Green Fingers IV

Just before the anniversary of the March 23 Covid lockdown my greenhouse was waiting, with empty shelves, to be filled with ready-sown seed trays and pots of bulbs. I too was anticipating new seedlings emerging from their compost. But, now the greenhouse was double-glazed, and although the space felt very warm, especially on sunny days, the thermometer showed it was barely 33deg F inside the polycarbonate ‘glass’ house.

I knew it was too early to sow beans but I had packets of cosmos, sunflowers, sweet peas and leeks, lettuce and spinach. 33 deg F was far too cold for germination. Even D, my shed & greenhouse builder, remarked how tropical it felt inside even though the thermometer sternly said it was merely a few degrees above freezing.

On the evening of March 23 itself I lit a candle on our front steps in remembrance of those lost to covid. 

In our bubble we had all had our first jabs and I was relieved that we were beginning to feel safer. The lead GP at the practice where we were jabbed even said it was safe to stop washing all groceries and disinfecting newspapers and the mail that came into the house. That gave me confidence too.

And it was still light at 7pm. Spring had sprung. But not in my greenhouse!

I spent time potting up Suttons beautiful lilac and pink primulas and laying bark on the flower beds. My petunia plugs were no longer than the first joint on my little finger but I could use the greenhouse to bring them on. And my begonia bulbs were ready to plant in pots. All were suitable for the greenhouse, despite the thermometer reading.

By the 12th April lockdown restrictions were partially lifted, our patio fence had blown in, and it was our 40th wedding anniversary. Nevertheless we had a patio party under the rule of six. The primulas made the patio look pretty, even though the fence was hanging badly. I covered it with a screen which displayed our Ruby Wedding cards and bunting.

Meanwhile the greenhouse thermometer was resolute that it was 32 deg F. Friends had given us a lemon tree as an anniversary present, but it would be far too cold for it in the greenhouse. I opted to place it in the new, well-clad shed, in front of the big glass window. As stated in the instructions I repotted the lemon tree as soon as I could and kept the watering can nearby. I didn’t want the water temperature in the can to drop to outside temps. It might be too much of a shock. And I wrapped my new citrus tree in bubble wrap.

That week we enjoyed an anniversary trip to Devon, had warm days on the beach and cooler evenings eating out at the many restaurants and pubs questing for business. We had to book and couldn’t sit inside. There were still covid restrictions. 

And at the end of that sunny week I bought grafted ‘Sweet Petite’ tomato plants. But they stayed in my kitchen. It still registered just above freezing in the greenhouse, even though a blast of hot air met me when I opened the door. 

It was then I took a closer look at the meniscus on the thermometer. In fact it was reading 48 deg F. The mercury had pulled away from the bulb and it needed a magnet to reset it. 

Although it was still just too cold for germination my petunia plugs were growing and I brought my begonias on. Spring was almost springing.

Although it was too early to sow my French beans, dwarf and climbers, the leek seedlings were finally fatter than a strand of hair and D gave me some pea plants to grow on the same shelf as the petunias. 

But what to do about raising the temperature? I opted for a small gas heater. It sounded fine in theory, especially in a greenhouse that suffers from leaks and rain getting in through the roof top window. But I had advice about putting heat in the greenhouse and electricity seemed too dangerous. I don’t like paraffin heaters. The small gas heater seemed to fit the bill. And - on first use - the temperatures rose.

It was the end of April and I felt ready to start sowing my beans and transferring the tomatoes into the greenhouse. But then we had the wettest, coldest May on record. And the manufacturers of the little gas heater were most insistent it wasn’t safe to use it without ventilation ie have the greenhouse window open. But it hadn’t said that in the description when I bought it. Another conundrum. If I opened the window the rain got in. Again I was pondering what to do about the leaks and, apparently, cold temperatures in the new greenhouse.  

Back to square one. It was far too cold to use the greenhouse without heating. Temperatures had to be 50 deg for germination but I couldn’t leave the gas heater on over night - the coldest hours. The gas heater manufacturers said so. And I wasn’t going to set the alarm to wander out into the garden in the wee small hours to remove the gas heater once temperatures were higher. 

