The latest gardening view from the potting shed window.
My Gardening View this month is all about starting to get the benefits of all that seed sowing and planning earlier in the year.
The cutting bed is beginning to produce flowers for the house, the sweet peas are in full flow and I’ve been picking fruit.
It’s been a good year for blackcurrants after a poor season last year. They’re one of my favourite fruits and are often difficult to find in the shops.
Soft fruit is one of the most rewarding – and straightforward – things to grow and something I wouldn’t be without.
The summer raspberries have also been good with both the yellow and red varieties producing lots of fruit.
This red in particular has had a better year than most not least because it appears to have escaped the attentions of the raspberry beetle.
Meanwhile, the autumn raspberries are already starting to have the odd berry with lots more on the way.
The first of the tomatoes have also been harvested. ‘Honeycomb’ was the quickest to ripen but the rest are beginning to catch up.
I grow a lot of tomatoes and every corner seems to have a pot – or three! The greenhouse is also crammed.
The strawberries have finished for this year – not as long a season as last year and probably an indication that I need to replace the plants. I’ve taken the netting off and will start to look for runners that I can root ready for a new bed.
The self-sown sunflowers are brightening the main vegetable beds – far ahead of those I’ve grown from seed. I’ve picked mange tout, dwarf French beans, courgette, petty pan squash and finished off the broad beans.
It’s not all been good news though. There’s been a complete failure to germinate runner beans and I’ve sown more climbing French beans instead. Some of the squash have taken a long time to get going but seem to be starting to move now, and the pigeons have eaten the peas.
More irritatingly, the resident slugs and snails have wiped out a batch of lettuce that I planted out, despite checking the bed thoroughly. A second batch are being grown on in modules and won’t go out until they are big enough to scare the molluscs!
The cutting bed is looking pretty with Antirrhinum majus ‘Chantilly Bronze’ from Chiltern Seeds every bit as lovely as the seed catalogue picture suggested.
I’m also rather pleased with the Cosmos sulphureus ‘Bright Lights’, also from Chiltern, which is filling the old galvanised bucket.
The only problem with the cutting bed is that it looks so good from the potting shed window I’m reluctant to cut anything!
The grass under the old apple tree has a section that’s full of spring bulbs so it doesn’t get cut until their leaves have died back. This year, it’s been left unmown even after that and I rather like the ‘meadow-like appearance. Adding some ox-eye daisies is a possibility.
The oregano flowers are proving popular and are usually covered in bees and butterflies.
The potting shed is looking pretty empty, apart from a pile of pots and seed trays that need washing ready to use again.
I am being invaded by the fig though, despite pruning it earlier this year. More drastic action is obviously needed.
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