How Grows It? (June)

 

 

Here comes the rain again

Falling on my head like a memory

Falling on my head like a .............................. 

Hhmmm, wonder if Annie Lennox had advance warning of what May 2015 would be like when she sang that?  It seems likely as on the last day of the month the weather forecaster told us May had been:

• wetter than average,
• cooler than average and
• below average level of sunshine

 

To be fair I could have saved them a salary and told them that as there’s been some intermittent sunshine but the predominating climactic feature is a bitter chill.  Immediately the sun disappears momentarily behind a cloud the temperature dips.  Sunlight is so crucial to the progression of the our delicate seedlings, indeed in bringing on all the plants, but the vegetables particularly need warmth at this stage to encourage them so they’ll be healthy and fruit well in the months to come.  It's vital to their development and they'll suffer if deprived of optimum growing conditions at this stage of cultivation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nearly lunchtime and menacing skies above Northants makes it look and feel a lot more like Doomsday than Thursday.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In all honesty we were beginning to despair of losing most or all of the mini plantlets we were so devotedly trying to protect, and then, halfway through May we had a succession of violent hail storms which left ice all around and in and among the seedlings.  Though the weather hindered growth, and progress was obdurately slow the report from the affray is that casualties were light and we didn't sustain any heavy losses.

 

The temperature was so low that the residual hail had failed to melt, even an hour later. 

 

Giving some indication of how slowly and irresolutely reluctant the temperature is to rise so far this spring/early summer.  Let’s hope for something better in the months ahead.

 

 

Tender young salad crops with hail stone ice deposits.

 

Summer bedding, 
cucumbers and runners addled by 78mph winds. 

Not what they signed up for.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Anyway, not to be despondent in the face of adversity and as the end of May is always our benchmark for getting the hardened off seedlings and any tender bedding outside, we got on and planted up the second border. 

 

 

 

 

Our USG-Plot ‘Corporation Border’, all with summer bedding to create maximum impact in the shortest time. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The colourful clang of jangling annuals it has to be said are not our usual weapon of choice, in fact far from it.  Previously we’ve always intrepidly searched out unusually rare and surprising perennial specimens.  
 

However, what we’re using here are a mixture of the plants we raised ourselves from seed, together with a couple of back-up cells packs of bedding plus a few begonias from corms. 

These are all interspersed with a random scattering of seeds which mimic the now established cosmos, cornflowers and zinnias that we’ve already brought on. 

The idea is that as their flowering life comes to an end, we should get a succession of secondary showings as the newly sown young seeds, now planted directly into the ground, should by then be sufficiently developed to pick up the slack. 

Or, a horticultural Mexican Wave.

 

 

We've even left some gaps here for the Zinnias which are showing stubbornly slow advancement (but they are known to be temperamental). 

 

The vacant space here denoted by the empty pot.

 

We used our 'dibber' to locate some of the seeds exactly where we want them


If you want your seeds or tiny bulbs (ie: snowdrops) more precisely placed you could get one of these or alternatively, if you have fingers, or know someone who does, you could ask to borrow those.

 

 

 

It's such a temptation to overspend on plants and end up inundated with far too many, so we're doggedly determined to avoid this mistake here this year and manage our simple little garden as cheaply and efficiently as possible.  

So, with this stratagem firmly set as our default mind-set we’ve still managed to pick up a few surplus to requirements, but utterly gorgeous Lupins and some extraneous other oddments from 'The Plant Man' a fantastic little family run nursery that we’ve discovered right here on our doorstep, too close and way too tempting but with such fantastic prices and selection it'd be silly not to.   www.theplantman.net

 

 

 

 

To be honest we're impatient to stop showing plant labels and can't wait until we can start depicting an ocean of colour from our own endeavours, but that's not going to happen for a couple of months at least. 

But in the meantime, here's one youngster struggling to put on a show. 

 

And so to the sickly clematis of which we reported at the end of last month. Thank you for all your caring and compassionate messages of support, and yes it did rally. 

Although it sustained some further trauma later when wind damage whipped out the main stem. 


Thus, although appearing a little foreshortened in the picture (right) it's now doing well.  We delayed the planting of it to its final destination so as not to engender further shock or encourage ‘wilt’ and once it had put on some keen growth we introduced it to its forever home, where it's acclimatising nicely. 

 

As May has been so long, eventful and fraught with hardship I think we'll say "so long" for now and review how the vegetables are all doing in the next post.

No one said it was going to be easy.