What to do? I could light a candle in an upturned terracotta pot. Or I could use the gas heater on dry days and just in the day time when I was home. But that’s hardly running the greenhouse at a regular temperature. And it wasn’t just the heater that was somewhat problematic. The thermometer hadn’t actually working at all.

I came up with a better solution: More on the pesky thermometer and ‘heating the greenhouse’ in Green Fingers V. 

Green Fingers III

The problem with having so much hardware introduced to the garden it’s easy to forget it’s a place for plants.

The fashion - about twenty years ago - for garden decking, glass and metal constructions and tv screens in a garden, the outside room, always seemed to me to be more about stone, pebbles, cement, sawing and hammering than growing and nurturing.

In our garden, by February this year, we had a new leaky greenhouse, an insulated almost perfect shed, bags of gravel, sand and cement and decorative bark, raised beds on legs, step ladders, tarpaulin and tins of paint. There was a point at which I wondered whether any growing would ever actually take place.

Even my hard-working builder friend,D, said the top garden looked like a building site. Bags of rubble and clag were filling the garage, while I awaited a slot at the corporation tip aka the city recycling site. Spare cement was used to make small walls and boundaries from a few red bricks we had lying around. The bonfire- cum-enriched veggie plot was no more - its space taken by the new shed. And the new raised beds were ready for fresh compost. 

So my green fingers turned black and I improved the soil too. Gotta get down and dirty!

But what to do about the condensation in the greenhouse? Polycarbonate sheets seemed to be the answer: double-glazing for the greenhouse. We looked at various websites; remember we no longer have a Homebase or a local DIY store. The nearest B&Q store is in Bristol but we do have a Screwfix. In the end I ordered £200 worth of polycarbonate sheets to be collected. This cost on top of the initial outlay for the greenhouse was leading me to think an expensive one might have been more economical in the end. However it was a perfect size for the space we had. And, days later, after my friend, D, had created a double-glazed effect using poly sheets,beading, nails and more and more silicon, the transformation was truly remarkable. Gone were the grey, fogged, wet windows. We had a working, unheated greenhouse.

Then the shelves went in. Even more exciting was getting the tumbler compost maker. A neighbour saved me £100 by donating his to me. He had cleaned it out and it fitted neatly next to the new shed. I was finally beginning to think of growing rather than building. And it was still only February. And to add to my gratitude another neighbour helped D to carry my pine table into the shed for me. 

A favourite uncle of mine had given me the money for the pine table when we got married 40 years ago. We also purchased a matching cabinet with shelves. They were among our first purchases when we moved into our new home. We hardly needed to buy anything, however, as Richard’s mother chose to go into a nursing home at the same time and we inherited her dresser, three piece suite, desk, double bed and occasional tables. My aunt gave us a canteen of silver and we had many chairs, bookshelves, cooking pots and pans of our own plus my mother-in-law’s kitchen ware. 

The pine table, then, meant a lot to me. But we have had it outside, wrapped in bubble-wrap and many layers of tarpaulins, for more years than was good for it as oak replaced pine in our dining room. But the pine table was a poor thing: Its legs were bowed, the drawer no longer fitted, the table top was damp and needed sandpapering but nevertheless it worked as a table. Others would have taken it to a tip. I had it moved into the new shed. Sheltered housing for its old age. 

Come mid-March, my birthday, the flower beds were looking colourful and my thoughts turned to vegetables. I had half-heartedly planted cabbages which, in the main, had unsuccessfully overwintered. But I left four of them to grow on and covered them with mesh. 

It was high time for using some of my freshly-made compost on the veggie beds. It took three digs to work them as every time I raked them and prepped them another load of grit was put on top; so much work was still going on in the garden with fewer places to deposit excess soil. After the third attempt I covered them with tarpaulins … ‘verboten’.

I was itching to sow beans, peas, leeks and spinach, my usual fare. But the thermometer said ‘no’. More of that next time: my adventures in heating a greenhouse…

Green Fingers II

The greenhouse had been finished just a few days ago. It was a cold January and even in an unheated greenhouse the air inside the glass was warmer than outside. The condensation was grey it was so thick: it blocked the windows and water dripped to the floor. 

