeks and the courgette is now thriving.

The hydrangea is doing better than I have ever seen before.

August 8th 

Everything is producing really well and the tomatoes are turning red.  Only the potatoes have been a disaster but this has worked in my favour, my neighbour thought that her potatoes were only fit to give to the pigs as they are mostly small this year, when I said that I like small potatoes with my salads she told me to take as many as I wanted as she would be throwing the rest away, no one has a pig!! So now I have plenty of salad potatoes. 

29th August

A wonderful year for vegetables but incredibly dry, finally it has rained which is great as I am about to be away. Next year I must label the peppers and tomatoes as to variety as I have no idea what they aere this year. 

Spring 2017

April
This Spring has been crazy, after a very cold but very dry winter it snowed for the last week, since then it has just got hotter and hotter. The fruit blossom was early and I was worried that it would get frosted or that there would not be enough insects around but it seems to have been OK. Won't know until summer and autumn but the amount of blossom is amazing and there have been no frosts and lot of insects.
The family with the plot next door to mine kindly ploughed half of my plot, he said he would harrow it later but he didn't come back for ages so I planted my onions and put sticks in for my tomatoes, then he came back and harrowed!! I had to dig to find my onions, under about 6 inches of soil! I found most and planted some new ones, at least the soil has been well broken up this year.

I've sown lettuce seed inside and out, the inside has germinated, it's too early for the outside yet, I also have tomatoes growing inside, the problem is that I will be away next week and I am having to water at the moment, hopefully it will rain!😊  It isn't often I say that!
16th May
The weather continues to be crazy, but we did have several days of heavy rain last week. When I first came I was told not to plant out tomatoes or peppers until after 15th May and last week I saw a gardening programme on TV that said not to plant out tender plants till the 3rd week of May! I confess I planted out on the 13th, not a good day for doing anything but the last few days have been fine but there are likely to be frosts at the end of the week!
There was a very bad frost a week or two ago and many fruit plants were badly affected, the cherries look pathetic and I don't think it will be a good year for walnuts.
At the moment my plot looks healthy.

The first lettuce are doing really well and today I am going to have my first helping of lettuce from the garden.  The leeks germinated exactly a month after I sowed them, I was just giving up hope!  Tomorrow I will cover and protect as much as I can I just hope the potatoes survive as I can't cover them.
30th May
Thursday will be the start of meteorological summer! The weather has become more normal, I don't think we had a frost last week. The temperatures are now reasonable for the time of year and it has rained plenty this last week. I don't think I have done anything different this year but everything is growing well, the beans and mange-tout have sprouted, I have loads of lettuce, everything looks healthy, except the cherries which are virtually non-existent, such a shame because the blossom was beautiful, the later flowering apples also look as if they are doing nothing.  I am going to have to rethink my raspberries, I wanted to move them all up to the orchard but the deer have been having a feast, eating the tops of the majority of the canes, it doesn't look like it is a good idea, the gooseberries are doing nothing as well :(

August

Eventually everything is growing, the lettuce have been reluctant but I have sufficient. The tomatoes are now changing colour, I won't have to buy any more. The beans are still producing and I have frozen quite a few, the courgette is slow, which is probably a blessing :) I have sufficient and I have frozen some already. I have harvested the potatoes and some of the onions, next year I must only grow onions in the lower plot, keep the 'orchard' for fruit and potatoes.
The plum doesn't have much fruit and what it has seems to have been nobbled, I aim to pick them all tomorrow.
It has been a very hot dry summer, today is cloudy, for the first time in 2 months. I don't know whether it has been because of the unusually hot weather but the snakes have been much in evidence. One, very hot, afternoon there were 3 snakes swimming in the old wash place, I got a photo of one of them leaving!

 Another day there was only one having a swim, he was more unlucky as the water level was reduced, I think he couldn't get out and the next day he was dead.

It gives pause for thought when walking around in long grass!

summer

So now it is officially summer. Things are growing slowly, that is, everything except the weeds are growing slowly!!  I have a flower on the 'mange-tout', the raspberries are just starting to ripen and I have had strawberries. The gooseberries are virtually non existent and I am still waiting for lettuce seeds to germinate!

I have one great achievement! I have picked my garlic and they are the best ever. Usually I am ashamed of the size, but this year they have really grown well.

June

I wonder how many years of gardening it takes before you can really recognize when to sow and plant!! It doesn't help that the instructions on the back of the seed packets seem to be really wrong. Looking at last year I seem to be having the same problem with the lettuce that I have each year, I sow according to the instructions but they never germinate until the weather gets warm.
This year Spring has been particularly cold and wet and germination seems particularly slow, but maybe not. My leeks germinated well, the beans are just starting and I have 4 mange-tout. It is the lettuce that are being a pain, I have sown seeds 3 times, one packet promised me that I would have salad to eat in 26 days!! Not a thing, I have bought 12 lettuce plants at various times over the last few weeks and 9 have been eaten by something, as have 2 peppers and a courgette, I now have 3 lettuce and 2 courgettes sitting under plastic bottles, hopefully they will survive.
We have been lucky with the fruit this year, the trees all managed to blossom whilst we had a few days of good weather, the only fruit that is not performing well is my gooseberries, they seem to be on strike. The snow in winter broke some branches off my neighbours plum tree, these happened to be the branches that grew over my plot and they are really nice plums so I won't have any of those this year but mine seem to be doing well. Now I just have to be patient and maybe also sow some more lettuce :)