SoS 20/11
It’s still wet! Wet wet wet!
Everything in the garden is done at breakneck speed as we literally only have one clear day between multiple wets. Are there still climate change deniers out there? Seriously?
We are having the wettest, coldest November in my memory and I just turned 70. Anyway, apart from various veg bolting, here’s my six – all from the veggie and berry gardens.
The berries are fantastic. If we can just get enough to sun to ripen them, we will have the biggest ever supply to date, in the freezer. We have loganberries, raspberries, silvan berries, thornless blackberries and boysenberries. The blueberries this year don’t even rate a mention.
The snowpeas have been prolific but have been smashed down with the weight of their crop and the rain.
The fledgling rhubarb is going well but I need one of those pipe thingies to keep it upright.
This is all there is of a whole fence of sweet peas. Sad. The seeds were grown in the cold frame.
Same with my sunflowers. I normally have swathes. I shall try and remedy that by planting more as they are my bee magnets and also feed the wild parrots at the end of summer. I feel responsible for providing fodder for birds and bees.
The potatoes are going well (Kipflers and Pink Eyes in top right of screen) – which is good. We might have to rethink the amount we plant and double it for next year. Till now, we’ve been feeding two households from the veggie garden but our son has now created his own beautiful potager, so we will have much more space available just for us.
And to end on a positive note, can I throw in one extra?
I pruned Madame Alfred Carriere mercilessly in late autumn. It seems she loves a haircut!
Don’t forget to trot off to Mr.P for SOS across the globe.
Cheers.
What a lovely supply of berries!
I like using berries for many things, Barbara – but they are so beautiful straight from the garden.
A mighty crop of berries (of various sorts)! The peas look very healthy too, if a bit weather beaten.
Quite a few varieties, Andrew. I LOVE berries. Yes, the snowpeas really almost deserve a compost burial now.
You are going to have a lot of berries this year! These raspberries are very beautiful. I also really liked the photo of the rose ‘Madame Alfred Carriere’ with the blue sky behind.
Thank you, Fred.
I adore your Madame A. I grew it ages ago, decades ago in my big garden, which now belongs to another. Seeing it bloom, even on my little I Pad screen, is a thrill. All my roses are gone, I can tell, from Google Earth! But some remnants of that garden remain!
Oh, Jayne, how sad!
I try never to look at the garden my husband and I created years ago in a previous house. It was so lovely and I’d hate to see it less than what it was. The Madame A is just so beautiful. Quite my favourite rose.
So many lovely berries, I hope you soon get some sunshine to ripen them! Madame alfred is flowering much better than mine, maybe I ought to prune it like you have!
Hi Pauline! I try to imagine picking all the berries – stained fingers, bowls of berries and cream, berry and chocolate brownies, pavlova and berries, berry icecream and best of all, berry jam. Madame A – we rpuned her so hard. I was TERRIFIED she might not bounce back because when I enquired from the supplier in August, it will be next August before they have any new roses and I’m no good at striking cuttings. But all’s well.
We’ve yet to have a frost, its been cooler today, but at the third week in November I’d expected some frost, In my memories 2 years ago we’d a hard frost and in the photos the garden looked like middle of winter, at the moment I have hebe’s reflowering, roses and my fushia’s are still glorious, apart from the leaves from the trees , t looks autumnal. We even have tomatoes still ripening albeit slowly in our unheated greenhouse. Global warming is definately real
As long as the bees are okay and we can still grow food. That’s my main concern, Libby.
Oops meant to add your garden looks fabulous
Pleased to see your Madame A responded so well to the hard prune. I’m thinking of giving mine a similar treatment. I see the wet weather has benefited what I think of as the Scottish crops – the Raspberries and similar rubus.
Do you know, just the other day I mentioned to a friend that I felt we were living in Scotland! Just hope we don’t get the midges in summer. Pretty sure we’ll get masses of mosquitoes (or mozzies as they’re called in Australia).
Prue, I hope you don’t get the midges either, they are fierce critters !! Sadly they love me :'(