Snow

It's only been a week since the first frost of the winter, and now it's snowing.

The Herb Garden (&copy Ian 2016)

The Orchard (© Ian 2016)

The house in the snow (© Ian 2016)

When I commented on the colour being ephemeral, I didn't think we'd only have ten days more of it—but you'll see the Virginia Creeper is bare, and the acers have lost most of their leaves, too.

First Frost

We had our first frost of the year last night. Later than I'd normally expect, but it's been lovely mild autumn.

Orchard Mown

It's been a rather long and tiring day, but the grass of the orchard is now all cut. It always looks a little sorry for itself at this point (yellow patches, brown patches...patches I missed with Sigrid), but it will soon look reasonable—and will continue to look tidy over the winter, which it wouldn't otherwise. Cutting it back at least once a year also means that the brambles and thistles don't slowly dominate, and the grass stays tidy, rather than gradually forming tussocks, which are a pain underfoot.

Conversely, only cutting it annually means that the non-grass plants have a chance to complete their lifecycle, growing, flowering, and setting seed, which makes for a much more wildlife friendly landscape, and a much prettier one, as we get the succession of flowers and seeds—including the grass, a lot of the varieties of which have pretty flowers, and then good autumn colouring.

The hillside strimmed, and ready for winter (© Ian 2016)

It's been a good autumn for colours: I think the combination of reasonable rainfall, but no high winds, coupled with warm (well, not cold) days and cool (but not freezing) nights has meant that leaves have developed good colours, and not been shed. This is the beautiful moment where the Virginia Creeper (I love the Latin name, Parthenocissus quinquefolia, which tells you everything) has completely turned colour, to bright scarlet, but hasn't lost too many leaves. At the same time, the two acers in front of it, which spend the summer clothed in light green, have turned yellow, and are just getting the red-orange highlights they'll sport until the leaves drop.

It's ephemeral, but for a few days, we get both.

The house in autumn colours (© Ian 2016)

Ditches and Drains

Yesterday, I spent a very pleasant day with David in Leeds, whereas Liz has painted the sitting room and dining room walls with watered-down basecoat. They're a bit patchy, of course, but they look loads better. Next weekend we will hopefully get one or two of the proper coats on top.

Today then I've done some bits and pieces, which hasn't really felt very productive: but Liz has first-coat painted the rest of the kitchen, including undercoating the big window's reveals. Meanwhile, I've filled the screw holes on the reveals in the sitting room (almost), and started undercoating them.

The really heavy rain of the last few days has meant there have been two little rivers flowing down the orchard. We've had about 4" of rain, which is a large fraction of the annual 48"—that's about a month's rain in two days. The ditch is just about keeping up, but the silly drain that I keep meaning to change is, well, being silly, and flooding some of the water onto the lane. That's a pain, as it scours the potholes. However, it's all worse still for the New Barn, as everything in the ditch and track finds its way to the crossroads, and some goes down to them. The ditch for this has, really, been inadequate for this much water, and they're in serious of danger of a flooded ground floor. Madness, for 1100' up in the Pennines, to flood, but there you go.

In brighter news, my part-made pond (where I dug out clay for planting the pond) has filled. I suspect it will empty again, as I don't think the walls are sufficiently clay-heavy to hold it. Never mind: as I make more ponds above it, to create a chain of reservoirs, and eventually line them, they'll clearly fill—and they will help slow the flow of water.

Land-Drains Completed

Having got the dining room wall plastered, we've got it painted: a watered down sealing coat on Friday night; a proper coat of white base on Saturday morning, and the 'Timeless' topcoat last night. It looks really good, and Liz's plastering is excellent. You now wouldn't know that that wall was newly insulated, boarded, and plastered, when compared to the two unaffected walls next to it.

