Gardening with a dodgy knee # 7

Despite the relative warmth in March we had a really cold spell at the beginning of April. I’d just sanitised the greenhouse - ready for the pre-ordered tomato plants - and didn’t want to lug my lemon tree back in there. It really is a small tree now and too heavy to lift if you’ve got a dodgy knee. And it might (might) have introduced bugs that the new tomato plants couldn’t handle. But as the lemon tree is so much heavier to shift now I wouldn’t just have had a dodgy knee - I’d more than likely end up with a slipped disc - if I lifted it. Yes I do need a trolley for manoeuvring my maturing citrus monster.

I decided to chance it and leave it outside. Friends have friends who leave their lemon trees out all winter - but mine hadn’t been hardened off. I feared it wouldn’t cope. 

I wrapped the once-protected tree in fleece, then bubble wrap and finally in a third layer of tarpaulin. All the fledgling lemon fruits were carefully protected too. We were expecting below freezing temperatures - cold winds rather than ice or snow - but potentially devastating for a mediterranean plant which had known such cosseting. 

By 11 April the cold winds had dropped. It was our wedding anniversary and we went out to Dyrham Park for a walk. The temperatures had picked up. We lunched in one pub on the top of Lansdown and had our evening meal in another. Covid was less of a threat by then.

Next day I needed to know the truth. Had my citrus plant survived the week of chilling winds? I carefully unwrapped the first tarpaulin layer. No errant lemon fruit had dropped off in the cold, as far as I could see. I removed the bubble wrap layer. Still all looked good. And finally I took away the fleece. And what did I discover?

Not only had ten semi-ripe lemon fruits stayed in situ: the plant’s leaves were still green, with no sign of frost damage and - even better - baby flowers were just forming. The gamble had paid off. The tree simply needed watering as its compost was dry.

Phew! I hadn’t lost my citrus wonder. 

I almost went into my new shed ( aka Nina’s gin palace) and poured myself a g&t with a slice from my brave, beautiful lemon tree.

But, on this occasion, I didn’t.

More next time.  

Gardening with a dodgy knee - the Midwich Cuckoos edition

You would expect any link with John Wyndham’s novels and the (super) natural plant world to be about ‘The Triffids’, wouldn’t you?  Walking monstrous plants with tendrils that blinded any human in their path could be readily associated with gardens and plant life.  But, in my case, I liken tending to my lemon tree, climbing beans and tomato plants as a scene from Wyndhams ‘The Midwich Cuckoos’. In my thoughts it’s plant life, not children, that have dominance over us, their humble gardeners. Truly. I do. 

My waking hours since returning from Dorset are dominated by these livings things. I have reminders on my phone and horticultural calendar about their feeding and watering regimes. I daily check that the climbing beans are free of predators. Every other day the tomatoes need water. (Then it’ll be a daily ritual.)Every week the lemon tree needs watering with its citrus feed. If it was this time last year I would be putting a parasol over it to protect the lemon tree leaves from the sun’s rays. It’s treated like a baby. A baby in the nest. A cuckoo. 

Daily I check the temperature in the greenhouse and see whether the tomato flowers have set. Now that the tomatoes are about twenty times the height they were when I placed them in their first pots they need staking. And if their flowers have set I need to give them tormorite feed in a week’s time. 

I don’t have a posh greenhouse so I leave the window open to allow tomato pollination from flying creatures. In order to ensure no overwintering bugs nor blight would weaken them I washed the greenhouse down with a Jeyes fluid solution before the darling plants ever stepped foot in there. Mustn’t upset the plant life or they won’t deliver.

It’s exhausting! 

And now - because we allowed ourselves a four-day holiday the herbaceous borders are paying me back by sprouting bloody bindweed.

So needy. So demanding of my time. Are the plants, like the Midwich Cuckoos, talking to each other? Causing me to change my indolent behaviour in order to give them my undivided attention?

I know I sound as if I am raving like a mad woman. I am, as far as I know, perfectly sane. But I feel the beans, lemons and tomatoes, in particular, need such a lot of support, both physically ie with canes and in terms of nurturing. They are, of course, plants that grow in south America and on the Med. That, rather than my mad notions of thought control, explains why they need so much tending. They are, when thinking more rationally, warm weather plants. 

For years I grew dwarf french beans. Absolutely no bother. No staking. No special temperatures - providing no frost was due. No special watering nor feeding required. No bending, even, as they grow in raised beds ie on legs. I check them at waist height. 

This year relations sent me six romanesco brassicas. Three look remarkably healthy and strong. One is non-existent and the other two are struggling. They are not my choice of vegetable. I’m inclined to nurture the three strongest plants. And now I read they need mesh over them to stop the pigeons. What? Even more slave labour??

But will the vegetation-hive-mind get to me? Will their dominance over me force me to nurture all the plants in my care so that I daren’t leave the garden?

Or, do I do as a friend - now a winner of medals from the Royal Society - once suggested? 

‘Let’s go on holiday. Bugger the beans.’

Yes. I have been watching the ‘Midwich Cuckoos’ starring Keeley Hawes on Sky max. It’s all about control. Find someone daft enough to grow you on from seed to seedling then conjour a fate worse than death if your carer hasn’t given you every attention.

