More harvesting done.

Dessert gooseberries, now made into jam. 

We will get more each year, so might try wine in 2019.

Charlotte potatoes, to have with a pie for dinner :) Others have said the yield is not good, but ours seem OK.

More gooseberries picked, the red as jam, the green now frozen and might be jam or wine.

Thanks for reading/returning. Ian & Jo

Harvesting & watering time

First thing to do was to water the Peas & Squashes, I draw the soil up around them so the water stays like a reservoir and doesn't run off, as the soil is so dry.

We noticed that some of the Peas had been pulled out! Most likely suspect are the Pheasants, so I rigged up some netting while the peas get established, I also replaced the pulled up ones by pushing a pea seed direct into the soil and watering in well. 

You can probably see how dry everywhere is, but some of our flower patches are thriving and covered in Bees, they love the Lavender especially.

The sunny weather has certainly helped the fruit to ripen, here is over 10lb of Redcurrants, we left some that were not quite ready, so more to come!

While we were harvesting in the fruit cage, we noticed this Frog and just managed to photo it before it dissapeared.

More of todays harvest:
Blueberries, 
Raspberries, 
Tayberries, 
Blackberries, 
Blackcurrants, 
Broad Beans.

So another hot, dry day. 
But at least we got lots harvested & watered. Luckily had some rain a few days ago, so a little in the rain barrels.

Thanks for reading/returning. Ian & Jo

Another hot, dry day.

So first can you see the Bees ? 

They are all over this Lavender and they love it. 
We still have a Bees nest/hive which we are happy about, its under the patio in front of the shed :)

Last earthing up of the Picasso main crop potatoes, in the background some I planted over a month ago, in the foreground 4 rows planted just a couple of weeks ago, for a staggered harvest.

Today's Harvest: 
Loganberries, 
Dessert Gooseberries, 
Raspberries,
Blackcurrants, 
Gooseberries.

Oh and (not in photo) more Pentland Javelin spuds.

So even though we harvested 2 punnets of gooseberries, we left plenty on the bush, mainly because some were not ripe yet and we dont want to pick them all just yet. 
Last year we harvested 22lb and there are more this year!

I'll leave you with another photo of our Lavender with Poppies in the background, we call it our 'wildflower meadow' as no plans to cutivate this area this year.

Thanks for reading/returning. Ian & Jo

First potatoes dug up today and another bumper harvest

 First early Pentland Javelin, planted 15th April. 

Due to the lack of rain not a good yield from 3 seed potatoes planted! 

2nd early Kestrel, planted 15th April too. 

Also a poor yield from 3 seed potatoes planted. 

So the advantage of no rain meant the pile of weeds we had dug out over the last few weeks were so dry, so I had another bonfire and burnt the lot!

I weeded and earthed up the main crop Picasso potatoes, as the staggered planting were doing well. 

 Last year we had such a good crop of Borlotti Beans, I kept back some pods to dry, today I got all the beans from the dry pods, hope we can plant for another bumper crop.

This photo would make a great jigsaw puzzle!

Todays Harvest: 
Raspberries, 
Strawberries & Blueberries
Peas & Broad Beans, 
And Logan Berries 

So another scorcher of a day, we have totally run out of water, rain barrels and the well are empty! We will have to bring water from home now!

Thanks for reading/returning. Ian & Jo