Almost all the rest of the weekend has been spent installing proper land-drains on the hillside, to drain the orchard. When we planted the trees, two years ago, we only had time (and money) to dig open trenches to drain the ground, and they've remained so. That's been a little unsightly, but also made it awkward (even dangerous) to walk around the orchard, so it was only ever a temporary measure. The winter's the ideal time to do something about this, as the grass is dormant and shorter, the mess of sorting it out will be grown over in a short while, and the ground is wet—making it easy to check things are working.

The land-drains comprise an 80mm pipe, which comes with 15mm slits in it (two opposite each other, offset 90° with the next pair, about 10mm apart). The pipe gets covered in a polypropylene geotextile sock, which stops large particles getting into the drain and blocking it. Small silty particles pass through and get carried away, and the idea is that a permeable layer of larger particles builds up, improving water flow. Once this is laid in the trench, we've partly backfilled with 10-20mm gravel, and then covered it over. It looks a bit of a mess now, where the spoil stacks next to the trenches have been removed, and the trench is obviously bare soil. However, the grass will start growing quickly soon, and soon the lack of trenches and hummock-y spoil heaps will be a massive improvement. More important, practically, will be the much safer footing as I cut the grass with the brushcutter!

While we've been out, I also popped up to the birch clearing, and saw that a number of the snowdrops we planted last year have started to come up. Hopefully there'll be even more by next weekend.

Snowy Weekend

We've had a weekend at home, with a couple of short trips to see people, as we've had Liz's sister staying with us. There's been a lot of snow in the last week, and everything's looking very picturesque—although it does always make travel that little bit more trying.

[photos from top circuit walk in snow]

Master En Suite

Yesterday we connected the new bath in the master en suite (waste and both taps), levelled the tub and fixed it down, and then tiled around the bath. That was followed, this morning, by grouting the tiles, which now look really good; we've also attached a shower-curtain rail that doubles as a normal curtain, and installed the glass shower screen.

While Liz grouted, I've properly hung the door between the guest room and that en suite—it couldn't be done until the blockwork wall was down, because the door couldn't open. That's now up, and allows access as intended. On the landing, we've put up the last section of plasterboard in the lobby, as well as finishing the stud wall separating the side guest room from the en suite, and plasterboarded the unfinished guest room side. That also meant hanging a wall light (reusing the cabling for the shaving light from its bathroom incarnation.

That really does bring us the end of major operations, which has meant that we've been able to clear the dining room, which has been the staging arena for tools, consumables, and building material for months, now—since August. We've been able to return tools and the small remaining amount of materials to the workshop and garage (as was), and collect up the waste, which is broadly either scrap metal, wood for recycling, and a small amount of 'domestic' waste. It's lovely to have the dining room back, which now feels like a big room again.

We've also resorted to turning on the central heating, as the stove is starting to struggle as the only heating in the house. Not bad, turning on the boiler right at the end of November.

First Frost

This morning saw our first frost of the winter—coincidentally, on the same date as last year.

Fortunately, it wasn't a hard frost, hitting only the windscreen of the car, and not quite reaching the ground, which is as well, because we've not lifted anything. A frost was predicted for Wednesday morning, but not last night, so we were lucky. The house, too, protects the front garden, where the zonal pelagoniums are: we only have a limited number of non-hardy perennials, and these are a high fraction of the total.

As a result, we went out after getting back from work to lift the other vulnerable plants, as well as the geraniums in the front garden. The variegated agapanthus, Tinkerbell, and tulbaghia from Tatton last year, the three chocolate cosmos from this year, and the Queen Victoria lobelia (also Tatton Park 2013, I realise) have all been potted, and are in the greenhouse. That extends the time they can stay outside, before we have to find windowsills for them to go on, although they can't stay out there over winter, as the greenhouse isn't heated.

We've left the dahlias (Bishop of Llandaff, Twying's After Eight) for now, as they can wait until a proper frost kills the top-growth, before we lift the tubers for the winter.