Is this why my eye blew up to twice its size 48 hours ago? Had pollen got under my eye lid causing redness, copious tears and great pain? I bet it was the plants. Getting their own back because I was cutting them down. 

They’re watching me, you know. 

Next year it’ll just be spinach and dwarf beans. Now give me nightmares, why don’t you?

 

Gardening with a dodgy knee #5

After the spring equinox we were into our last week of long dark nights. Around March 20th it was dark about 7:15 pm and suddenly spring arrived when we changed the clocks and twilight happened an hour later. It was 70 deg in my ( slightly) heated greenhouse. Time to switch off the frost stat and prepare the greenhouse for another season.

Fundamentally I had a glasshouse for two reasons: i) to overwinter geraniums and other plants as I have no room in the house and, as yet, no conservatory  

ii) to raise seedlings and successfully grow tomatoes with a reduced fear of the blight. 

The year before my greenhouse arrived I spent every day for ten days moving my French beans in and out of the kitchen to harden them off. As I sowed 90 plus seeds it’s a lot to do. Plus I hardened the geraniums, courgettes and small tomato plants in the same way. It was too much. And I don’t have the window ledges needed to house them overnight. And it was taking up my garden table space so we couldn’t sit on the patio to drink a cuppa without feeling we were starring in ‘The Day of the Triffids’. 

Now I have the space, light, warmth and shelter of the perspex greenhouse. So much easier. I open a window - or the door - to let air through. Introducing fledgling plants to outside temperatures is much easier now with exterior and interior staging. Sigh!

But work had to start in earnest. I removed last year’s pots and washed them with the aid of one of my three water butts. I cleared the greenhouse flooring and made a solution of Jeyes fluid. Then wiped down the walls, the perspex lights, the roof and the corners. I mopped the floor and wiped down the shelving and under the shelves. It was tricky to reach the skylight as I’m only 5 foot 2 inches but I wanted to ensure no spores nor air borne bugs had overwintered in there. Jeyes is specially formulated for greenhouse and tool use. 

I allowed it to dry out for a couple of days and put down fresh tarpaulin and matting. There was a chemical smell in there. Not too unpleasant. I certainly don’t like an over-chemicalised world. But as an annual, once a year only, event I could live with it. And my dodgy knee didn’t complain. 

Then the staging, pots and tools went back in. My bagged compost arrived and I put my potting tray in my potting shed ( aka Nina’s gin palace). Ready for the sowing season to begin. 

I began with leek seeds. Just placed them in seed compost in small nodule trays on the greenhouse staging. And I thoroughly cleaned all pots and saucers ready for tomato plants much further down the line. My spinach seedlings were growing away in their raised beds and last season’s leeks were thickening beautifully in their very enriched deep ( raised) bed.  

I like cosmos and I decided to try growing schizanthus. I created a few seedling trays of each, sprinkling the seeds on the compost without burying too deeply. Then just giving them a light covering. After labelling them and putting them on the staging I recorded my sowing activities on my gardener’s calendar. I like to use it for future reference. It’s also my attempt to track how warm our springs are becoming with climate change. 

That was my flurry of early sowings - veggies and flowers. Sweet peas were still in the greenhouse. I may not bother overwintering them another year. I don’t bother much with broad beans now, either. But I love French beans. However I never sow them until May. There was time for that. 

Gardening with a Dodgy Knee - early spring edition

For much of March I didn’t get a lot of time to work outside. It was either too wet or we were busy tidying, cleaning, decorating and sorting after having work done in the kitchen. The ongoing project. 

Other days we were in Bath enjoying ourselves with friends or with my brother and his family for my birthday treats. And our Latvian friends were helping fund long trips to rescue Ukrainian war refugees at the Polish border. We contributed, of course. We donated money for petrol ( it’s a long drive through Latvia and Lithuania to Poland and back) and we donated goods such as toiletries, dried foods, baby items and first aid packs. I also donated books for a separate fund raiser. 

Towards the equinox I had, however, managed to edge part of the lawn. The clods of earth were heavy to lift following successive downpours and at some points tugging them did pull on my neck and back. The dodgy knee didn’t seem to react to my digging, though, which was good news. I raked the lawn as it still hadn’t had its first cut of the year and I got up the last of the winter leaves. 

A beautiful new rose called ‘Molineux’ from David Austin Roses sat in the freshly dug flower bed. I had prepared the planting hole well with plenty of organic matter in and around the hole. It was a birthday present from my brother who lives a 10 minute hop, skip and jump from David Austin’s nurseries. It’s my brother who follows the footie at Molineux, though, not me.

As with a lot of flowers and shrubs it’s best to plant the rose at the same depth as it was in its pot, keeping the roots deep. The graft union should be underground and the planting hole should be bigger than the pot, with the roots spread out. I also watered the new rose in even though the soil was damp - it was still only mid-March - and I added plenty of mulch. 

That same weekend ( mid-March) I showed off my lemon tree to my brother and my niece. I hadn’t watered it much over the winter. And, although it was in a slightly heated greenhouse, I’d wrapped it in bubble wrap. Just to protect against a real drop in temperatures. And it was truly exciting to be able to peel away the bubble wrap and reveal 12 developing fruits. Good little lemon tree! 

