Saturday, 29 September 2018
Harvest festival
My tomatoes are excelling themselves. I don't think I've ever had such a good crop - of anything.
Saturday, 15 September 2018
A fuchsia from the past
My mum died in April 2015, more than three years ago, but I always think of her when I see these fuchsias.
I took a cutting from the fuchsias outside her front door after she'd died but I wasn't hopeful they'd come to anything. They meant a lot to my mum in her very old age. They were given to her by her kind cleaner, Ruth. My mum always liked to tell me that Ruth had said she had so many fuchsias in her garden that she could have as many cuttings as she liked.
Well, I took some cuttings and brought them back to London and planted them in a pot. To start with, they behaved just like cut flowers, soon wilting and leaving a few apparently dead twigs. I think this is them below, in March 2016.
I never got round to throwing them out. One day I spotted some minute green buds appearing lower down the stems.
There was no turning back. They thrived, I repotted them, and they've been growing happily outside our front door ever since.
Friday, 20 July 2018
Expensive tomato seeds: I take it all back
Last time I was whinging about the cost of the packet of tomato seeds I'd just bought. Well, I'm not whinging any more. I actually have twelve very decent-looking tomato plants from them, which must be a strike rate of close to 90 per cent.
Don't you love the smell of tomato plants - even before there are any tomatoes on them? It's a little sharp but somehow incredibly healthy.
So I take it all back, Thompson and Morgan, they are obviously quality seeds, if small in number.
Don't you love the smell of tomato plants - even before there are any tomatoes on them? It's a little sharp but somehow incredibly healthy.
So I take it all back, Thompson and Morgan, they are obviously quality seeds, if small in number.
I am watering the plants conscientiously with a special tomato feed supplement every evening and it seems to be working. The only problem with the plant above, the biggest, is that if there's a storm, it's so big and heavy that it could easily break.
Still, the problems of success!
Saturday, 26 May 2018
These tomato seeds are like gold dust
NEXT POST
I try to avoid spending money on anything to do with the greenhouse: the idea is to grow things that will produce seeds or compost for next year - like a tech startup that's profitable from day one and doesn't need to rely on venture capital.
However, I usually buy the odd packet of seeds and this year, went down to my local garden centre to pick up a packet of tomato seeds and one packet of radish seeds. It was only when I got to the till that I found that the tomato seeds cost £4.99, which seemed excessive.
I try to avoid spending money on anything to do with the greenhouse: the idea is to grow things that will produce seeds or compost for next year - like a tech startup that's profitable from day one and doesn't need to rely on venture capital.
However, I usually buy the odd packet of seeds and this year, went down to my local garden centre to pick up a packet of tomato seeds and one packet of radish seeds. It was only when I got to the till that I found that the tomato seeds cost £4.99, which seemed excessive.
I didn't realise the price was written on the back of the packet and asked the person serving me whether she'd got it right. She showed me she had. I said they were expensive. She agreed and had a look at the packet.
"Well, they're 'the exhibitor's favourite'," she read out.
"Yeah right," I said.
But I decided I'd give the exhibitor's favourite a go, and see whether they'd be my favourite too.
Back in the greenhouse, I opened the little white inner packet, which appeared to be empty. Oh no, there was a tiny little collection of about a dozen seeds in the bottom corner. There were so few that there was no question of trying to sprinkle them onto the soil: they'd all come out at once and land too close together.
Instead, I extracted them each by hand and put them into the soil. Afterwards I thought there must have been a mistake. Surely some machine in a factory had gone wrong and failed to put the right number of seeds into the packet.
I decided to email the manufacturers, Thompson and Morgan, point out their mistake and and ask for another packet. Back in the house, I had a proper look at the back of the packet and saw this:
"Average 15 seeds". How mean can you get? Surely the actual cost of the seeds is the least expensive part of their business? Still, if I'd looked, I'd have been warned. That's an average cost of 33 pence per seed. They must be literally worth their weight in gold.
So far, only the radish seeds are sprouting. I hope those precious tomato seeds aren't just going to disappear forever.
Friday, 20 April 2018
The start of the greenhouse year
Gosh! I haven't written this blog for more than eight months. To everyone who's been checking hopefully every day to see whether it had sprung back to life, I can only apologise.
