George Symonette – Don’t Touch Me Tomato – Various
Number one in a short series featuring the beloved tomato! First off, a calypso about someone running a fruit stall at a farmers market…
Salute to Solanum (lycopersicum) pt.1
2
Category Archives: Jazz Gardening
Didn’t he do well? Not really
I painted two panels of the fence this afternoon after a hiatus of two years. I have two more panels to do to complete the job which I will get around to next weekend if all goes well (that’s what I said last time!)
Thanks to Theresa Webb at Kitchen Buddy for letting us know about her great wild food walk in Hither Green on Sunday 18th May as part of the Hither Green Festival & also for telling us about the London Permaculture Festival on 6th July 2014.
Also thanks to Lewisham Gardens for letting us know about a few things, firstly The Hither Green Festival Seed Swap event on Sunday 18th May (see above) and for informing us about the World Naked Gardening Day over the weekend. I couldn’t stop laughing as how mad is that? Do some naked pruning in your front garden next year on world naked gardening day and your neighbours WILL be calling the police!
And finally for letting us know about next week’s Edible High Road festival in Forest Hill. It’s on Saturday 10th May at Forest Hill Station Forecourt, Devonshire Road, Forest Hill SE23 3HB from 2pm-4pm with live music and free plants. I got some great seeds and tomato plants there last year and it’s worth a visit. For more info here.
Frozen
It was a lovely scorching day today and some time was spent “tipping around” in the garden this afternoon but as soon as the sun disappeared it got very cold, so the fleece, bubble wrap and jam jars have reappeared!
Southern Freeez
There’s been another frost warning tonight so the big cover up continues here in SE23. Listening to the last episode of Gardening with Tim & Joe on BBC Radio Leeds this afternoon, Joe mentioned using something as simple as old newspapers as frost protection which, being cheap and cheerful, is well up our street!
Me, I’m using a combination of some old bubble-wrap (from an e-bay purchase) over my tomato plants, some fleece over my early potatoes and jam jars and a top off a seed propagator over some sunflower seedlings, all various ways of doing the same job. Jack Frost please be kind to us tonight!
This is a warning…
I’ve just heard on the local weather forecast that we might have possible frosts later this week so it’s out with the horticultural fleece, net curtains, cloches and jam jars to stick over those tender seedlings that are in the garden for some protection! I’ve a couple of tomatoes plants and some spuds I’ve put in early that’ll be getting covered up over the next few nights.
The long good Friday
A few weeks ago after listening to Joe Maiden on BBC Radio Leeds’ Gardening with Tim and Joe I took the risk and bunged in some of my seed spuds and now they’re well on their way (thanks Joe, you know your stuff!) But there’s a piece of fleece at the side just in case to stick over the plants if there’s any risk of frost as you can’t take anything for granted weatherwise.
Talking of spuds, Good Friday is traditionally the day to plant them, but I wasn’t around. As I was off work and the weather was great (and it was a root day from 1pm, man) I stuck the remainder of my well chitted seed potatoes in today.
As per the RHS website I stuck them in five inches deep (with the chitted end upwards), twelve inches apart in two rows (two feet between each row). Also to aid growth I stuck some ripped up Comfrey leaves under them (I was given a root of Comfrey a couple of years ago by our good mate Scarlett and boy has it grown!) When the shoots start to show through on the spuds I’ll be earthing them up. Early spuds are good stuff and well easy to grow. If you haven’t got a garden, you can stick them in a plastic dustbin, builders sacks or even carrier bags!
Also while “tipping around” the garden today I found a lone wild garlic not growing too wildly around by the pond but growing all the same!
A message from a (dub) gardener
Big shout to the Balaganjah crew out of Tel Aviv for their excellent podcast discovered last week through a random search for “roots reggae” on i-Tunes.
Episode 420 – Message from Jamdown has been on heavy rotation here at weeds and features some excellent 70’s roots featuring tracks previously unheard of to this ear from Rudy Mowatt “Public Enemy No.1”, Horace Martin “Unity” and Cornell Campbell’s “Keep on pushing” amongst many others. One to download here and crank up on the hi-fi!
Royal flush
Loving the use of these antique loo’s as posh planters seen at Wells-next-the-Sea railway station over the weekend.
I’m trying to rack my brains to think of loo-related plants to put in them. I’ve just googled Great/Common Mullein which is known in the US as “cowboy toilet paper,” that’s got to be in there. Anymore toilet-related plant names? Answers on a postcard please…
A giant leap for a Lettuce
As you know of late I’ve been very obsessed with watching the International Space Station in the night sky and tonight I was checking on the NASA website when the next sighting will be, and found out something well up our street!
If all goes well tomorrow the unmanned spacecraft DRAGON CR3 will be bringing supplies to the ISS and should be visible from Earth in the evening. What is brilliant is that the spacecraft will be carrying a project called Veg-01, (the first vegetable garden in space!) aka “Veggie,” an attempt to grow a Lettuce in space. The above chart is for sighting the Dragon in London but for other locations look here.
I will be watching the skies tommorow night with a tear in my eye while waving a handkerchief at this scientific first! Big up the first Lettuce in space!
Another onion in a different kitchen
It didn’t half get cold later on last night but I did manage to enjoy a bit of “tipping around” in the back garden in the sunshine after I got in from work yesterday.
Up near the house in a interesting concrete pot that I found when I cleaned out the then neglected garden pond years ago, I have some Eau de Cologne Mint and an Egyptian Walking Onion aka Tree, Top or Walking Onion. I noticed that a bulb is starting to form on it’s stem (close up below.) It’s a very strange plant indeed and If you like “odd” like I do, there’s some great pics of mad walking onions here.