The year still felt young. Bright yellow-faced pansies and pretty blue and pink ones adorned the patio and the first set of steps up to the lawn. Family members in our guest bedroom could look down on their colours. It did look pretty, but the bindweed hadn’t started wrapping itself around more cherished plants. The sun tried hard to warm us. The garden was awake. But the hard work was yet to come.

More next time.

Gardening with a Dodgy Knee #3

My first foray into gardening this year was back in February. We’d had the cooker moved, new splash backs and a cooker hood installed and some painting and decorating done to spruce up the kitchen. That occupied us until the weather opened up.

On February 11 I put spent indoor hyacinths in the greenhouse which had had had the frost stat on for 2 months. It felt warm inside and all was doing well in there. The sweet peas were growing and the geraniums had overwintered well in the just-above-freezing temperatures.

As it was likely we’d still get a few days or nights of frost I planted the certified garlic bulbs in a small raised bed and a few more in the veggie plot in pre-prepped soil. The soil was workable - which shows we’d had a mild winter - and it was just like planting onion sets except that garlic is supposed to need frost to help them develop. Hence the need to get them in the ground without delay. (To keep the birds off I covered over the rows of planted garlic with fleece - so no hungry beaks could pluck at them.)

The next day the weather was still open allowing me to do some cutting back of old growth and the greenhouse was up to 50 deg F. I pinched out the overwintering sweet peas for bushier growth. And it was light outside until about 6 pm. Although it was still only mid February the day had the feel of shifting out of winter into almost early spring. 

A week later I’d created enough dead growth clippings to fill the garden waste bin. Then a few days after that I couldn’t do any gardening:  we were in the thrall of Storm Eunice which created turbulent winds. We were lucky not to have anything too wild here in the south west of England. And for the first winter in years no fence panels had blown down. But as well as the terrific winds it was very wet out. 

On February 24th the truly saddening news that Russia had invaded Ukraine was across all news media. February 24th. I will never forget the date. All I had to think about was sowing my leek seeds. Others were sheltering from bomb blasts or escaping to the West with babies, one bag and a dog - to a very uncertain future.

As a distraction from this disturbing news I bought pink and yellow primulas at our local farm shop and, as they were destined for the beds in our front garden, it didn’t affect my dodgy knee. I plant them at the height of the steps… going down. So it causes very little bending. It was a beautiful sunny day - by contrast snow was on the ground in Ukraine - and I got up the last of the winter leaves. Not a creative job. It makes my back ache but there are fewer drifts of leaves now we’ve had two deciduous trees cut back. 

By the last day of February pretty pink and blue pulmonaria were growing in ‘mum’s garden’. Crocuses were looking good at the front of the house along with the miniature daffodils. The patio tubs were full of white cyclamen and they needed very little tending but my miniature irises were doing very little. I would have thought they should have been displaying their violet and yellow petals. Yet they had the growing habit of leeks.

Were they leeks?

Had I got my planting arse over tit? Only time would tell. But given the plight of the Ukrainians it was nothing to be bothered about.In the scheme of things.

And on March 1 we officially entered a new season. Winter was behind us. 

Until next time. 

Gardening with a Dodgy Knee #2

As we wallow in and out of warm weather I reflect on my ideas for the garden ( and my dodgy knee) at the top of the year: 

It’s cold and dank out there. I want to plant primulas to give a little pale colour in my front borders, now we are entering a cold, dark season. 

That change in pace. That change in feelings, in thoughts and in our sense of comfort. We emerge from a period of self indulgence; scoffing mince pies and chocolate, watching films and adjusting biblical figures in our nativity scene. 

My knee, barely oiled through indolence, suffers from negotiating the steps at eight o’ clock in the morning. Sharp spikes of cold hit my damaged kneecap. It’s barely light. There’s a film of frost glinting on the tarmac. We have to get the car out but the shock of scraping the windscreen pushes the festive period back into the shiny box of Christmas memories.

This is no longer hogmanay. It’s a bleak, barely back-to-life winter’s morning. The world is cold. I want to retreat to the comfort of the warm sitting room and not be concerned about whether the car will start. Or whether my knee will hurt. 

Down the hill the village square is devoid of human life. The lights are on at the supermarket and seem unusually welcome. We can wait in there, stay warm, do a shop, until the bus arrives. The bistro and the cafe won’t open for an hour. The bus shelter affords no protection from the icy roars belting around the corner on to this treeless pavement. In summer the heat beats through the bus shelter’s perspex roof. There is no shade. In winter there is no protection from the wind.

The farm shop with its early spring-coloured hyacinths and primulas is still in darkness. No colourful flowers for our front garden this morning. 

It’s barely dawn. We haven’t been out so early for weeks. Back then we were having the warmest December on record. It was hardly daylight but there was no winter chill. 

Now is a time for stillness. The garden will need to be still too. Not even a snowdrop has emerged. We wait.

Gardening with a dodgy knee #1

One of the glories of late spring, when thermometer readings race above 50 deg F, is that it’s time to start growing flowers and veg, under glass. But also the pain in my knee seems less.

There’s something about warmth: warm sunshine, warm water or even a hot water bottle, that soothes a dodgy knee. And physical activity gets easier. But I do have to garden in a slightly less vigorous way now. It’s not because I’m ancient that I have a dodgy knee. It is a result of having to jump off a boat that ran aground in Exmouth 30 years ago. The trauma to the knee when I landed badly ( trying to protect my back which had caused me some pain) meant I lost cartilage. I was told I’d likely get trouble with that knee in years to come. So here we are.

