Summer Update

I thought that this week I would give you an update on all of the recent ups and downs of garden life…

Where there’s a will there’s a wormery: I’ll be honest with you, it’s not going well. I killed most of the worms on the first evening. Not my fault. Well actually it was entirely my fault but it wasn’t intentional.

I read that worms need darkness so I lined the box with black bags to block out the sunlight… job done. I also read that during the first week of establishing a wormery, the worms will wait until night fall and then try to escape…. So I sealed them in with a bin-bag-lined lid and some bricks… job done. What I neglected to consider is that the worms would need some oxygen. Effectively what I had done is seal the little loves into a plastic box in another plastic box, in a plastic bag, under a plastic lid held down by concrete bricks, just to make really really sure that they couldn’t breathe. Oh dear. The next morning wasn’t a pretty picture… I’ll spare you the gruesome details.

The next dilemma is how much to feed them. The ones that did survive don’t seem to like the tomatoes and bread that I gave them. So, all in all, I’ve been left with a big smelly mess at the end of my garden. I’m not even convinced that there are any worms left. Shame.

Live or Let Die?: Last week I declared a truce on all but the malicious bugs in my garden. This week the spiders are literally trying to take over. You may think this is an exaggeration. It’s not.

I saw it a couple of mornings ago whilst brushing my teeth, propped up against the sink. It was like a scene from a bad 90s horror movie. Stretched across the bathroom door leading to the terrace was the world’s biggest spider, calmly weaving the world’s biggest web. Trapped. It didn’t even flinch when I opened the door. I left it to the boyfriend to decide what to do about it.

I’m not entirely sure why we’re being overrun with spiders now, after all they were never on my hitlist. All I can imagine is that the spiders have taken up where we left off and the increased food supply has made our terrace more attractive than ever. Kind of logical. My entire reality is informed by this kind of homemade logic.

Flowers: Fail. Somehow I am still unable to grow pretty things in the garden. I’ve kind of stopped caring.

Basil: Fail. Somehow I am still unable to grow basil. Yes, yes I know, it’s supposedly the easiest herb to grow. I can’t do it. I still yearn for homemade pesto though so sadly I have not yet stopped caring.

Veggies: Toms still in abundant supply. Beetroots all eaten… delicious. Nearing the end of the onion crop, they did well this year. Mini corns doing well, although this is the first year of growing them so I’m not too sure when they’ll be ready, to be honest, it’s much more fun not knowing.

What else? Ah yes, the first step into fruit growing seems to be going well. The kiwi plant is thriving. I'm still unconvinced by the garden centre man’s insistence that we’ll get fruit this autumn… I’ll keep you posted.

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All Things Edible

For me, one of the most appealing things about having a garden is the possibility of growing my own vegetables and becoming self sufficient – well not exactly self sufficient, I’m a meat eater after all but you get my drift. Well now I have it… to date I have two thriving pots of lettuce, 7 tomotato plants, 3 pots of beetroot, 2 pepper plants and my most recent addition, 10 little pots of red onion seed.

Perhaps my pride in my little vegetable patch is a little premature given that the only thing that’s ready to eat is the lettuce, and my partner and I aren’t able to eat it quickly enough so it’s starting to wither. But, still, I wasn’t expecting my friend’s slightly dismissive comment during an evening on the roof terrace, ‘oh growing vegetables, it’s great isn’t it, it’s so trendy now too, everyone’s doing it.’ Now I don’t take offence easily, but I was offended. ‘YOU DON’T GET IT’ I wanted to shout. The romance of growing vegetables lies in the premise that it’s not just part of a trend. Exactly the opposite in fact, it’s an attempt to remove yourself from a consumer driven society. To only produce what you need (there’ll only be one pot of lettuce next year), to learn to care for and understand what you are producing, and to work hard to produce it. And as a new-comer to this gardening malarky, it is damn hard work.

Suddenly there are so many things to consider. When I buy my fruit and veg at a supermarket, I merrily ignore the chemicals that have been used to grow and and protect the plants I’m eating. When I grow them on my roof terrace I’m suddenly filled with paranoia. Will the dye from the wool I’ve used to tie my tomato plants contaminate the fruit? What kind of fertiliser is safe to use? Is this whole exercise going to be fruitless anyway given the levels of pollution in London?

The tomatoes started off so well, lovely, little shoots grown from seed that grew and grew. Then, we went on holiday and came back to what can only be described as natural selection in action. Half of the shoots were dead and disintegrating, and the other half, for reasons unbeknownst to me had tripled in size and were literally bursting out of their containers. The survivors were swiftly transferred outside into appropriately sized pots. The next day London was hit by a frost, seven survived. They’re now doing well with no fruit yet but full of clusters of beautiful yellow flowers.

The BBC Website tells me that I should be aiming to have single stemmed tomato plants and to achieve that I have to snap the other branches off. What?? This seems to be a familiar theme throughout the gardening world, lovingly nuture your plants from seed, and then when they’ve grown to a reasonable size, ruthlessly destroy the weak to save the strong. Logically I realise my garden is not the site of an epic battle of morality and that at some point the deed will have to be done, but until I’m ready to pluck up the courage to do it, my toms will remain multi stemmed.

The beetroot are my greatest source of pride. The Guardian newspaper gave away a guide to gardening that advised soaking the beetroot seed in water for 24 hours before planting. Now I have no control sample to compare them to but the beets have done amazingly, their healthy green leaves stained with the unmistakeable red of beetroot make me smile every time I see them. However, I have no idea how I’ll know when they’re ready. The Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) say that there are three harvests, starting in June ending in October. To my mind that’s four months of wondering and waiting and a massive window of opportunity to get it wrong. I’ll keep you posted…

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