Autumn Cut

We've enjoyed the wildflowers in the orchard this summer, which is one reason why I've left large swathes of it uncut for some time, only clearing paths through it. However, as autumn enters, I've now gone over the entire orchard, cutting it back as close as I can, so that it stays neat, and walkable, over the winter. Heavy work, even in the milder temperature, but it actually only took about three hours, which isn't bad. It looks a lot neater, even with the strewn vegetation.

Before doing that, though, this morning I've painted the arches of the apple walk, coating the steel rebar with cream-coloured metal paint. The arches now really stand out, and will stand the weather much better.

I've planted out the autumn-planting onions (100 Radar) and garlic (30-odd Marco) in the herb garden, through weed-proof membrane.

Last thing, I managed (just, before the light faded and drizzle set in) to mow the lawn. I managed to do the games lawn a while ago, but it's been some time since the rest has been done, and it really needed it. Hopefully, as the weather cools and the days shorten, it'll be a while until I have to do it again. I am hoping to manage to keep trimming it through the winter, weather permitting, this year. I do still need to take the brushcutter to the copse, though, and tidy the verges of the lane, so my grass-cutting isn't over for the year...

Planting Out

It's been a little while since we actually spent much time in the garden, so it's been nice to get out today. We spent the morning at Harlow Carr, enjoying the start of the transition into autumn in the shrubs and trees, and the long borders are glorious in their late-summer show.

Once we were home, we started by doing some weeding in the herb garden, which really needs it, although the addition of the membrane & chippings path has significantly reduced the impact of walking on the ground. It did get very compacted, which made weeding hard work, and although there's a lot of grass to dig out, it's much better. The grass will, I'm sure, continue to be a problem for a year or more, as we weaken the remaining, creeping roots.

We didn't have time to finish the herb garden, though, so once we'd made a dent in it, we went down to the kitchen garden. Having weeded those beds, I planted out a few clumps of spring cabbages (Durham Early), which may not amount to much, but might provide some useful leaves. Spring cabbages aren't, for us, a particularly useful crop, as they seem to come ready a little late, when actually we want to be putting in new plants in their space. Much more effective, to date, have been the winter Savoy cabbages (January King, the last couple of winters), which is harvested at a more useful moment. Anyway, we had some Durham Early plants, so in they've gone.

We've cut down the fruited raspberry canes, leaving only the stems that have grown this year. Getting the pruning right (last autumn) has made a big difference to the plant health and the size of the harvest this year.

The spring cabbages are the last thing that we'll be planting out in the kitchen garden until spring, now, so the remaining empty space was weeded, raked, and sown with green manure. This is a winter mix of crimson and red clover (leguminous nitrogen fixer and weed suppressors), Italian ryegrass (good soil stabilization, and deep roots for mineral up-lift), and mustard (bulky foliage for digging in). We added extra Caliente mustard, which is a particularly good biofumigant, improving soil health when it's chopped into the ground in spring. The current weather is good for sowing green manure: the soil's still warm, and moist, so it should germinate well, and get a few weeks growth before it gets particularly cold. The mustard nor the crimson clover are particularly hardy, so they won't survive a bitter winter, but there's a window for them to do some work, at least.

The kitchen garden sorted, we spent half an hour tidying the long border, before planting out the plants we bought at York Gate and Wisley.

From York Gate: a white salvia (into the copse bed: Salvia paniculata, I think), a white Jacob's Ladder (P. caeruleum subsp. caeruleum f. album), a white phlox (P. paniculata), a helenium, and a golden oats (Stipa gigantea). Wisley yielded three variegated eupatorium ('Pink Elegans'), two variegated phlox (P. paniculata 'Norah Leigh'), three agastache ('Blackadder'), a crimson sedum ('Red Cauli'), and a molinia ('Skyracer'), which have, apart from 'Norah Leigh', gone into the long border.

Near the End of Mowing

I was a little pushed for time, and only managed to do the games lawn, but I've mown some of the lawn tonight: that bit grows fastest. It's nearing the end of regular/frequent mowing, and hopefully I'll only have one or two more 'weekly' cuts to make. I shall try to do it once or twice over the winter, if there's a dry spell, to keep it neat.