But we're back, and I'm officially pronouncing this the first day of the new greenhouse year.
Why? Well, because I've emptied it out, hosed it down, wiped the windows and replaced the wooden benches. I know you're going to be impressed:
OK, there's nothing much to see yet, but it's like a blank canvas waiting for the artist to create.
This is the third year I've had the greenhouse and I have to admit that I'm a little less greenhouse-proud each year. My cleanup operation wasn't as thorough as last year. But I think that if I can start growing all sorts of exciting stuff in it, my attitude will improve.
I would say 'watch this space' but this isn't a space. But through this blog, watch the space in the greenhouse, which will become less space and more green as the summer progresses.
Au revoir.
But we're back, and I'm officially pronouncing this the first day of the new greenhouse year.
Why? Well, because I've emptied it out, hosed it down, wiped the windows and replaced the wooden benches. I know you're going to be impressed:
OK, there's nothing much to see yet, but it's like a blank canvas waiting for the artist to create.
This is the third year I've had the greenhouse and I have to admit that I'm a little less greenhouse-proud each year. My cleanup operation wasn't as thorough as last year. But I think that if I can start growing all sorts of exciting stuff in it, my attitude will improve.
I would say 'watch this space' but this isn't a space. But through this blog, watch the space in the greenhouse, which will become less space and more green as the summer progresses.
Au revoir.
Monday, 31 July 2017
A crumble in the making
NEXT POST
It's been a good year for blackberries in London. They're a couple of months early I think (as are the few mushrooms I've seen), but that's part of another debate.
Because they're early, I don't think people are expecting to be out picking, and I've only seen a couple of other people with their plastic containers in the woods and on the sides of paths.
But here's what I got from about 15 minutes of picking down at the end of my road.
It's been a good year for blackberries in London. They're a couple of months early I think (as are the few mushrooms I've seen), but that's part of another debate.
Because they're early, I don't think people are expecting to be out picking, and I've only seen a couple of other people with their plastic containers in the woods and on the sides of paths.
But here's what I got from about 15 minutes of picking down at the end of my road.
And here's what they looked like when mixed with apples, some from our garden (again, early) and some garden rhubarb (the right time of year, I think).
Now, stew with some sugar and a little water.
Mix up flour with some margarine and more sugar and bake for 20 minutes or so.
It was bigger than it looks there (the lumps of crumble are bigger than you think) and in fact I was able to make two decent-sized crumbles that were well-received.
Living off the land! For the extras, once in a while.
Friday, 10 March 2017
The start of the 2017 season
NEXT POST
It's the Ides of March next week. The Ides of any month is really just half way through the month. So, for March, all that means is that we're 2.5 months out of 12 through the year, or a little over a fifth, but not a round number.
Of course, the Ides of March acquired its own significance through the murder of Julius Caesar in 44BC, but that's got very little to do with greenhouses, unless there's some connection with it being time to plant lettuce and other ingredients of a future Caesar salad. But that's not what I'm saying.
What I am celebrating - well, marking at least - is that today I did a kind of pre-Spring clean of the greenhouse, and I'm afraid there have been some sad losses over the Winter. How are you supposed to keep geraniums alive over the winter in a greenhouse? I was told not to water them too much, but frankly, during the cold days of November, December and January, I didn't feel like going outside, never mind watering anything in the greenhouse.
So I suppose I've only got myself to blame for the fact that about half the geraniums and a few other things seem to have died.
Today felt like the start of things because I reconnected the outside tap, confident that they'll be no more frost - or at least not enough to burst the outside pipe. That meant I could easily pull the hose into the greenhouse and give the survivors a well-earned drink of water.
A lot of the dead geraniums had become brown and dusty, so I have sorted them out, creating these pots where there was nothing left to save:
And these which look like they'll make it:
In some cases, the promise of great things this summer rests on the tiniest leaf:
But, hey, the more compact the plant at this stage, the healthier it'll be as it grows, I think.
Now I need to russell up some seeds and get ahead of the season - because that's what a greenhouse is for.
It's the Ides of March next week. The Ides of any month is really just half way through the month. So, for March, all that means is that we're 2.5 months out of 12 through the year, or a little over a fifth, but not a round number.
