Kewt!

On the way home through London a few weeks ago I had a late morning with nothing to do. Royal Botanic Gardens Kew. Brought up in London SW, I thought I knew it well. But at that age I never quite registered what a stupendous place it is. Now I have to go back again and again I think. I only had time to see just a snippet - didn't even go in any hothouses. The Spectrum garden spoke to my condition particularly. Have a look at this great bit of the website - with 360 degree views.

A real inspiration to me as I'm hoping to get some other colours beside green next year. And I had a good chat with a couple of the fortunate people who look after it. Hardy annuals are the way to go I think. I want some Chysanthemums and some Felicia amelloides.

The rest of the Kew site doesn't make it too easy to get around, but there's a huge amount of information. A google search with the term "site:www.rbgkew.org.uk" added to whatever you were looking for will yield riches.

World's Smallest Sweet Potato!

Early this year I found a sweet potato from the greengrocer that I'd forgotten to eat (obviously I mean I'd forgotten to eat the sweet potato, not the grocer) was putting out eyes like a regular spud. I'd always wanted to try growing sweet potatoes, having picked up a rumour that it might be possible under glass even in England. So I cut it up and buried the eyes and after a few weeks I had vines growing up my kitchen window. In the fullness of time I put them in the greenhouse, where the vines got bigger and bigger.

In September came the proud moment of disinterment. What will my homegrown sweet potato be like??? A roll of the drums, please, maestro, as I wield my trowel....

Ta-daaaa:

Note: the coin is a 10p piece, about the size of a quarter.

World's Fairly Decent Carrots Don't You Think?

Some other things have grown though. The squashes I hand pollinated - I got two fruits going so far. But alas, all the others I pollinated just rotted. I don't know why. Too late in the season? Too much water? Not enough water? (I tried both.) Anybody know why this might be? So, a bit of a disappointment - but an education too.

Carrots have met expectations, though, all tasty and some quite elegant, though by no means contenders for the Fulbourn and Teversham Flower and Produce Show, where Mr Jackson (a transplanted Yorkshireman) wins every year with onions the size of bowling balls.

As well as that, courgettes are still coming, greenhouse tomatoes are accelerating if anything, spinach is thriving and...

Kale!

I got a bit disheartened after I'd planted out my sprigs of kale. How can they ever come up?, I wondered. And because I've been busy and away and not weeding, the patch I put them in just looked overgrown and that was it. But then... well I'll be, my Seasonal Affective Pessimism was leading me wrong because in fact there are a dozen viable plants shouldering up through the weeds - each with two to four leaves, leaves up to three inches long. A bit nibbled by slugs but healthy.

So I weeded round them and earthed them up and watered and then sprinkled crushed eggshells all round - I think this actually works, something to do with the slugs not liking the sharp feeling on their squishy bellies... or it may be co-incidence... but every time I did this so far I think slug attacks stopped.

So anyway, maybe I won't get scurvy this winter after all.

And finally

Apart from that, I've been pickling the last of the pears, still eating outdoors but with a sweater on (when do you stop eating outdoors?), picking a few Michaelmas Daisies, and thinking about some winter tasks:

• start some more lettuces and plant out in the greenhouse
• one last big mow and then get the mower serviced
• prune the hard fruit
• prune the roses
• cut back various invasive hedges and bushes
• dig over the flowerbed that's been completely colonised by bindweed and get some hardy annuals going instead
• cut some logs before the rain starts
• lay a path on the mud patch between the house and the veg garden
• make up a planting / cropping schedule for 2004 veg
• cut down and back almost everything in the north facing back garden I never go into that is going back to the primeval forest

More by jbr | Oct 13, 2005 | | TrackBack ()