My friend D put in new shelves and kept the window open in an attempt to shift the condensation. But every morning the floor was wet as the rain or sleet blasted its way through the roof. Something had to be done. The cheap but attractive greenhouse was about to cost me a lot more.

Meanwhile just as we saw January out the new shed arrived. It was a very different construction. D and I had had great fun using a cement mixture to make the base. All I did was fill its hungry tummy with water and sand and I pressed the on-off button. Nevertheless I felt empowered!

The greenhouse continued producing condensation but the cement set overnight. It’s a chemical reaction and not dependent on heat for drying and setting. Through a chemical reaction called hydration

calcium oxide, aluminum oxide, and ferric oxide react together ( CaO.Al2O3.Fe2O3 )to form cement.  

Again, it’s amazing what you learn. I did pass ‘A’level chemistry so I understand it ( a bit).

The base was set but the weather was closing in. Nevertheless, despite the dull skies, a kindly retired man delivered the shed  - and bang on time. He said he enjoyed his work - he felt useful in his retirement - and didn’t mind reversing his van downhill to our garage. He was able to lift each heavy section alone - showing the work was keeping him fit. Then D arrived to help carry the shed kit indoors. 

Happily the window section incorporated a large piece of (real) glass and the doors had their own key in a working lock. In addition there was flooring and high quality roofing felt. But the wood was so good it was a heavy kit to move. Between them the gents manoeuvred the sections into our empty garage. 

Next day D contacted his brother to help anchor the heavy wood sections on to the base. By 11:00 on Sunday they set to with just my trays of tea to sustain them.

They worked hard and I ordered take away roast beef for them as a thank you. Again the pub was allowed to serve take outs only. It seemed normal then but as I write such restrictions have been lifted and we can eat at tables again.

The boys did very well but D’s brother decided to get on the road early. Snow was expected and, naturally, he didn’t want to be marooned. Before he hit the road the roof went on - minus its lovely green felt - then the snow started to fall. 

At 4 pm I collected the roast beef and divided it up between us inside our barely weather-proof garage. D took his portion with him and the neonate shed had to cope on its own, unprotected in the inclement weather. 

Meanwhile, in between making the workers hot drinks, I’d watched the film ‘The Train’ where French resistance workers try to divert a train full of art work away from the hands of the Nazis. I don’t know who worked harder: French resistance or my friend and his brother constructing the shed. Thankfully the snow didn’t last long. And we were proud parents - now a two-sheds family with an imperfect greenhouse. 

Next: how to get heat in the greenhouse and stop the condensation (it took months of effort). 

But the new shed was my play house and it filled me with glee. From an unpromising start it has become ‘a shed of one’s own’.  

Green Fingers

As a carer during the pandemic I have been cautious about mixing with others. I can’t risk my husband getting covid-sick on top of his medical state. And if I got covid he couldn’t care for me. My outlet has been: a ‘literature on film course’, swimming, art challenge, carers cafe, covid-safe meet-ups with mates… and my garden.

At the start of lockdown #2, November 2020, our garden fence and hardware chap said my shed was rotten. I was happy to replace it with a potting shed. We have little substantial window ledge room in our house making germination of seedlings difficult. A potting shed or greenhouse was required. This same chap said it was impossible to build a potting shed where I wanted it and thereby talked himself out of a job. A friend of ours understood exactly what I wanted. We perused websites and brochures and I ordered a £700 potting shed. Expensive but taller than average with double doors, space for the pine table we had from uncle when we got married, with good sized windows and much space for shelves and hooks. The greenhouse I chose was a wooden construction with polycarbonate windows. And about a third of the price. 

By January my friend-cum-gardener had made space for concrete bases for the shed and greenhouse in our top garden. He shifted the raised beds and ordered bags and bags of sand and cement. All was going well until the shed suppliers said there was a delay in receiving the shed sections their end. Was it covid? Was it Brexit? Either way we had to wait. Meanwhile the inferior greenhouse was available. As was the so-called help on their switchboard: 

Me: ‘Does the greenhouse come with its own staging?’

Reply: ‘What’s staging?’

Clearly an expert.

Nor did they know if it came with its own floor. 

