Blueberries

It's been a brilliant year for the Blueberries this year, just as it was last year. 

Being in the Net Tunnel seems to really agree with the three bushes that we have.  The pots were were lifted outside when the flowers first appeared for natural pollination by pollinating insects and then once there were signs of fruit developing moved back in, where they have remained all Summer safe from the  birds and other thieving little critters, and they will stay there through the Winter after a bit of a pruning.

The first few pickings were weighed for posterity but as is so often the way this fell by the wayside as busy days and longs watering sessions made my mind a blur.

But we have ate royally well from the bushes, tubs have been taken to Mum's and we have eaten some straight from the bushes as we have passed by ... well it would be rude not too  ;-)

They are lovely sprinkled onto breakfast cereals to add a pop of summery freshness and even better when added to the cereal bowl straight from the freezer ... when the ice cold pop as the berry explodes in your mouth is absolutely amazing.  They freeze so easily, a quick wash, a good dry and then straight into tubs.  I try and remember to give the tub a good shake an hour or so after putting it in the freezer just to ensure that they remain free-flowing, but I have never had a problem even if I forget to do this.

Our bushes are now about eight or nine years old and have been growing from strength to strength, with a repot and a change of compost last year, but I think I will supplement them with a couple of younger bushes in time for next years picking season to keep a line of continuity going .... just in case.

Sue xx

Peas, Mice, Blueberries and Shows

The peas haven't been brilliant in quantity this year but we've enjoyed enough for a few good meals.  This pea pod shows the standard of the peas we got from the ones that were available a week or so ago.  Sadly there are no more to go in the freezer but we do have a few more pods developing on the outdoor plants, the ones in the net tunnel have unfortunately all been eaten by mice, so I've pulled up the dying plants to make more space for the Strawberry runners.

Talking of mice, we've been using two humane mouse traps to catch the mice, releasing them unharmed after a good snack ... which they have now figured out how to get out of.  The last few days when we have checked the traps there are no tasty treats left ... and no mice!!

So now it's a case of them or us and sadly I have had to use poison pellets in the traps instead of the usual tasty treats  :-(

Even though our pea crop is coming to an end with no supplies to see us through the Winter, the Blueberries show no signs of dwindling.  This was one of the first pickings a couple of weeks ago, which unfortunately I didn't weigh ...

...this was a week later.

These were picked when we got back from the Royal Welsh Show last week and yesterdays smaller picking was taken for Mum, as was one other picking a few weeks ago, and of course we've been eating lots ourselves, either when we're out working or a small picking to go in a dessert or smoothie.

This week I have purposely been avoiding picking off the middle Blueberry bush ... the one with the biggest juiciest berries ... as I wanted to enter a bowlful into the Trelawnyd Show on Saturday to support blogging buddy John Gray, now (because I forgot to tell him) I've just found out that my Lovely Hubby has been snacking on them ... naughty boy!!

Talking of the Trelawnyd Flower Show, today I am going to start getting my entries together to save a last minute panic on Saturday morning.  The first year I entered I managed to get two Second places for my tomatoes and potatoes, last year I improved slightly with a First for my Orange Marmalade and a Second for my Green Tomato Chutney.

How will I do this year?  Well I have no idea, the fruit and veg growing has been a bit out of time, the mice have been a pain, but I'm going to put my best foot, and marrow,  forward and do what I can. 

At the very least we are going to get a good day out  :-)

Sue xx

Tour of the Plot - Part Four

Well here it is the final Tour of the Plot. 

Let's go past the polytunnel now towards the waving man in the distance ... honestly since he came back to work at home full time, every time I get the camera out he's there hogging the shot   :-)

Notice on your left the little troughs of Cosmos that I've been selling at Car Boot Sales ...

... and on your right our most recent homemade flower bed.

Back to your left is The Orchard, also known as Chicken Land.  Here we have three Damson Plum trees, three Pear trees, four Apple trees (one of them is an espalier on the top fence) and three 'Victoria' Plum trees.

Also there are two Fig bushes, protected from the chickens by posts and wires. 

Back to your right and against the fence to the manure pile is our largest Gooseberry bush. It obviously enjoys all the healthy soil from being so near that amount of horse manure.

And speaking of horse manure ... that's just what Alan is busy unloading.

Going past him and we are into the paddock, and looking into the top right corner is the fenced off area we call Nut Wood.

It's here that we have most of our nut trees along with wild flowers and areas for wildlife.

The trees we have in here are three Oak and three Birch along the fence nearest the road, and then we have two Sweet Chestnut, four Walnut trees and two Almond trees. Of course we also have the Cob Nut trees in our woodland overlooking the Veggie Patch.  Cob nuts are like Hazelnuts, so altogether we have should have quite a good selection of nuts for future use.

Deliberately placed in here are the huge rocks that we excavated from the hillside when we were building the foundations for the garage and workshop, along with some smaller rocks, all there fore the insects and wildlife to make their homes under and around.

There's also the large piece of the old oak tree that we sadly had to fell not long after we bought the house. Now as it slowly decomposes it is home to masses of insects.

The whole area is alive with insects, birds, butterflies and bees and now we have just found out we have frogs around the pond.

The main wildflower area is in the corner.  Seeds sown and plants planted and then left to their own devices for the wildlife to enjoy.  These will self seed and spread each year.

The pond is just an old plastic paddling pool that we found here, dug half into the ground with rocks and stones to make safe area for smaller creatures to get down and drink or bask in the sun.

It's amazing how lush this area has become so quickly.

The chipped wood floor is also home to all sorts of insect life and mushrooms.