Of course, the Ides of March acquired its own significance through the murder of Julius Caesar in 44BC, but that's got very little to do with greenhouses, unless there's some connection with it being time to plant lettuce and other ingredients of a future Caesar salad. But that's not what I'm saying.
What I am celebrating - well, marking at least - is that today I did a kind of pre-Spring clean of the greenhouse, and I'm afraid there have been some sad losses over the Winter. How are you supposed to keep geraniums alive over the winter in a greenhouse? I was told not to water them too much, but frankly, during the cold days of November, December and January, I didn't feel like going outside, never mind watering anything in the greenhouse.
So I suppose I've only got myself to blame for the fact that about half the geraniums and a few other things seem to have died.
Today felt like the start of things because I reconnected the outside tap, confident that they'll be no more frost - or at least not enough to burst the outside pipe. That meant I could easily pull the hose into the greenhouse and give the survivors a well-earned drink of water.
A lot of the dead geraniums had become brown and dusty, so I have sorted them out, creating these pots where there was nothing left to save:
And these which look like they'll make it:
In some cases, the promise of great things this summer rests on the tiniest leaf:
But, hey, the more compact the plant at this stage, the healthier it'll be as it grows, I think.
Now I need to russell up some seeds and get ahead of the season - because that's what a greenhouse is for.
Saturday, 29 October 2016
The last tomato of summer
NEXT POST
As I suggested just over a month ago, it's been a race between the advance of autumn and the reddening of my tomatoes.
Well, with Halloween just two days away, I've admitted defeat and collected my last tomatoes this afternoon. I have started pulling up their plants, partly to make room for the tulip bulbs I want to plant.
So here it is, the last tomato of summer.
And if you wonder why I've given up on the rest, this is why: they are looking seasonally spooky.
They are going to go brown before they go red. Sad that my most promising-looking green tomatoes have gone this way. Oh well, maybe next year...
NEXT POST
As I suggested just over a month ago, it's been a race between the advance of autumn and the reddening of my tomatoes.
Well, with Halloween just two days away, I've admitted defeat and collected my last tomatoes this afternoon. I have started pulling up their plants, partly to make room for the tulip bulbs I want to plant.
So here it is, the last tomato of summer.
NEXT POST
Sunday, 25 September 2016
The race between Autumn and tomatoes
NEXT POST
No matter how early in the year you start growing tomatoes, around now you always seem to be waiting to see whether they're going to have enough sun and warmth to ripen before the chill, dark days of Autumn.
Or whether they'll stay green until their plant dries out and then gets soggy and you just have to watch them rot. It's not good if dew and rain start appearing and the tomatoes are still looking like this:
In fact, with the changeable weather recently, there's been good news on the tomato front in my garden. This is what they've started to look like:
No matter how early in the year you start growing tomatoes, around now you always seem to be waiting to see whether they're going to have enough sun and warmth to ripen before the chill, dark days of Autumn.
Or whether they'll stay green until their plant dries out and then gets soggy and you just have to watch them rot. It's not good if dew and rain start appearing and the tomatoes are still looking like this:
In fact, with the changeable weather recently, there's been good news on the tomato front in my garden. This is what they've started to look like:
And several times, I've gone out into the garden and returned with quite a decent crop:
But there's still plenty to play for. Some of the best plants are still looking like this:
Please, just another few warm days, and it could be a bumper crop.
Sunday, 7 August 2016
From greenhouse to gut?
NEXT POST
I hate that phrase you hear on food programmes on the radio: 'from farm to fork'. But what would the greenhouse equivalent be: 'from greenhouse to gut'? 'From greenhouse to gustatory experience'? 'From greenhouse to getting supper'?
Well anyway, if we had a suitable phrase, we could have used it yesterday, because we went from this:
And this:
To this:
And this:
I hate that phrase you hear on food programmes on the radio: 'from farm to fork'. But what would the greenhouse equivalent be: 'from greenhouse to gut'? 'From greenhouse to gustatory experience'? 'From greenhouse to getting supper'?
Well anyway, if we had a suitable phrase, we could have used it yesterday, because we went from this:
And this:
To this:
And this:
And jolly good they were, though I say so myself.
