And so it continues...

    The wet and cold weather continue. Nothing has been done in the garden this week. Too wet by far. Next week does not look good either but maybe between showers?? Hopefully they will not been long or heavy. Some play time on the ride on mower gather up leaves and also spreading chicken dirty chicken bedding on next years brassica patch.

 

Heavy rain overnight filled the ponds

Broad beans

Cold and wet

 

Moss curled parsly patch

   It always seems the weather is a matter for discussion amongst gardeners. Come drought, flood or pestilence. Meteorological winter started on the 1st December and the shortest day is, what, some three weeks away (21st December). Christmas is on ones mind and so Christmas trees and carols, turkey and ham start to become more prevelent in ones thoughts! LOL!

  In the garden? Well, not a lot. Forked and weeded the other half of the bed that has sprouting broad beans and sowed with broad beans. More stones moved for the path at the bottom of the bulb bank but by golly there is a lot to move to somewhere!

  Oh yes there is plenty to do but cold and dank conditions outside and a warm fire inside? Umm. Sometimes warmth inside overcomes the desire to get stuff done outside. Hot chocolate....umm. Must be getting old. No, to be fair, the soil is too wet to do anything with to be honest.

  Chickens are being chickens and the rivilary between the cockerals have been facing up to each other. The eldest, Mr. Chick is holding his own and the middle Maran cockeral keeps trying his luck. At one time he had succeeded in getting the newest hens away from Mr. Chick but they decided they preferred Mr. Chick. The youngest cockeral, another Maran, dashes in and chases a hen whenever he can! Egg laying is still on the low side, two to three eggs a day. Enough to keep us going for now.

And the result is.....

 The last week has been spent getting the bulb bank bed prepared and bulbs planted. Yes, the bulbs arrived on the 24th November! I marked out the bed and set to! At the end of planting the three hundred and fifty bulbs (Dutchmaster,bottom left, Fortune, bottom right and mixed spicies narcissi) I was left with a big pile of stones of various sizes and no edge to the bottom of my bulb bank bed. I decided to raise a one stone wall and created a broken stone path at the bottom (see photo). The allowed me to edge the bulb bank bed and give me another foot width along the bottom of the bank to put bulbs in that I had dug up while clearing the space.(see photo). So, it is now pretty much done. Some tidying up to do and what the heck do I do with a pile of stones? Oh, I did do a bit of vegetable gardening. In my poly tunnel I have been transplanting Sanquine beetroot plants. I am hoping that the seedlings will be ok for next spring.

Path taking shape

Stone pile shrinks a litte...

Creating the bulb bed

     Should I have started doing this I wonder to myself? The bank I cleared of brambles is now being turned into an area to allow me to plant bulbs. Nice idea. Outside the front of the house will look very pretty come spring, however, (always a however) once I started work I did begin to think ths is a silly idea! I uncovered a fallen wall and have been removing stones ever since! Been at it for four days (well, no whole days) and still probably two days (four to six hours) still to go! Man!

After Day 4

After Day 1

    So what else has been going on? In my enthusiasm and having discovered under the brambles a forgotten cut down tree (smallish one I hasten to add) I have created another Huglekultur bed. Photos below. The over winder broad beans are now showing so thats good! Chickens are being chickens and it looks like they are starting to lay a little better. Getting four eggs almost every other day now. I do not expect things to get better until the days get longer.

Huglekultur bed being filled

Completed Huglekultur bed

CONTINUING TO RECLAIM

     The weather continues to be kind. Mild, bit of sun, no rain. Ideal for working out in the garden. So I have undertaken to reclaim the bank that is just outside the front of my house. Over the last couple of years it has been left to do its own thing that being growing brambles! One or two reasonable pickings of black berries ensued but really why did I let them get out of control? Anyway the last week has been spent making good use of a pair of secateurs, a heavy duty hoe, fork and barrow! 

The START

Almost the END!

   The last of the outdoor lettuce has been pulled. Once again I planted out plants with the hope that they might do something and again I have been surprised that the chance I took paid off. The weather has been mild to date with only one or two frosts and those not severe. Anyway all spring/summer vegetables are now picked or pulled and cleared. Only winter stuff in the ground now...leeks, sprouts, purple sprouting, swede. 

   The chickens are being chickens at this time of year and are not laying well. They do not like short days of daylight. Of course it also did not help that most went into moult too! Hopefully in the not too distant future I will be saying that I have too many eggs!

BED RECOVERY

       For some time I have been considering digging up my lavender bed. The bushes are old and unkempt to be kind to them. They have served their purpose in proving lavender for my son in laws business (now defunct) and are just taking up space and looking very untidy. So I have set too and recovered the bed. My plan is to plant sweet peppers in it next year. At the moment there are some late sowing Touchen carrots at one end but they will be gone soon. As always I have a two legged feathered helper....

Top end of old lavender bed

Bottom end of old lavender bed

   I have discovered a few onions that were missed when I harvested them and have put up some good growth. I have moved those and added to the new onion bed some separated Egyptian (walking) onions. My intention is to do away with the old Egyptian onion bed as it has been in situ for a number of years and the adult plants are in need of being split up. All these onions should be ok over the winter but hey nothing ventured nothing gained. A couple of lettuce pulled this week. There are a few left and to be honest they need to be eaten!

  Chickens are being chickens and the newbies on the block, a couple of Brahma crosses, have started to lay. Still only two or three eggs a day but that is enough for us for now.

Blue gray eggs are the new Brahma cross hen eggs

Slow, quick quick slow....

     My local argricultural merchant who usually has garlic bulbs left over has this year sold out! I am hoping with fingers crossed they they get some more in. Still a couple of weeks left to get some planted so I will wait but will plant some of last years just in case. I have found that previouis years bulbs do not do as well but hey at the end of the day beggers cannot be choosers!

    So that have I been upto this last week? Pulled a couple of Batavia Blonde lettuce which despite all have done well. I still have a few in the ground but they need eating up really! Lettuce soup? I have decided that my lavender bushes are no longer fit for purpose and I have cut them down with the intend of digging up the bushes and reverting the bed back to vegetable growing, probably pototoes next year. As always some forking and weeding which allowed me to remove "rogue" onions from another bed. These were ones from last winters experiment of growing onions over winter which I decided was not a particular success. They must have been small ones that I missed when harvesting the others! Oh well half a dozen onions to over winter. Why not? In the poly tunnel my bed of Champeau Sanquine beetroot (Champeau because they are seed gathered in my garden and not bought) has decided to germinate! Man! So I am transplanting them within the poly tunnel which is currently pretty much empty. They will tolerate low temperatures and given a bit of protection from the elements I should get a decent crop of beetroot next spring. My small no dig bed of strawberries is looking good and I even picked one strawberry! Ha! I had feared that my moss curled parsley bed would not be any good this year but I have been proven wrong. The plants have survived and are thriving. On the 31st October  I am still mowing the grass! Out and about on the ride on mowing away. Will it be the last cut of the year? Probably not if it stays mild.

  Chickens are being chickens and at this time of year the number of eggs I am getting every day is low. Some are in moult and others I think have decided that the short amount of daylight is enough to put them off! Of course some are still youngsters and I have found with the hens that are more of a pure breed they do not come into lay until quite a bit later than what one would expect (usually around sixteen weeks). Oh well next spring I will be writing that I have so many eggs I will not know what to do with them!

Moss curled parsly patch

Full moon on Halloween 311020