Rain, glorious rain...

    Ok, you can have too much of a good thing. Too much sun, too much rain! Man! No a lot achieved. It has been a damp to wet week. Lifted some Agata first earlies. So far not impressed with this variety and if I were planting next year I would not bother with these. Good ole Touchon carrots are producing again. I love this old varity and have had success over multiple years. Cut off the broad been stalks. Left the roots to so as to fix nitrogen in the soil from them. Violet garlic lifted. Poor crop but at least some! Elephant garlic has been a disappointment with most going to seed and the rest not producing any sort of Elephant garlic at all! Did some tidying up of the chicken run area. The forsythia as usual was trying its take over bit along with the lemon balm. Looks like it is going to be a damp week so very likely not a lot will get done.

    Chickens are not laying well and the suspect of all things is Wilba the cat!! Empty egg found on the drive way of my daughter house. The egg split neatly in halve and the contents devoured! Never would have thought a cat would eat an egg. Well an average of 2.9 eggs a day this last week up on last but still not as good as it should be.

No, it is not in the garden HONEST!

Yes more sun

    Vegetable gardening can be a fickle thing. You can go from success to failure in such a short time. Over my time here in la Creuse I have had successes and failures and I have had tremendous fun trying to grow unusual veg and trying out things like Hugelkultur and no dig beds. This year is one of failure I fear. Grass mowing, vine pruning and new potato lifting done this last week. The grass is brown and I was really just mowing off the weeds. A good start to the year with warmth and rain and an early planting out of lettuce was sucessful. Summer cabbage plants also planted out and fingers crossed I may get something from them. Now the sun is beating down at very high temperatures. I have lost my squash, pumpkins, tomatoes and cucumber plants despite watering.  Water melon plants are small and as I will have more than likely have moved by the time they produce I doubt if I will bother to plant them out.  A very poor germination rate of beetroot and other seeds.  Parsnips have gone to seed more so than usual and the shallots have already died back and are very small. Onions are small but are hanging in there but I am not expecting great things. Even the garlic has been poor. Success was had with over winter broad beans but the early sowing of peas was not a great success. On the upside strawberries have been good and it looks like I will get a decent potato crop. Not as large as last year but still decent. The sweet corn is going well and maize is a little more drought tolerant I think.  Early sowing of carrots are at least giving a crop that can be pulled. 

  The hens do not enjoy hot weather. Egg production over the last week has been poor with an average of 2.1 eggs per day. 

   So as the days go by I have to start to wind down my veg garden as the day draws closer to calling it a day on my time at Watermeadows.

Wilba cat on the poly tunnel roof!