However on delivery day, at the end of January this year, my friend and I waited for the driver to deliver the sections of the greenhouse via the back roads to the rear of our house. It takes some doing manoeuvring around our neighbourhood for someone with a lorry driving up from Southampton in hail and sleet. My friend and I stood at points along the road to flag him down in case we saw him driving the wrong way. It’s surprising what you learn about lorry types, their width and tonnage, when asking them to reverse down hill to your garage. And a neighbour had just had a load of logs delivered which was blocking the entrance to our slip road. That meant more work for my friend. But he is very fit, rarely tires and was a mountaineer in a past life. 

The sections were duly delivered but my friend discovered there was no greenhouse floor. He, being a quick thinker with an eye for a bargain, asked what the piece of wood was that was next to the shed and greenhouse sections on the back of his lorry.

Driver: ‘Oh that’s packing material.’

My friend: ‘Can we have a sheet as a floor for the greenhouse?’

Driver: ‘I don’t see why not. It’ll only go for scrap.’

Within minutes the driver had left to deliver another substandard shed to the Forest of Dean and my friend was raiding a skip for a doormat and blocks to use as a step into the greenhouse-to-be. 

As the concrete base had already been made I asked a young person I know if he could help assemble the greenhouse and next day the two men were in the top garden messing about with silicon sealant, nails, screws drills and polycarbonate windows. And no the pieces did not fit well together, yes there were gaps and it was a very cold Thursday in January. 

By mid afternoon I ordered them takeaway fish n chips as they’d been out there in the cold for ours. It was still lockdown and only takeaway service was available. And it was dark at 5 pm. So they sat with their fish n chips in the cold while I dished mine up on real plates. They didn’t come inside the house. It wasn’t wise and none of us were jabbed by then. 

But by the Saturday evening we had a greenhouse. Hoozah! It was then that the problems really started. So much sealant was needed to glue the sides together. The condensation was dreadful and the greenhouse window would not open. Then when it allowed itself to be prized open it would not shut. 

Should I have bought a more expensive greenhouse? Probably. But, as I write, it has grown my petunia plants, all my climbing and dwarf beans and is now producing sweet red tomatoes. Not all bad then. 

Next time I will write about the arrival of the shed. Not quite as exotic as the the arrival of the magi but it was an impressive bit of kit. 

Stay safe. And adieu till next time.

 

Applause for the pause

It has been a couple of months since my last blog. I - along with a friend or two - have been busy transforming part of my garden. Applause for the pause and more of that later. 

For all of us 15 months of lockdown, changing habits, using sanitiser, masks and contactless payments, standing a metre or two apart and joshing for supermarket delivery slots have altered us. I haven’t had the strain of home-schooling, nor working from home with a dodgy signal nor with bored children needing a lot of attention. I haven’t had to travel to work on a crowded bus, train or tube. But I am a carer. And I don’t watch football or tennis from the terraces. 60,000 spectators are due to watch the next round of our fabulous football team versus Denmark at Wembley on Wednesday but what of the covid risk? 

‘We are all spectators in a giant human health experiment.’

More prosaically I have chosen to go to friends, usually meeting in their gardens or in a conservatory, to outdoor cafeterias or to a carers’ cafe. But I haven’t gone anywhere with crowds. When I go for a swim I walk there through the city. Bath’s Pulteney Bridge has become very crowded  since the April lockdown restrictions were lifted. Traffic is back to its usual heavy self but the walk to my swim is along a lovely Georgian boulevard, up an incline and into a fairly spacious changing room in a hotel. Residential hotel guests are asked to change in their rooms meaning our changing area is for us - the members of the spa club. Fairly safe in terms of social distancing. 

I have, in the main, been able to keep my distance during lockdown but with rising cases owing to the delta variant of covid I am inclined to continue wearing my face mask and sanitising frequently whatever Bojo announces for the July 19th lifting of restrictions. 

But back to the garden. Since January friends and I have transformed an area at the top of the garden which was formerly just gravel with a few raised beds. It now has a greenhouse, a new substantial potting shed, three water butts with new guttering and the raised beds are truly raised. They are on legs! As I write my dwarf beans are in flower, the leeks are still thin but not still like strands of green hair, the climbing beans are climbing, spuds are flowering, the cabbages are getting fat and a few pea plants are growing strong. The rest have had it. But I never promised you a pea garden.