I planted both courgette and marrow seeds in the greenhouse a few months ago, but I can't remember which were where. I suspect the darker one here was a marrow and could have carried on growing more and the lighter one was a courgette. They seemed to taste the same though, and probably both better than a big marrow would do in a month or so.
When you use a kitchen knife outside to cut a vegetable, you're turning something from the world of the garden into something for the world of the kitchen. Where previously, a bit of mud and the odd insect were perfectly acceptable, now tiny blemishes are examined forensically and removed before cooking and consumption. Imagine having to clean the greenhouse to the standard of the kitchen.
Saturday, 30 July 2016
What a difference two weeks makes
We just got back from a fortnight away, and the place looks like a jungle:
The marrows and courgettes have taken over, filling up the passage through the middle of the greenhouse and pretty much excluding other plants from the light. I don't particularly mind about the nasturtiums, which self-seeded anyway, but there are also tomato plants in there which are looking unhealthily tall and thin.
That may be partly because the greenhouse itself doesn't get as much light as it should, being in the shadow of the house in the morning and that of some large trees at the bottom of the garden in the afternoon. But obviously the big marrow leaves don't help.
Someone kindly watered the greenhouse while we were away, but I forgot to ask her to leave the door open if it was hot, which I think it was. So there are signs of decay, of living in a hot, damp atmosphere:
Now I've left the door open, hoping the plants will get used to more normal conditions for England.
Plants that I'd already transferred outside did best while I was away, and I'm pleased to see that there are some quite healthy looking marrows and courgettes on the way:
I have now rescued some of the lanky tomato plants from death by marrow leaf, hoping a new life in the real world will restore them to health.
Saturday, 2 July 2016
Parsnip surprise
NEXT POST
This is the first time I've grown parsnips. They seem to be doing well, although I probably haven't given them enough space, letting them squeeze together in a couple of pots.
But when will they be ready for picking? I read one book that said it's when they're about two foot high. Well, some of mine had reached that, so I thought I'd pull one out. I wanted to avoid leaving it for so long that the roots had become tough and woody.
What I found was a relatively large bulb immediately below the surface and a lot of little parsnips growing out of it.
I'd been expecting to find just one parsnip. So do parsnips grow in bunches, as these ones look like they would if I'd left them? Or is this some kind of anomaly caused by transplanting or a time when it was short of water or something?
Anyway, my conclusion is that I should leave the rest to keep on growing for quite a few more weeks. Any thoughts would be welcome.
NEXT POST
This is the first time I've grown parsnips. They seem to be doing well, although I probably haven't given them enough space, letting them squeeze together in a couple of pots.
But when will they be ready for picking? I read one book that said it's when they're about two foot high. Well, some of mine had reached that, so I thought I'd pull one out. I wanted to avoid leaving it for so long that the roots had become tough and woody.
What I found was a relatively large bulb immediately below the surface and a lot of little parsnips growing out of it.
I'd been expecting to find just one parsnip. So do parsnips grow in bunches, as these ones look like they would if I'd left them? Or is this some kind of anomaly caused by transplanting or a time when it was short of water or something?
Anyway, my conclusion is that I should leave the rest to keep on growing for quite a few more weeks. Any thoughts would be welcome.
NEXT POST
Monday, 16 May 2016
Courgettes v marrows
NEXT POST
Only a week ago, I planted several lots of seeds from the bumper pack I bought back in January: courgettes, marrows and onions. I hope I'm not too late to be starting now (like Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman).
I am hugely impressed with the courgettes:
Especially when the marrows look like this:
I haven't grown onions before, so I don't know what to expect from them. I've planted some outside and some in the greenhouse. There are signs of life from the ones in the greenhouse, but I can't really believe I'm ever going to end up with real onions:
Finally, although it's nothing to do with the greenhouses, I couldn't ignore the colour of our new rhododendron, recently acquired from a garden centre and therefore, in my mind, cheating. Its colours are so bright that they practically broke my camera. Is there a colour equivalent of over-exposure - because that's what I was getting? The only way I could try to stop this picture burning out (or, as I say, the colour equivalent) was to under-expose and then brighten in Photoshop - and even that didn't completely work. Still, I'm not complaining: they look great:
NEXT POST
Only a week ago, I planted several lots of seeds from the bumper pack I bought back in January: courgettes, marrows and onions. I hope I'm not too late to be starting now (like Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman).
