Activity has been minimal for the last four weeks, as Miss Swallow has been off ill! This has given the wasps a chance to die off, so their nest is no longer a problem! This week, the competition potatoes were collected from Frank Nicol's and the Greenhouse community shop. We now need to weigh out the produce from each one, to find a winner. This will keep us busy after we return from our October break (two weeks, starting tomorrow).
The sunflowers are looking good and generally the garden is in pretty good shape considering nothing much has been done since June!
The teasels look wonderfully structural now they have gone to seed.
Even this hanging basket looked after itself - with some help from the rain!
There are way too many "Jersey Kale" seeds for us to collect though we will do our best!
Some Lupins are still in flower though most have gone to seed - again, we are collecting as many as possible.
The wild flower seeds are also giving an excellent show! The mixture contains: Cornflowers (blue), Corn Cockle (purple), Corn Chamomile (white/yellow), Corn Marigold (yellow) and Corn Poppy (red).
Today, we sat for fifteen minutes to watch the insects visiting them. We were completing a survey for "buglife" to help the Royal Horticultural Society build information about which flowers are best for attracting pollinating insects.
There aren't any butterflies, bees or wasps about now, but we saw loads of hover flies and other flies of all sizes - they preferred the Corn Chamomile and Corn Marigold.
Our garlic has gone to seed - the heads are architectural marvels! Not sure if that affects the garlic - we'll dig it up after the break, as we love our garlic bread!
The strawberries have grown runners that have rooted into the soil - new plants for next year!
Hopefully, bugs and insects will be finding a nice home here for the winter.
In November, we will be planting hedge-row plants along the side of the wild flowers - this will make more wildlife friendly habitat in future.
Seeds drying in the shed
Well, I'm glad to see the Garden has survived the Summer ... we have had such an outright evil Summer over here on this side of the Water, that it is a relief to see Winter ahead (Though the met folk predict that we'll have a Winter similar to last ... too warm and too dry. 'WAY too dry!). Our Summer was, roughly: The Eastern ¼ of the country flooded, or nearly; the middle ½ of the country (the Prairies and Great Plains) parched and very hot; and the Western ¼ alight. NOT a good year! You seem to have fared better, though your days are shortening. An exercise for you scholarly ones: Look up the Greek word for "dark" and see how Scotland got its name.
ReplyDeleteGlad, also, to see you indulging in one of my favourite gardening activities (when I had a bit of land) ... that of saving seeds. It is both a thrifty practise, and one that just seems right, you know ... after all, the plants spend all that energy and effort into making those seeds, it seems rather an affront to Nature, an offense against Harmony, as it were, to simply chuck 'em out and buy new.
BTW, speaking of seeds, how fared those rather bizarre squash seeds that I sent? I thought you'd enjoy the shapes and colours of them. I haven't seen any this year; they are rather rare in the supermarkets, but I assure you that they are edible.
BTW (again), I met a nice Japanese lady living in New Zealand who eats the squash blossoms that she removes from her squash vines (so as to encourage larger squashes from the remaining blooms). Not a practise that I'm familiar with, though I do understand that most flowers are edible, and quite good. I shall have to research this.
The greenhouses look wonderful, and are the envy of my wife (and of myself, if the truth be known). It's nice the strawberries are doing well, but have an eye to their spreading .... they can be quite invasive and difficult to control ... but OH! the lovely fruit of ripe berries from the vine! Another caution: Bunnies love them too, as do birds. Get there first.
I reckon I've been nattering on, as usual ... a fault of the old; they think folk have nowt to do but listen to them.
Good luck from your friend across the sea ...
der Wandersmann