On the other hand, I also need to cut the grass in the orchard in the next month or so. When I have a spare day.

More Perennial Plugs

As expected (though we didn't think it would follow quite so hot on emptying the module trays last night), today we received 96 perennial plugs: 24 each of 'Mussinni' catmint (nepeta), echinacea 'Deep Rose', achillea 'Cassis', and a dozen each of 'Blue Queen' salvia, and 'Lady Strathden' geum. Interestingly, the cats don't seem as interested in the catmint as our other plants, grown from seed or 'Walkers Low', which bodes well for actually being able to plant it out.

Forgot to mention: I was finally able to mow the lawn yesterday, too, after not being able to coincide good weather and time for three weeks. The games lawn really needed it, but actually the rest wasn't too bad.

Preparing the Dining Room

Since Friday afternoon, we've had Rachel, Philip, Luke, Elizabeth, Robert, Liz, and Ash with us. We were really lucky with the weather, which meant we could spend yesterday afternoon outside, and have a barbecue. Today's been a lot worse, with high winds and heavy rain. However, as they left yesterday evening and after breakfast, respectively, we've had an opportunity to do some work inside.

This is what the dining room looked like at lunchtime.

Garden side of the dining room (© Ian 2014)

Front side of the dining room (© Ian 2014)

And this is what it was like when we finished for the day. We still need to fix the rest of the horizontal battens, and then attach the insulation, vertical battens, and plasterboard, but we didn't think we'd get any work done this weekend, so that's good.

Stripped dining room wall (© Ian 2014)

A Full Greenhouse

We didn't do anything much in the garden over the weekend other than walk round it, as Philip, Rachel and baby Luke were visiting. It must be said that walking round it was rather nice, as it's an opportunity to ignore the weedy patches, and the not-doing-anything-yet herbaceous perennials, and enjoy the daffodils in full glory, the swelling buds on trees, and the daily lengthening of rhubarb stems.

After they'd set off home, though, we sowed a number of seeds (marigolds, stipa, pennisetum, lupins, verbena, cucomelon, I think), and I pottered briefly in the greenhouse. This is our first spring with a greenhouse, and the young plants we've overwintered in it are much further on than those in open ground. The extra warmth and protection are fantastic. It's full, inevitably. Many of the plants in it are going to be forced out soon: they're hardy plants, that didn't need the greenhouse (even un-heated, it's got no lower than -1°C, and mostly been frost free), but have clearly benefitted. However, with a steady train of seedlings germinating inside, they older plants will need to make way for new plants, and eventually even these will get planted out, to be replaced with tender veg. We've got germinated tomatoes, chillis, sweet peppers, and aubergines, which will all occupy the glasshouse for the summer.

For now, though, it's almost all perennials, and about a hundred sweet peas.

Greenhouse full of young plants, grown on over the winter, and ready to plant out soon (© Ian 2014)

 There are a lot of small lavenders (on the right), which were intended for the edges of the herb garden. We've been doing a bit of a think about this: further work is probably off the cards until the autumn, as anything we do will be trampled by wall insulation this summer. The lavender will have to be planted out in a temporary location. On the far bench are some of the sweet peas, the tulbaghia and agapanthus from Tatton Park, a couple of dozen deschampsia from seed last year, and in the back left the cut-off rootstocks from grafting. These have come into leaf, and look like they've rooted, which is marvellous news. They'll go into a nursery bed for future grafting. On the top shelves on the right are a load of vegetable seedlings: brassicas, beetroot, spinach, chard. There are also some perennials: six herbaceous potentillas, for example. On the left are ungerminated seeds (which don't need so much light), and other perennials: half a dozen astilbes, some geraniums, some clivia (technically not hardy, but they've done fine), and some hostas that are in pots waiting for a bog garden to be built. And, also, a tray of hosta seedlings from last year, which are just coming out for their first 'adult' year.