I am hugely impressed with the courgettes:
Especially when the marrows look like this:
I haven't grown onions before, so I don't know what to expect from them. I've planted some outside and some in the greenhouse. There are signs of life from the ones in the greenhouse, but I can't really believe I'm ever going to end up with real onions:
Finally, although it's nothing to do with the greenhouses, I couldn't ignore the colour of our new rhododendron, recently acquired from a garden centre and therefore, in my mind, cheating. Its colours are so bright that they practically broke my camera. Is there a colour equivalent of over-exposure - because that's what I was getting? The only way I could try to stop this picture burning out (or, as I say, the colour equivalent) was to under-expose and then brighten in Photoshop - and even that didn't completely work. Still, I'm not complaining: they look great:
NEXT POST
Saturday, 7 May 2016
Getting out in the sun
NEXT POST
It's May 7th, the sun is out, and it's hot too.
Last weekend, I did a bit of 'landscaping' around my greenhouse. Well, I built a little path to the door and turned a small square around it that wasn't quite lawn or flowerbed, into flowerbed. This was thanks to some planks I'd got off the back of the truck belonging to the man who'd come to cut our trees a few weeks ago. They were heading for the skip and so he was happy for me to take them.
And this morning, confident that spring has finally sprung, I transplanted some of my parsnips and cauliflowers out of pots in the greenhouse into the new bed, and moved a pot of leek seedlings out there too.
Behind them are wild raspberries and some mint that my aunt gave me a few years ago. Above it all is a cherry tree, whose white blossom has been blowing around today.
The cauliflowers have been rather horribly chewed by something in the greenhouse, but I hope they will have escaped whatever it is by being outside. Could it be snails? I have been systematically removing them from the greenhouse - well, systematically on random occasions - but they never seem to be fully eradicated. It's not like Bill Gates and polio.
And I moved out all the repotted geraniums too. None have died, amazingly, but they don't seem to have grown either. I expect a bit of warm weather will bring them on.
So now the greenhouse is looking rather empty. Tomorrow I hope to change that by planting some more seeds - tomatoes especially, and I'll see what else I've got.
A final word of praise to rhubarb. I don't know where this lot came from, but it's doing very well with no help from me, even if it is hogging the light that some more of the parsnips and cauliflowers that I transferred into the same tub really need. And what's the plant on the right - please, anyone know? It never seems to do anything much. Is it some kind of iris maybe?
NEXT POST
It's May 7th, the sun is out, and it's hot too.
Last weekend, I did a bit of 'landscaping' around my greenhouse. Well, I built a little path to the door and turned a small square around it that wasn't quite lawn or flowerbed, into flowerbed. This was thanks to some planks I'd got off the back of the truck belonging to the man who'd come to cut our trees a few weeks ago. They were heading for the skip and so he was happy for me to take them.
And this morning, confident that spring has finally sprung, I transplanted some of my parsnips and cauliflowers out of pots in the greenhouse into the new bed, and moved a pot of leek seedlings out there too.
Behind them are wild raspberries and some mint that my aunt gave me a few years ago. Above it all is a cherry tree, whose white blossom has been blowing around today.
The cauliflowers have been rather horribly chewed by something in the greenhouse, but I hope they will have escaped whatever it is by being outside. Could it be snails? I have been systematically removing them from the greenhouse - well, systematically on random occasions - but they never seem to be fully eradicated. It's not like Bill Gates and polio.
And I moved out all the repotted geraniums too. None have died, amazingly, but they don't seem to have grown either. I expect a bit of warm weather will bring them on.
So now the greenhouse is looking rather empty. Tomorrow I hope to change that by planting some more seeds - tomatoes especially, and I'll see what else I've got.
A final word of praise to rhubarb. I don't know where this lot came from, but it's doing very well with no help from me, even if it is hogging the light that some more of the parsnips and cauliflowers that I transferred into the same tub really need. And what's the plant on the right - please, anyone know? It never seems to do anything much. Is it some kind of iris maybe?
NEXT POST
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)