Goodbye Lust Garden

In the last days I’ve been feeling elegiac about the garden.

Georgi is wanting to move. She’s found the garden too big to manage on her own. And there’s frustration that she can’t do with it what she would like to do.

And the loneliness too of being up here, in this isolated windy place.

So it’s probably time to let go of the garden. And let this blog go too. (Appropriately, this is the 50th post so it would be neat to end now)

For 6 brief months we’ve had much enjoyment out of it (perhaps less in the last month, but certainly in the earlier part of the summer)

It’s been lovely to share it together with you George. Thank you.

But life has to move on.

To pastures new.

Goodbye Lust Garden. May you continue to flourish.

And nourish others also.

The fields beyond

Looking from the bottom of the Lust Garden this is what you see

A nursery of saplings – and beyond, fields (of grazing sheep usually)

Looks like most of these saplings haven’t survived. They’ve got adequate protection from rabbits – so maybe it’s an effect of the strong winds that blow constantly in from the Purbeck Hills.

It’s a very windy, blowy garden. An exposed feeling.

George has wind chimes hung from the greenhouse that tinkle away continually. i should have made a recording of them to stick on here.

You could imagine that a family of yak herders had arrived. Blown in across the Russian Steppes and turned up here in little Dorset.

Hopefully their Yaks will munch up the grass. Save George money for mowing….Lol….

Ripening toms

On the kitchen window sill

It’s kind of indicative of the summer – and the August we’ve had.

They aren’t getting enough sun out there on their vines.

So George picks them off to give them a chance to ripen here on the window.

I don’t know if lack of sun and heat has an effect on whats inside the skins also

but i found the taste of these toms slightly bland

They don’t burst into your mouth with sunshine.

Hello, Green Willy

And i haven’t finished yet.

Down in the bottom left corner of the patch this was happening

Courgette plants bursting out and bursting through the fence.

And when you looked underneath those leaves – tons of little penis’s growing!

They’re so insistent they wanted to push and poke at you

There’s going to be many many of these little fella’s bustin up and out

This one’s a bit on the small size. And not as sensitive obviously. But very firm.

And likely to be getting much bigger and firmer in the weeks to come.

Green hearts

And there was more to come.

What looked like a vegetable graveyard turned out to be a veritable treasure trove.

Loads of broad beans dying to be picked

Ok, some were going on the turn, blackening around their cases. But when you picked them out they looked like this

Look how green they are?! Fat little packets of green-ness.

Like green hearts.

It made me feel healthy just looking at that bowl of beans.

Greener equals gooder!

Unearthing goodies

In the process of rescuing the plot from those caterpillars i also unearthed lots of goodies

These potatoes seem to have grown from plants that we put back in. Don’t know if thats true or not, but it kept coming up potatoes everywhere i dug in that top right corner.

Yes, they look a tad pathetic these scraps; 2 half eaten cabbages prized out of the jaws of those monster munchers; 4 runner beans picked off the canes in the herb circle (but there’s more of them to come); and one solitary little onion that somehow survived and struggled up.

Only to be eaten! By us, like this

With sherried kidneys. And very nice too.

Slightly out of focus with this picture. But you get the picture. Think it was cus i was hungry to get stuck in!

Caterpillar Attack!

Look at these little bleeders

Crawled all over our veg patch. Bleeding the cabbages dry.

Already munched their way through the Brussels and Cauli’s.

Those poor Cauli’s. They were never gonna make it really.

And to think when we saw those Cabbage White Butterflies sweetly dancing over our veggies a few weeks back – little did we know the devastation they were laying and planting everywhere … thousands of eggs hatched into thousands of these creepy crawly caterpillars with teeth like razors, slicing and sawing…. on the backs of our brassica’s…. the tenacious little f—-rs…..

I must have picked off 5 million of them, squashing their slushy green insides between my fingers – then chuck!, over the hedge you go matey!….. I was lobbing them over like an Olympic shot-putter….. and slugs and snails were being lobbed and tossed over too…. Behind that hedge must be piled high with smashed up shells and slithery green blood….

Anyway. After de-caterpillaring, de-snailing, and de-slugging (and weeding too) the veg patch looked like it had no longer lost – but found, the plot again

And space now for replanting. If Georgi wants to.

Circle without the herbs

I haven’t been in this garden for a month.

Bigger life events meant George hadn’t had the time or inclination to be in it. And this horribly wet August we’re having doesn’t exactly encourage anybody to be outdoors much.

So things have been merrily doing there own thang. Which means they look like this

The herb circle messed up with weeds.

But an hour later, George and I turned it into this

All spruced up again, re-circled, the runner beans and toms straightened.

That herb pot has gone tho. George gave it to Gill.

As a memento of/for Al.

Another garden update

Just been watching a vid i taped for George last Wednesday off BBC 2, “Grow your own veg“.

Funny time to show it cus we’re already in the middle of summer, but It’ll be a useful resource for next year’s garden i guess.

Seems like we got some things not quite right!

Could have dug the pots deeper. Could have planted the cauli’s firmer. Could have been mulching the runner beans with cardboard, etc etc.

Oh well. Things have still grown anyway. The pots haven’t had blight on them. We’re chuffed to monkeys at how much yield we’ve had out of them. (Georgi would eat a bowl of her spuds on their own I’m sure)

The runner beans might still make a late run for glory.

Loads of toms are on their way too.

George has cropped a nice bag full of calabrese into the freezer.

The cauli’s don’t look like they’ll amount to much. The curds are seperating like this

A firm round cauli is the test of a “proper” gardener (along with perfectly tipped asparagus spears)

Anyway, no need to get too pressured or precious about it. The “produce” is all great – but it’s not the only value the garden has.

So much to delight in.

Those pairs of white butterflies flutter-fluttering around the cabbages….. the dappled shade under the apple tree…. sun-hungry poppies waving in the bees….. bats blipping across the twilight….

And the great thing is, you always get another go to grow next year what didn’t quite make it this.

Asparagus here we come!

We’re gonna grow and grow.

Every damm thing!

Swifts playing

Many delightful “little” happenings take place in the garden. All by themselves. Nature at “play” so to speak.

All you have to do is keep paying attention.

We were watching (from the hammock) a dozen or so tiny swifts lined up in a row on the electricity (high) wire; one by one on cue they dived off like little kids into the pools of air, splashing about with the wind as if it were water. I tried taking pics, but too late – they’d finished, were done, already gone.

So no pictures to show (you)

Their “show” only lasted about 10 minutes.

You could have easily missed it.

Being busy. Or preoccupied. Or not bothered.

To quietly marvel at it all.