One-year-old hostas (© Ian 2014)

Noble Potatoes

Our seed potatoes arrived today. This year, we've ordered a collection that are all, in some way, noble, partly for fun, partly because they composed a sensible group.

• British Queen, a second early. I don't know whether it's for a particular British Queen, but note that it was bred in 1894, when Victoria was on the throne.
• Red Duke of York, a red sport of Duke of York, and a first early. I assume it was named after Richard, Duke of York (father of Edward IV and Richard III (not, himself, ever Duke of York, as that creation of the title reverted to the crown with Edward IV's accession), and not one of the later creations of the title.
• Lady Christl, a first early which we've grown each of the last three years. It yields well and early, is tasty, and stores surprisingly well for a first early (right through to spring). Sadly, Lady Christl doesn't appear to be named for anyone.
• International Kidney, a second early. Grown on Jersey, under trademark, as Royal Jersey. Close enough?
• Lady Balfour, an early maincrop named after the founder of the Soil Association. (She was 'Lady' Balfour as a courtesy title, her father being the second Earl of Balfour.)

We've gone for earlier varieties, without a late maincrop (Druid was unavailable, sadly), in the hope that it'll avoid wireworm or blight trouble. The seed tubers are now in the spare room, chitting, ready to plant out in a month or so.

Also this evening, we've sown a few ornamental seeds from the RHS's seed scheme, as well as beetroot and swiss chard.

Sprung

Today's been a phenomenally nice day, with temperatures around 17°C, and bright sun. Yesterday was cooler, and a bit cloudier, which made it an ideal day for chopping a load of firewood (sticky tricky pine, but never mind).

The warmth and bright sun today's meant that there are probably a dozen daffodils pretty much out, where yesterday there were three. The crocuses enjoyed it, too, and I'm pretty sure a bee flew past me (too fast to be sure) this afternoon.

The dwarf irises in the long border, and around the pond, are out, and beautiful.

Dwarf iris (© Ian 2014)

When the acer in the front garden was first planted, in a large pot in our last garden, we underplanted it with snowdrops. They never came to much, but after we planted the acer in our new front garden (before starting this blog: I think it was September 2009), they've started to come up, and the last couple of years have given us a decent show.

Snowdrops under the acer (© Ian 2014) 

I've actually got a big consignment of snowdrops on order—1000 common singles (Galanthus nivalis) and 500 doubles (G. n. 'Flora Pleno')—which will hopefully arrive, in the green, soon, and can go out, on hillside and in garden.

Which brings us to today's efforts. First thing was finishing the winter pruning, by working on the fruit bushes. The blackcurrants, gooseberries, and red/whitecurrants all needed pruning, and we also removed some old wood on the blueberries, which are still proving troublesome. The two oldest ('Grover' and something unknown) were several years old when planted in 2010, and the other three are now four years old—and still not very large (to say the least). These three have definitely grown better over the last year (hopefully the good mulching last spring and resultant weed-free year has got them going), at least. However, we decided that we had to take out some old wood on the oldest pair, as ageing stems is possibly the cause of their much-reduced yield.

Once we'd finished in the fruit beds, we went up onto the hillside, to start work on clearing the blackthorn at the back of the orchard. This is partly to increase the size of the orchard, as the two sweet chestnuts are nestled into clearings in the blackthorn, and the space for the second mulberry (which, I'm astonished to realise, I never mentioned) is currently somewhere inside the blackthorn shown below.

Orchard, with back boundary of blackthorn (© Ian 2014) 

The blackthorn (which have never produced loads of sloes, sadly) lies in front of a line of trees (hawthorn, elder, and holly, primarily) which would make a better boundary, probably underplanted with hazel, beech, and bulbs. We're working on it from above, so it looks much the same today as it does in these photos, but we've actually hollowed out the undergrowth quite effectively. It's probably still a couple of days' work, but it's a good start. As Liz cleared, I was burning the blackthorn on a bonfire in the upper clearing (a hot, fast burning bonfire, I must note: no smoky, smouldering eyesore), as blackthorn's a nightmare to chip.