More positively there’s a scientific explanation for heat therapy. Warmth makes blood vessels dilate which means more oxygen flows to the muscles - presumably around the knee in my case. And when the muscles are pliable the knee joint is flexible - and lubricated - and the stiffness goes. Also, we all know how we feel when the sun is out. Warmth, on a neuro-psychological level, is good for us and decreases the pain signals to the brain. So warmth is good.

It doesn’t alter the fact that I have 3 or 4 prescription pain killers a day when I’m back out in the garden. I can’t kneel to weed as shooting pains charge up my thigh and I can’t get up. So I dig - with a fork or spade - and weed that way. When the soil is really dry I have a hefty hoe to weed between plants, if I’m lucky, or between rows if I’m not. There are ways around gardening with a dodgy knee. I get less done per hour than I used to. But, as I have all the time I need, now I’ve stopped tutoring, I don’t have to garden in a rush. 

Weeding between patio slabs, where I can’t dig with a spade is a trial. Sometimes my husband helps. Occasionally I resort to the least harmful weedkiller possible. There may be a tool on the market for such a job. I have joined a fb gardening group. They are so helpful - I’d better ask them.

Being outside at least 10 minutes a day is good for us psychologically, so says Dr Michael Mosley, who researches such things. It has been a very dry few weeks and I’ve barely been out to a pub, restaurant or to see friends over the last eight days as there’s been so much to do in the garden. But there’s also been much sitting out in the sunshine. 

A garden is a lovesome thing, God wot?

As I write I remember I left my amaranth - celosia plants out overnight. They should have hardened off by now. And the same goes for the romanseco ( calabrese) which arrived a fortnight ago in a cardboard book wrapper from cousins in Leeds. I repotted them and they are a good few inches bigger now. My lovely dwarf beans have also hardened off and I told my brother I would send him photographs of the rose he gave me for my birthday. It’s called Molineux. No guessing what the colour of the petals is!

But I’d better get on with it! A day’s light gardening to do. I may have to put a few plants in at ground level but many will go in the raised beds. The latter is much easier to do with a dodgy knee. Far less bending is involved. 

Until next time.

Bedtime

It’s finally dropped to 50 deg F in my small greenhouse and I’ve picked the last of the tomatoes. It’s been a long season: our first fruits were ready on July 3. And, so powerful are the cherry tomatoes, I could put away my chutney ingredients: Almost overnight, with my cherry tomatoes in the same bowl, the green medium-sized ones turned red. Hoorah.

Many weeks later than I expected I dismantled our last two tomato plants. There was some mould or maybe even blight on a stem on their last day. But it was academic as the plants were headed for the incinerator. I never compost tomato plants. I don’t want to spread blight but nor do I want the seeds from discarded tomato fruits to randomly germinate in the veggie plot.

I haven’t used Jeyes Fluid to disinfect the greenhouse now the temperatures outside have dropped. It was time to bring my lemon tree under glass and I felt Jeyes would be too strong for it. I could disinfect with a milder cleanser but I don’t want to upset the lemon tree which is full of fruit.

Now I am on that last bowl of tomatoes - the cherry and medium-sized fruits - it will be November when I cook with shop-bought ones. For four months we have enjoyed our own tomatoes and French beans, dwarf and climbers. I have a freezer-full of beans but never fear…the August-sown broad beans are in flower. And right on cue. We may yet have full pods in December. The ‘Luz de Otono’ variety is new to me. If they produce pods this side of Christmas I will include them in my future growing plans.

Meanwhile my thin leeks are gradually fattening and I plan to dig them in deeper, as suggested by a helpful member of the ‘grow your own’ group. I await the spinach crop but until then I can be picking the salad leaves. It’s hardly cold out there this late in the year.  I may even transplant the salad crops closer to the house. It’s then much easier to cover them with frost-proof netting this end of our long garden. 

So relatively warm has it been that my miniature iris bulbs are already 12 cm high. They are spring-flowering and shouldn’t even be showing themselves yet. I’ll be interested to see what Monty Don suggests for garden maintenance in the last programme of Gardeners World. It’s time to let nature go to sleep. 

Sunshine

It has been a joyous, warm and sunny September. And today, October 12th, I had to come inside as it was so warm sitting on our patio. The ‘sweet petite’ tomatoes are continuing to grow and fruit in the greenhouse which is recording temperatures of 62deg F. Still.

My shed/ workspace reached 66deg F yesterday afternoon - with the door open. In a few weeks’ time I will have to dismantle my tomato plants, move begonias, geraniums and others into the greenhouse to overwinter. It has a frost stat and a small gas heater for very cold January/February days. But not yet. 

But where do I put my lemon tree? It has produced lots of fruit, hasn’t dropped its leaves, and is healthy. However the fruits haven’t yet turned yellow.Maybe next season. 

Should I wrap the whole lemon plant in bubble wrap and put it in the (well-made) shed where it’s a few degrees warmer than outside? (But I can’t heat the shed easily). Or should I put it in the greenhouse - still bubble-wrapped - where it’s lighter and where I can put in a few hours heating as temperatures drop? 

These questions don’t have to be answered yet. 