Beans are my thing! 

Next time I write I will tell you of the triumphs and frustrations of my more recent gardening life. Especially now I’m waiting for an op. on my knee. Just like Roger Federer. I have yet to get the deckchairs on the lawn this year. That tells you something! 

Adieu.

Bye for now.  

Going green

 The light streamed through our bedroom curtains at 5:30 am today and I was wide awake. But that was far too early to get up, feed the cat, get breakfast & make a cuppa. The wind had dropped, the storm had lost its energy. It was sunny out but felt very cold.

Thankfully I managed to get back to sleep and by 9:30 the day had begun (again.) However I underestimated how long it would take me to have a bath, hoover, do my hair, pack my swimming gear, get Richard’s meds and offer the cat four different types of food. Yes. He was being fussy. By 10:30 I had managed to eat breakfast and down a cup of tea. I had remembered to fill my water bottle, but had still to make Richard’s sandwich for lunch and pack myself a couple of mini cheeses. 

The BBC News clock showed it was 10:46 and time to leave the house. In my attempt to be green and have a low carbon footprint I’d decided to bus it into town. But as I slammed the front door I had a nagging feeling I’d forgotten something. It’s just as well that I checked my bag. I couldn’t unzip it as threads of the ribbon to my key chain had got caught in the zip. I tugged and tugged until by some miracle I eased the offending keys out of the pocket and fully unzipped it. Hey presto!  I could retrieve my bank cards. (Vital for contactless payments on the bus.) Imagine all that fiddling with a queue of folk behind you waiting to alight? Curses.

But by the time I’d got my zips sorted I was late. And of course, en route, I saw loads of people I knew who I would have loved a chat with. Instead I rushed to the bus stop with 2 minutes to spare. 

And every seat on the bus was taken or reserved for disabled passengers. A kindly person gave up their seat for me. I can’t stand for ages - I’m waiting for a knee op - I wanted to shout. But my glasses steamed up owing to my over loose MacPherson tartan face mask so I swore under the mask then took my seat. 

The bus journey and, later, bits of shopping were mercifully uneventful. And I had time before my swim to take photographs of the 1866 decorated post boxes in the beautiful Pulteney Street. But walking up the hill to the hotel’s swimming pool seemed arduous. I must have looked out of breath as an annoyingly chatty woman whom I remembered from the week before managed to catch my attention with the words ‘It’s easier downhill.’ Did I look that decrepit?

I didn’t engage in banter. She had irritated me the previous Tuesday but I found a bench, swigged a few mouthfuls of water and felt restored. Then I looked for the bike stands. Surely they’d always been at the entrance to the leisure spa? I hoped no-one was watching me wander around the car park with my shopping trolley looking lost and confused. 

Then I saw a rail with a very faint sign telling me ‘bicycles left at owner’s risk’. 

All I wanted to do was to leave my metal shopping trolley frame secured with a bicycle lock. I was taking the trolley bag itself into the lockers with me. There is no room for a whole trolley in the minuscule space they call a changing room. 

But, of course, the shopping trolley bag would not pull out of the frame. I tugged and tugged (again)and spilt my bottle of water on the ground and got cross. Then the bag budged and I staggered up twenty steps to reception where four young things behind the desk were chatting away. They ignored me so I shouted ‘I’ll just go through then.’

One thing about lockdown is that there can never be more than four people in the changing room at any one time. Bliss! And at least the locker was big enough for all my belongings. 

The water was warm. I saw an old friend who was just getting out and for over thirty minutes I exercised my podgy body. 

I love the water. Even the showers worked and I was the only one to use the hairdryers. I met another friend en passant and had a merry chat. But, of course, the feeling of energy and goodwill couldn’t last. The water dispenser had hardly anything in it and took an age to half fill my bottle. I was going to be late for my bus home...

And before I rushed downhill to my return bus I needed the loo. I had to negotiate yards of fat, blue tubes, brushes, huge vats of soapy water and electric cables. But I nipped into the ladies before being spotted. Contractors were shampooing the hotel carpets in advance of reopening after lockdown and I shouldn’t have been using the hotel guest loos.