The entrance to the clearing, through, hopefully, arch-trained plums, will be roughly central in the photo below. You can just make out the sweet chestnut's stake on the far right; the other is hidden on the left. The mulberry will probably go behind and left of the established apple tree just in front of the blackthorn (for now). So; the mulberry. For several years, our local garden centre has sent a voucher around early November, which I've managed to use for a cheap fruit tree: a Broadview walnut in 2012, and a Serbian Gold quince in 2011. Last November, they had a 'Chelsea' mulberry (also known as 'King James', as it comes from a plant grown at Chelsea Physic Park as part of King James IV's misguided silk industry initiative), which we thought would make a good partner to the Jerusalem mulberry planted nearer the front of the orchard. And with 50% off, it was rather a good deal. It's had to remain in its pot, unfortunately, as we've not finished clearing its space, but fortunately, as it's container grown, it should be fine for a little longer: there's not the rush to get it in the ground, unlike bare-root, field-grown trees.

The orchard, looking up at the doomed blackthorn bank (© Ian 2014)

Rootstocks

The MM106 apple and Quince A rootstocks arrived during the week, and have been heeled into a bucket of compost, waiting to be planted out. That was the first order of the day, so all but two apples are now safely planted in the nursery beds we dug on the hillside. We've put up the chickenwire cage that will protect all three beds from deer, and the rootstocks should now have a couple of weeks to settle in before we graft onto them.

Yesterday afternoon, we then drove the 22 tubes that will support the apple walk arches into the ground. These are 5/8" steel tubes, with the underground section cold-galvanized, and bitumen painted, for corrosion protection. They extend about 90cm above ground, and the rebar arches will slot into them in a few weeks. Alongside are the support stakes, that will ensure that the rootstocks don't suffer windrock while they establish.

Steel tubes, zinc-painted and ready for bituminous paint over-coat ( Ian 2014)

Having got these carefully positioned, we then dug the two planting holes for our sweet chestnuts, which are on the same order as the twenty apples and one pear (the last two apples for the walk are amongst the grafting set). This was astonishingly easy: we each went to one hole, planning to get started then reconvene once we knew how difficult they were going to be—and had the holes dug in a few minutes. Working in the very stony (historically terraced) corner with the apple walk has clearly given us a different perspective. The holes dug, I drove an 8' stake for each; this has the advantage of being able to see the position from the house, to check that they seem right.

The two trenches of the apple walk then needed refilling, so we poured in seven bags of sand, to help drainage, and eight trugs of compost, before scraping the spoil heaps back into the trenches. Even with the additions, the loss of all that stone from the trenches means that they were still underfilled.

To make up the shortfall, we've used loam from the stacks of turf we've been building in the copse while lifting turves from the quince, sweet-pea, and copse beds. Trenches topped up, we then decided to put up the chicken-wire cage for the applewalk, having previously thought of leaving it until after planting. However, with the centre of the walk now clear of soil (but still muddy and slippery), we decided there was good enough access, and the greater risk was of kicking a tree over while manoeuvring the heavy roll of wire net. The corner stakes aren't really secure enough to tension a fence (I couldn't drive them deeply enough into the stony soil), but they've sufficed for getting the protective cage round the apple beds. We also had to dig one or two more short drains, to ensure that the ground isn't too wet—the very wet weather of the last month means there are several stream flowing down the hillside, in the main gullies and land-drain, and the ground just inside the gap in the wall is a pond. Fortunately, all our drainage work last year seems to have done the job well, and the existing trees seem protected from the worst of it.

The fruit trees are scheduled to arrive this coming week, and so we should be able to plant up the apple walk next weekend, at long last.

Stakes

It's been an unpleasant job, in the wet and the wind, but we managed to finish digging the second apple-walk trench, as well as the three nursery-bed trenches. The latter came across far fewer stones, which made it easier than it could have been—we definitely picked the stoniest part of the field to build the apple walk.