In the meantime I’ve been reflecting on what a good life I have. Yes my husband is ill with depression and I can get tired as he is debilitated by it. So I have to do more. ( I do get help in the home and garden and get lifts when required). But sitting in the sunshine, surrounded by apricot and orange begonias, my newly grown pansies, the last of the bedding plants and feeling the warmth it is a time to be alive. The news, post-Brexit, post-Afghanistan and mid-Covid is depressing and politicians have a lot to answer for. But if you are lucky enough to be able to sit in the sun this late in the year you have riches untold.  

I was listening to Simon & Garfunkel’s ‘Only Livin’ Boy in New York’ and admiring the view from my patio. I saw colour; shocking pink, blousy pot plants and a long, productive, cared-for garden. As I sipped my coffee I felt huge contentment. And I realised I’d grown up. When I heard ‘Only Livin’ Boy in New York’ first time around life was for the having - in the US, in California, in New York. But I’m older now. I’ve grown up. Yellow cabs don’t enthral me. My garden is a place of gladness and serenity. And I feel blessed. It takes work but it’s a bit of Eden, just outside my back door.

Now I’m going outside again, to wallow in ‘The Boxer’, ‘Cecelia’, the sunshine and a fresh cuppa. Bliss. 

Photographs

I have joined a couple of ‘as it was in photographs’ on face book. It is astonishing how, despite the geographical distances apart, life in the 19th century or in the 1930s, or even post-war, looked pretty similar for working men & women whether close to wealthy suburbs or in the sight of heavy industries and the factory gate. 

Some areas have improved since the sepia-tinted images were first made. Other areas have never recovered from the lack of production and eventual unemployment in the 1980s. Thatcher’s Britain.

But it was in the 1970s that I first saw what poverty really looked like. My father was a grammar school Head and mum worked very part-time with special needs children. We had a comfortable life surrounded by woods and playing fields. Our neighbourhood was very safe: our childhood home was in a small cul-de-sac and there was very little traffic to risk our safety out-of-doors.

Books lined the shelves in every room. We were brought up in a state of security, informed discussion and happiness. I rarely heard my parents argue and I knew little of domestic tension nor a lack of cash. However we weren’t spoiled. A Head’s salary wasn’t huge but his quality of life in and out of school made dad a good chap to be around 

But it was at a school jumble sale that I saw a very poor man indeed. Every autumn the girls’ grammar school that I attended held a jumble sale in the wood-panelled school hall. All our mums were there, donating rather than buying, manning the stalls and making teas. The Headteacher was there in her batman cloak. There were few men.

Which is why it was so noticeable when a down-at-heel father-of-many with long black hair and an even longer beard arrived with a crowd of very young children wearing jumpers that had been washed far too often. He clearly hadn’t shaved in months. The Head smiled, uncertainly, at him when he entered. She was an unmarried MA in Maths from Oxbridge. 

He ruffled through a variety of jumble bundles. As he pushed his hand into his overcoat pocket I could see it was torn and buttons hung from his coat. His trousers were too long but it was the strain in his voice that told you all was not well. 

I’d have been about 13 and I could see he wasn’t like anyone I had ever met. When he handed a few coppers over for jumpers, slacks and skirts for his brood his hands were dirty and his finger nails were long.

I imagined that family lived in one of the council estates or in a privately-rented terraced house. Now I wonder whether they were in temporary accommodation. There certainly were poor areas in my town although there was full employment.

Looking back I guess his wife had died and he was bringing up the children alone. I do recall he held conversations with some of the mums and stopped for tea and biscuits. He wasn’t frightening just sad and weary. My friend’s mum gave the children unopened packets of biscuits. I saw the man smile. A few moments of tension left his face. He looked younger.

I imagine he got most of his children’s clothes at jumble sales. His children ran around the school hall like undomesticated kittens but went to him when he called them over. They were excitable but did as they were told.

Today there will be families in England who have no idea how they are going to cope with the prospect of rising domestic fuel prices and the lack of the £20 weekly uplift. 

Around five million may have to use the Trussell Trust or food banks just to get a meal. If a kettle breaks how does it get fixed? Let’s hope there are cheap, working models of microwave ovens available for folk who aren’t going to cope with even less per month as we enter the coldest months of the year. Heat or eat? 

Poverty is a failure of a wealthy society, like ours,  to provide for those when they need it. When they need a hand-up. Our welfare state is something we should have been proud of. But it’s slipped through our fingers like twenty-pound notes. There’s a lack of care.

The Victorians saw poverty as shameful, and the result of laziness or vice. But Dr Barnardo refused to discriminate between the ‘deserving’ and ‘undeserving’ poor. He accepted all children, regardless of race, disability or circumstance. That was London 1870. How have things changed? We have universal schooling and free school meals now but housing is poor in some areas and rents are shockingly high. And we have the food banks.

Should poverty exist in the world’s fifth richest nation? 

The clash of the Titans (beans, that is)

For the next two weeks, indeed throughout most of September, temperatures shouldn’t drop below 64 deg F here in sheltered Bath. The ‘Luz de Otono’ broad beans, which were giants even in their seed trays, are going to make rapid growth at this rate. And with no sign of frost the climbing beans look set to keep on producing.