The Nut trees are all young, we had a few Almonds last year and there are more nuts appearing this year, but it will be another couple of years until we see much of a crop I think.

Heading back to the house we pass the manure pile now all unloaded and neatly covered over to steam away and rot down with the help of the hundreds of worms that are in there, ready to feed our vegetable beds next year.

And lastly at the back of the house, just outside the conservatory where they are handy for picking as I cook, is the majority of our herbs.  Still planted in the old tin bath. Here I have Rosemary, Chives, Parsley, Mint, two or three varieties of Sage, two types of Thyme, some Lovage .... and a scarecrow.

In these pots are some more herbs and some edible flowers, as well as a pot of Cosmos.

So that concludes the Tour of the Plot for this year. 

I doubt it will change much over the years, but things will move from bed to bed as I practice my slightly hit and miss planting rotations,  and fruit bushes and trees will hopefully mature and give us larger and larger harvests.

The only thing I've just realised that haven't mentioned or photographed are our wonderful old apple trees, they were here when we moved in and were most likely here for generations before the people that we bought the house from moved in.  Three have eating apples and one, deep into Chicken World, has a type of cooking apple.  Every year these help fill our freezer with apple slices, our cupboards with jars of stewed apples and give the chickens and wildlife lots to eat as they drop off the trees.  Oh yes, I almost forgot, also in Chicken World are one Cherry tree and one Plum tree, pruned hard by Alan last year and this year having a rest.

So we are now into the final part of our plan ... the one that we have been working towards for the last eight years ... the one where we cut our spending right down to only buying what we can't produce ourselves, shop less and less for food and learn to live more and more off the fruits of our land and labours.

I hope you have enjoyed this four part tour, it's been good to get it on here for posterity and really good for me to slowly walk our land photographing how far we have come in the three and a half years we have been here. 

Before this it was all building work, hard construction and big boys machines, now it's time to enjoy the results of all that upheaval.  But before we say goodbye to tradesmen there was just one more job to do .....

I'll tell you all about it next time.

Sue xx

Tour of the Plot - Part Three

Part three of the Tour of the Plot is the Veggie Patch. 

Situated above the Poly and Net tunnels it is a sloping area of raised beds and woodchip paths. We took the decision to grow in raised beds as I have found this the best way to grow vegetables.  You can feed or water specific beds without waste, dig up a bed of potatoes without disturbing another crop and I like the way it centres my mind on a small area.   I find can give each bed more care and attention than if I was faced with a large flat space.

We have four long beds each divided into smaller sections and one special bed.  Three going up the hill and one at the top going horizontal.  The special bed is Dad's Memorial Bed and is a wildlife haven, with flowers and a birdbath for all the little pollinating visitors and our feathered friends.

The woodchip paths between the beds was all given to us free of charge by our local friendly tree surgeons who have mandatory tree trimming to do each year for the local electricity companies (so the trees are not threatening all the overhead power lines).  They leave the owner of the land they are working on the chopped lengths of wood for their fires and log burners and have to come away with the chippings off all the small branches (if the person doesn't want them).  We were happy to offer to be a dropping off point for the whole of last year ... so we are making good use of the chippings.

The centre part of bed one has my new netted tents, bought in the Wyevale sale last year after a lunch with Mum, and up to now working brilliantly to protect my new Cabbage plants from all the Cabbage White butterflies that are in the area.

The first bed ... three Cabbages and a French Marigold, then a tyre with Peas growing up a support, behind them are half a dozen Tomato plants.

Under the net tents are 20 Cabbages.

The top section of this bed has the Runner Beans growing up the fixed wire mesh  and two Courgette plants on this side.

Yes, the lower part of the Runner Beans have had ALL the leaves eaten by rabbits or squirrels, but somehow the top parts are still surviving.  This happened last year and I left the roots of each plant in the soil, luckily they regrew and we ended up with a bumper crop off just two plants.

The horizontal bed at the top of the patch has an empty bed nearest to us, the mini compost bin in the centre one ... 

... a fantastic crop of Cob Nuts on the overhanging trees ...

... and a good crop of 'Estima' Potatoes in the far bed.

We have decided to use these top beds as two new Rhubarb beds and two new Asparagus beds from Autumn of this year when we will transplant the Rhubarb from the current Rhubarb patch and plant the Asparagus seedlings that I am currently growing from seed.

Going back down the hill and looking at the centre bed we have a couple more Potato plants and another tyre of Peas.

Then we have one empty bed (soon to have the Turnip seedlings) and then even more potatoes and a tyre planted with French Marigolds.

And then there is Dad's Bed ...

... a little wildlife oasis in the midst of all the vegetables. 

Lots of plants around a bird bath and  a small tree.  Salix 'Caprea Pendula' which is a half standard and this year is so lush it appears to be a big green pom pom.

Back to the bottom of the hill and we are at the last of the long beds.  The first section has six Butternut Squash plants.

The next section was to have been our Asparagus bed, but the escapee chickens last year killed all but two of the Asparagus plants, so now it has just been planted with this years Leek crop.  Which I carefully did around the ferns of the remaining two Asparagus.

Yes, teeny tiny Leeks.

The final section, has a couple of Runner Beans growing up the mesh (the rabbits ate the rest), and at either side of the wire there are some Marrow plants.

Meandering across the back of the plot to go back to the house we have a Hop plant at the top of the fence.  Hopefully one year there will be enough hops for Alan to use in his beer brewing, or at least to add flavour to his beer.

Continuing down the fence line there are the Blackcurrants ....

.... then after the compost bins the Raspberries.

All this leads us back down to the Belfast sink and round to the gateway that takes us back to the house.

The last part of this little tour will be in the next post.

Sue xx