Having dug the trench, we drove the first set of posts in: 2½" posts, 5'6" long, and spaced 3' apart. The first set of eleven were straightforward, but getting the second set parallel, with each one squarely opposite its pair, was a slog. Eventually, though, we got them all in, and are happy with their position. They're a bit wonky, in fairness, and not perfectly straight. I hope that we'll be able to drive the tubes for the actual arches a little more accurately. The stakes are off-set from the arches by a few inches (up-hill and outwards): the trees will be planted just outside the arch's tubes. As they're on MM106 rootstocks, they'll only need the stakes for a few years, to protect against wind rocking the roots, and then the stakes can be pulled up, or sawn off at ground level.

The nursery trenches were easier, as they don't have to be too accurate. There's a variety of heights, either 8' posts or 5'6", depending on what we intend for the adjacent tree. We can't be sure that we'll actually need them all for grafting: I've ordered three rootstocks per variety, but if the scion material is short, we may only get one, or two, scions worth from each. That's manageable: the rootstocks will 'keep'.

Once the support stakes were in, we also had posts to drive in around each set of beds (four around the nursery beds, six around the walk), which will support an anti-deer chicken-wire cage. We'll only put that up once the trees are in, to give maximum manoeuvrability for planting. 

First Frost

Today sees the first frost of the winter: later than I'd expect, but October was mild, and we've only just put the heating on this last weekend. The rest of the weekend (getting the boiler fired up the first time each winter is not insignificant, with two thousand litres of water to heat from 14 to 85°C) was spent on bits and pieces, including chopping and stacking a few cubic metres of firewood, and—fortunately, given today's weather!—lifting the Bishop of Llandaff dahlias.

I notice that my 25th October entry, about putting up the orchard fence, is my 400th. Cue some stats and data...

Bizarrely, in both my first twelve months of this blog, and the second twelve, I managed exactly the same number of posts (111); and in each of the third and fourth years, I made 90 entries. As well as a round number of posts, it's almost exactly four years since I started keeping the log of what was going on in the house and garden.

I've now managed to blog on 73% of the days of the year: interestingly, I've always written something on 1st September. One day, I'd quite like to compile a collection of diary entries, one for each day of the year. I think they'd give an interesting view of the regularities and irregularities, as a 3rd March from one year is followed by a 4th March from another. Monty Don's book, The Ivington Diaries, follows this structure, and I rather enjoyed reading it.

Apparently, it'll take me at least one more year of blogging to accumulate enough entries to cover the whole year (I managed to 'collect' 29th February last year, by accident, so I don't need to wait until 2018 for that!), but I may get there yet.

Potatoes, Parsnips, and Planting

After discovering quite a lot of wireworm damage to a couple of parsnips, we decided to take up the parsnips (4.5kg), carrots, and maincrop potatoes, to limit damage. The Druid potatoes have yielded 28kg, from 20 plants, which is pleasing.

Although taking them up early was a bit frustrating, we've also managed to get our honeyberries in the ground, finally, and get a number of other pots planted into the front copse bed, as well as the goji berries into their new beds on the back patio. The honeyberries, and two cultivated blackberries, have gone into new small beds demarcating the entrance to the kitchen garden, which also feature willow trellis panels. I'll have to get a photo...

A heather, the forsythias, the old astible and heuchera from the pots in the front, have all gone into the copse bed—the astilbe and heuchera having been split. Some of the heucheras have gone into the hanging baskets for the winter, as the nasturtiums (which have been great) have been badly caterpillared in the last couple of weeks, and are rather the worse for wear.

Lastly, a photo of this week's sweet pea harvest: 700 stems. It's probably the peak, but we've been getting about 500 stems each of the last 8-9 weeks, I estimate, which is a staggering number of flowers. Sadly, the plants are showing signs of fatigue, so it won't go on much longer.

The sweet-pea tripods (pre-harvest!) (© Ian 2013)

700 Sweet-Peas (© Ian 2013)