I have found an excellent recipe for the likely glut of climbing French beans. It was written for runner beans but I don’t like runners. I don’t waste my time making wigwam frames for them. Therefore I’m christening this recipe ‘French bean & tomato soup’. If you grow your own tomato plants you are very likely still picking fruits by the ton. In which case you can make 3 cups’ worth of tomatoes as stated* or use the tinned variety.

French Bean & Tomato Soup

• 1 cup chopped carrots
• 1 cup chopped onion
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 6 cups vegetable stock
• 1 pound beans, sliced
• 1 chopped garlic clove
• 3 cups chopped tomatoes*
• 1 tbsp dried basil
• 1/4 tsp pepper

• In a large saucepan, saute the onion and carrots in oil for approximately 5 minutes - until the carrots are softened. Stir in the stock , beans and garlic then bring the whole to the boil. Reduce the heat then cover and simmer for 20 minutes or until all the vegetables are tender. 
• Stir in the tomatoes, basil and pepper. Cover and simmer 5 minutes longer.
• Serve, eat and enjoy.

Meanwhile, after indulging in my vegetable-garden broth, a glance at the seed packet shows me my giant one-month-old broad beans are destined to grow over three foot tall. I’ll need the bamboo canes from the wigwams to help support them. But we may not get a frost until November so the climbers may need the sticks themselves … On the other hand with strong autumn winds the broad beans may well be rocked in their planting positions while the climbers keep producing. It’s the clash of the titans in the world of beans!!

Tomatoes can be kept in their growing positions until temperatures drop below 50 deg F. At which point it is time to dismantle them, remove the last fruits for ripening and discard the stems. The tomato-growing season is then over. By which time the climbing beans can still be going great guns as frosts don’t form until we reach 32 deg F. Oh to have more space! 

I plan to replenish the raised beds with fresh compost. One has lettuce and salad leaves growing in it. Another has leeks. Do I lift them and replant them after I’ve enriched their growing medium? I’m thinking it’s best to wait until this warm, dry spell is over and replant them when rain is expected and aim to disturb their root systems as little as possible.

The other raised beds are an easier matter. When the dwarf French beans are finished I can fully replenish the beds and leave them fallow until spring. 

What a busy gardening year this has turned out to be. My only real failure has been the spinach. And I can only think I was trying to sow old seed. 

When the battle of the beans is over I will try my hand at growing garlic. Some say plant in October, outside, where the frost can get at the clove. Others say ‘plant on shortest day’ ‘harvest on longest day.’ However it’s done I need space not just for the various beans but for garlic too!

The exciting new broad bean

In my enthusiasm to plant ‘Luz de Otono’ broad beans I took up a climbing French bean plant which I thought was nearing its end. A few weeks ago I dug over my vegetable plots and manured them then covered the prepped areas with tarpaulin.But my climbers were still strong and tall. I dug areas around them for the broaders. As a new experience ( I live a wild life) and an experiment, I sowed the winter-cropping Luz de Otono beans.

This will be a first for me. Normally I either sow broaders in the autumn for early summer flowering the following year. Or I sow them for planting out in the spring of their pod-producing year.

About two weeks ago the temperatures dropped and last week I put the garden parasols away. I thought autumn was with us. After I’d sown my special broad beans in toilet roll inners I placed them in the greenhouse. I expected them to take weeks to germinate. It was still August then but chilly. I also had guttering drilled for drainage holes to be used as long ‘window boxes’.

The idea behind these late summer antics was that the climbing beans were still growing and taking up space I knew the broad beans would devour. But, I thought, by the time the broad beans are ready for the ground the climbers would have finished. Wrong. Or I could use the guttering as a temporary home for the Luz de Otono. Wrong. And I thought the broad beans would take some time to grow to planting size. Wrong. 

Again.

Yesterday, as I was preparing the guttering with compost, I checked the Luz de Otono and they were already huge. This is what comes of being used to growing dwarf beans. When trying to grow standards their height is that much greater even at the seedling stage. Our mini heatwave, our Indian summer, since September had brought on the broad beans quickly and,at the same time, the climbers showed no sign of giving up the ghost. It was nearly 80 deg F in the greenhouse. I was overproducing for the space I had. 

The guttering idea - a temporary home for my fledgling broad beans - was a non-starter. They were too big and the guttering was too shallow for them.

Today, which was another splendid summery day,  I removed the tarpaulins from the pre-dug patches in the veggie plots. The soil underneath was still moist from the day I’d worked it and prepped it. It was now or never. Could I plant twenty 12 cm high broad beans in the few spaces of pre-dug soil I had between my wigwams? Only one way to find out: 

Almost an hour after my haphazard planting the broad beans were in place. The wigwams were still intact and the various beans, of whatever genetic make up, would just have to fight for space. I could have taken up one batch of French dwarf beans that were growing in a raised bed. They are not as productive as the climbers but a few still have flowers and pods. But the broad beans are going to grow too tall to be properly supported in the raised bed… Back to squeezing them

in between the climbers. 

This is the problem when the seasons are adrift. Early summer was so cold, wet and late most crops and flowering plants were a month behind when they did get going. My climbers are still going for it. Maybe they would be slowing down now if they had germinated in mid-May. But they didn’t show their heads until near-June.

Now we have much warmer weather again everything is giving its last hoorah. And my broad bean seedlings are growing visibly taller by the day.

I could make temporary homes for my last ten Luz de Otono in 20 cm diameter pots.

