Oh dearie me, that's a bit of a shame old chap ***

Last night was a bad one. It was then that I noticed this entire row of blanch leeks had gone to seed. If you look closely you can see the pointy seed heads popping up through the centre of the foliage. I bought them in from a fellow grower in April and have had good plants from this guy before but for some reason they're a complete failure this time around. I know he only has a cold greenhouse with double insulation but I guess the hard winter was just too cold and the check in growth has resulted in the plant doing this.

*** (Not what I actually said!!!)








After a good few weeks I'm starting to have one or two problems. My shallots have now been topped and tailed and are on trays of sawdust ripening, but a lot of them (in the blue trays) have gone out of shape during the drying out process. The ones in the wooden tray are pretty good however and certainly the best I have ever grown.





Yesterday I harvested the spuds growing in the buckets for the early show this coming weekend. I managed to get a reasonable set of 3 Kestrel but was disappointed to find the Winston were pretty scabbed up even having been grown in peat based compost.

The last apple fruitlet fell off my apple tree yesterday after a very poor fruit set. Late Spring frosts caught the blossom and only a few managed to bear fruit but these have all gradually succumbed. A popular class at some shows in my area is one for a single veg, single bloom and single fruit and I've always relied on my Cox (easy!) to give me the fruit for this class. I shall now be relying on a grape vine I planted a couple of years ago and which has a few small bunches like this one in amongst the foliage. Whether they'll be big enough for the September shows is doubtful as October is a more likely date for outdoor vines in Britain.

And finally, the bloke who lives 2 doors up from me has sold up and left which is good because he was a jumped up little knobhead who put stupid little officious tickets on people's cars if they parked slightly in front of his house. Tonight, before he left for his new abode he lit a bonfire in his fox infested overgrown back garden at 7pm and promptly buggered off leaving the smoke to annoy everyone.

Unfortunately, the fire got out of hand and spread two gardens up (away from us luckily otherwise the little twat would be dead) and this was the scene outside our house as the fire brigade attended the scene. Thick git.