Outside at the bike stand I retrieved my shopping trolley frame. The bag fitted back in place with remarkable ease and 

I managed to get to the bus stop with a few minutes to spare. Success! 

But my knee was hurting and I needed painkillers. And on the bus every seat was filled apart from the ones up three steps at the back of the bus. I swore, again, under my tartan mask. I was in luck. A very nice woman looked after my trolley as I really didn’t want to lift it up those three steps. 

And we were off. I pushed two painkillers in my mouth but couldn’t reach my water bottle. It was in my shopping trolley - where else? three steps away.

And then we were home. I saw a couple of friends on my walk back to my garden gate and enjoyed a well-earned cocoa when I got in. It was very blustery outside. But neither of my friends had had time for a cappuccino. I really felt the need. 

What’s the moral of the story? 

Going green is knackering.Even though we know walking and taking the bus will help save the planet and cut down on car exhaust pollution it takes effort to go green. What to do to make it more practical? Don’t take my shopping trolley on the bus? Go by taxi or simply leave more time to do things? Get sorted and get a takeaway cappuccino like everyone else? 

And stop being cross! Going green is going to be hard work, I think. Especially if I keep  getting red hot and angry. I intend to persevere and calm my temper. 

Tolkien & industrialisation

Many people know that JRR Tolkien moved from Africa to a Warwickshire village when he was a boy. His father died in South Africa before he ever set foot in England again. Later - owing to financial difficulties following his father’s death - their mother moved JRR and the rest of the family from the idyllic village ( the shire) to Birmingham. 

As someone born in the Midlands I can clearly see how the contrast between town and country, industrialisation and rurality, clean air and smoky, dusty air belched out by factories would strike a sensitive lad like JRR. 

My parents were professionals. They weren’t labourers but my grandfather was a skilled foreman at an iron foundry. The muck in the air created by the Bessemer Convertor eventually killed him and nana lived in reduced circumstances as did many women when they became widowed in 1930s-40s. However nana was looked after and employed by a good man - a family friend - who couldn’t see her financially ruined. And she owned her own house. She led a happy, hard working life thereafter.

Many years later when I was a child there was woodland at the bottom of our road ( sweetly called Nightingale Place) and our house was surrounded by three fields. It sounds idyllic. But it was close to the industrial midlands which JRR disliked. I never knew the inside of the factories and only noticed the noise they made when machines started up again one new year after a long festive break. JRR’s son, Christopher, who died in 2020, said his father had a fear of mechanisation and of the modern world: Rural life and certainties destroyed by machines.

Only now are governments waking up to the notion that if we destroy nature we destroy ourselves. If we burn fossil fuel the air becomes thick and clogs our lungs. If we fell forests and jungles we make creatures homeless. If we block out the sun we die.

I see more and more articles about electric cars and alternatives to power stations to heat and light our homes. During this lockdown we would have missed the tv and the internet for sure. We can’t endure a British winter without heating. So alternatives are essential if we aren’t to lead lives like 1380s peasants.

JRR Tolkien was right to draw a distinction between the ugliness of factory flames and pollution and the bucolic life of the countryside. It would take a huge amount of adaptation, however, to become demechanised: to get rid of our cars and learn to ride a horse or a bike again. It would take an immense effort to light our home with candles and go back to a range for cooking and heating. And industrialisation brought work to thousands in the Midlands.

But the decades of relatively cheap transport, fuel and power in the home has come at a cost. JRR Tolkien could see that. But a Professor of Anglo-Saxon ( who wasn’t even sent to school when he was little) and Professor of English Language and Literature is a very different man from a Midlands industrialist who sells taps, and a labourer who makes them, for a living.

Both thinkers and industrialists have to learn from each other if we are to avoid catastrophe. 

And now I read the headlines   “‘urban flight’ raises house prices in villages.” Another kind of disturbance and imbalance in the community. Another stress for the countryside to absorb. We all need to treat our environment with care. And not push out those families who made their homes there long before the pandemic. City dwellers may have enough capital to move to the countryside. But can villagers afford to live there when prices rise? 

There’s a lot to consider in the tug of war between town and countryside, urbanisation ruralism. We all need to have a care.