But they will soon need to feel the soil under their feet rather than spend their short lives in pots.

And what of the hapless climbing bean growing up its single bamboo cane? On closer inspection I saw more flowers and developing pods on this particular climber. It seemed too cruel to throw it on the heap. It was still enjoying life, after all. So I hurriedly found a barren spot by my tangerine rose which had been mulched with bark but not prepped with manure. And I watered it in, there and then, cane and all.

Whether it survives its premature uprooting only time will tell. So much produce and so little space. It’s a good problem to have.

The Allotment Shed

As if in readiness for autumn, when September hails a completely different season, we started the evening by putting on the central heating. And, sadly, I put away my shorts and thin summer dresses too. It seems far too early to be unearthing jeans and cardigans but I don’t relish getting cold. What happened to those long warm evenings and sultry, sunny days? Every year I forget those lazy times don’t last forever.

Looking on the bright side there will be fewer flies around our cat’s food. I won’t have to get the lawn mower out and even the bindweed will retract its claws. Now I’ve run out of room in the freezer I probably have as many beans as one small family can manage. But I’ll pick more and give to friends.

The autumn flowering broad beans ( luz de otono)  are gearing up. It’s an experimental sowing on my part. There’s a battle for space in the veggie plot. I can’t wrench up my wigwams while the climbing beans are still proudly producing their long, long pods. But the new broad beans have already poked their heads through the compost and will need to be transplanted.

However we did have spare downpipes left over from the construction of a water butt system. Never one to fill the car with rubbish for the corporation tip I got  the unwanted pipes cut in two - length ways - and drilled to make drainage holes. They will now form temporary, narrow broad bean beds. The new plants can grow a few centimetres before I place them in the beds vacated by the climbing beans. At least that’s the plan. And I aim to pick the pods in December… As I say it’s an experiment.

Temperatures for the next few weeks will make 50 deg F. The greenhouse temperatures will reach higher than that for a little while but at some point I will cut down my sturdy tomato plants and decide what to do with the green fruits. Until then they are sill blushing in the sunshine. I can rate my first year as a greenhouse owner a success. What I could have done with a bigger one! But contributors to The Allotment Shed have plenty of ideas for green tomatoes. I assume not all will ripen.

My lemon tree produced small lemons back in the spring and they are growing fatter. But they are still green. My instinct is to bring the citrus tree into the greenhouse where there is plenty of light and warmth. But I am open to suggestions. 

I have a pathetic display of spinach but the leeks are getting stronger. Perhaps I should feed them as their compost hasn’t been replenished. My lettuces haven’t been chewed, yet, largely because we’ve had a dry spell. But I want to start my sweet peas soon, along with garlic plantings. I’m hoping this is where my small but perfectly formed greenhouse will come into its own. 

As well as sweet peas my pansy plugs are gaining in strength and a few primulas are daring to show their magenta faces. When I discard my petunias and put my geraniums in the greenhouse the pansies should be large enough for tubs in the front garden.

If I’ve actually managed to time things properly I may even have space to plant snowdrops-in-the-green. To top it all miniature daffs and irises will add to the autumn plantings.

But it does seem awfully early to be waving the summer goodbye.

Tips I’ve learned from ‘Allotment Hints and Tips’

One of the earliest tips I used in 2021, after the dreadful cold and wet weather in May, was to sow my climbing beans in toilet roll inners. Climbing beans are more vigorous and, of course, taller than dwarf French beans. It was my first time growing French climbers from seed (I don’t like runner beans). And it was so much easier to simply plant the seedlings in the prepped vegetable bed in their inners. Those that weren’t dug in deep were just as successful as the deep planted ones and I wonder whether the card collars helped prevent a slug attack while the seedlings were establishing themselves.  What a great suggestion! Thank you lotters.

From early June onwards I followed suggestions that regular watering would help prevent blossom end rot for my tomatoes. Every morning I gave each tomato tub 1 litre of water. In addition each tub had a weekly tormorite feed. And I removed the lower tomato leaves to help prevent blight. Next year I will set up a self-watering system for when we are on our holidays. 

In July, when my first dwarf French beans developed, I had a bowl of cold water and a pan of boiling water on the hob ready before I picked them. As lotters have suggested: top and tail as you pick then plunge beans into cold water to wash them before blanching in boiling water for a couple of minutes. Their colour (and flavour) is indeed enhanced. 

In the flower garden I have regularly picked sweet peas. Especially from August. Until then their stems were short. They are now beautiful long-stemmed cut flowers in a mixture of pink, magenta, purple and lavender. And they just keep on giving.

During the mini heat wave I put a parasol over my tumbling compost maker. I read the advice from one lotter that on very hot days dry compost can ignite. I didn’t take the temperature inside the cauldron but I’m sure it was breaking down the peelings and grass with a vengeance! It was baking out there. 84 deg F in the shade!

Now it’s almost September and my chrysanthemums have black fly which I will spray with soapy water before I plant them. They are from our local nursery and I’ll grow them well away from the veggie plot. Thanks for the advice, lotters.

In a few weeks time, before the frosts arrive, and when we move into autumn proper with cooler evening temperatures and dark nights, I will replenish my raised beds. I like the idea of the no-dig method, as suggested by many lotters. I have sciatica and am waiting for a knee op. If I can avoid aggravating those conditions and still get a good crop I can be pleased with my efforts. And my raised beds have produced four huge cabbages (the rest were eaten) and a pound of dwarf French beans every time I pick them. That sounds like success to me!

And in the spaces in the raised beds created by the lifted cabbages I’m growing lettuces and leaves. 

Lotters have truly inspired me to try my hand at growing garlic. I had never even thought about it until now. I should have my earliest Wight bulbs arriving in October. I realise it’s a slow journey but I like the idea of ‘plant on shortest day, harvest on longest day.’ Thank you lotters. Great, easy-to-follow advice. 

With so much produce I’m struggling to find space to grow late summer plantings. But I have discovered the ‘Luz de Otono’ broad beans. 50 of them are in the greenhouse now, sown in toilet roll inners. I have unused guttering left behind from when we were setting up the greenhouse waterbutts. After drilling holes in the guttering and filling with quality compost I have two long rows of growing space for my autumn-growing broad beans. This is an experiment. I’ve never sown broad beans to pick in December before. And never in old guttering!!! But it gives me growing space while my French beans are still so productive. It would be criminal to lift my climbing beans and take down the wigwams this early. 

Another experiment I tried was in the use of tomato gro-bags. I planted one small tomato, about 1.5 feet high, in a tub of used compost. The rest - all about the same height - went into new tomato gro-bags or into large tubs filled with compost from the gro-bags. Do gro-bags contain nutrients? Well, yes, they do.

The tomato plant in spent compost was smaller, a much paler green and far less vigorous than the others in new tomato gro-bags. The spent compost was just not feeding it. 

Of course I replanted the ailing, under-nourished tom and fed it tomorite. 2 months later it has caught up and is producing shiny red tomato fruits all of its own.

It just shows that vegetables and plants are like children and pets: look after them, feed them carefully and they will grow strong and productive. ( Unlike my cat who is eleven this week. He isn’t productive but he certainly eats well!!). 

Thank you lotters for all your really good advice. And here’s to a new season’s growing success. And I’m truly looking forward to seeing what I can grow and overwinter in my new greenhouse. It has a frost stat heater. If it helps bring on early sweet peas and overwinters my geraniums it will be worth the money. I won’t know until next March, by which time it will be the start of a whole new gardening season.

Happy growing one and all! Always peanut biscuits in the tin!! 

Green Fingers VII

It was almost July. The solstice had come and gone but the rose arches were in full flower. On our upper arch I grow a climber from a cutting mum struck for me soon after we moved in. That was over twenty years ago. She called the variety ‘Queen Alexandra Day Rose’. Or simply the Alexandra Day Rose. The sale of roses dates from 1912 and celebrates Alexandra’s arrival here from Denmark. Its a fund-raising day for her charities, especially for hospitals. 

The Alexandra could be a type of Alpine Rose. It’s petals are just the same but, unfortunately, it’s not thornless as is the true Alpine. Either way it’s vigorous, very pretty and flowers freely every year. In fact it grows much more productively than the damask rose from David Austin roses which wasn’t free!  However for the last two summers I’ve been thinning the lovely climbing rose and, with another friend, removing the honeysuckle around the upper arch. A ‘honeysuckle and rose arch’ sounds so good but tragically the honeysuckle thwarts the rose. It is simply too rampant. And, of the two, I prefer the rose over the heavy honeysuckle.

By our patio a spreading Rose of Sharon was blooming. We fast approaching the end of June but this unchecked plant was growing faster than the honeysuckle. It’s lovely even as a cut flower - but pervasive. In the coming months it will also have to be dealt with. It is swallowing up prettier more delicate varieties. 

In contrast I was pleased to see the advanced progress of my veggies. By the 2nd of July my climbing beans were climbing. They had reached 1 foot in height. The dwarf beans were full of leaf and my first Sweet Petite cherry tomatoes were red. What a great time was to be had by walking up the garden and seeing it all flourishing.

My only real disappointment was the cherry tree which D had moved the previous autumn. It was still barely in leaf. I can only hazard a guess that the soil isn’t suiting it all. My spinach seedlings were doing nothing either. As spinach is so easy to grow I must have inadvertently tried sowing seeds from an old packet.

Nevertheless my new lawn mower was an ideal weight for me. I just had to remember to charge the battery pack before use! My wilding patch didn’t produce more self-seeded varieties than any other part of the garden so I took the decision to reseed it with grass seed for the time being. I had planted bate-rooted lupins, hollyhocks and Chines lanterns in the depths of winter. The first two were growing well. I can only think the lanterns had rotted or were eaten by slugs. Maybe I need to buy a potted lantern next summer rather than a root which can be planted in wintry, muddy, cold soil. But then fail to thrive.

Gardening is an experiment. And it’s exciting to see what works and what doesn’t. We went for a weekend in Devon in early July and afterwards I planted marigolds near my beans in order to lure insects away from the crops. That worked and the marigolds added a splash of yellow to the vegetable plots and raised beds. Then it was time for a week in Dartmouth and a weekend in Cornwall when my husband could see his brother. 

On our return the climbing beans were at the tops of their wigwams. It was July 16. 

Schools were about to break up and the July 19 easing of covid restrictions was about to take place. And I made my first pickings of dwarf and climbing beans. It was an excellent feeling!  

Next time: cabbages!