The death of a cob

We’ve just come back from a visit from Shannon’s today and this is the first thing that greeted us when we came back. We’re now thinking of starting up in nature photography and jacking in this gardening lark what with our brushes with nature this weekend.

We are even really considering a scarecrow (as suggested by Stevyn of Iron Feather Journal fanzine) as there was a cat sleeping possibly 3 metres away which didn’t deter the pesky squirrel consuming one of the many corn cobs that had formed on our plants we purchased from Shannon’ early this year. There’s two cobs left and they’ve been taken off. The really hot pepper plant beside it hasn’t been touched, we wonder why?

And on a good note here’s what we bought in Shannon’s earlier this morning, some Garlic bulbs and Shallots to overwinter, even though we didn’t have much luck with them last year. We will do as we always do, try again! Gardening eh why do we do it?

Sunflowers, snails, slugs and squirrels

The weather has been a bit changeable of late to say the least. Some of the sunflowers have been attacked by snails, slugs or squirrels but there are some that have out outmaneuvered them like the one next to the garage (above). It’s so tall nothing can climb it without a bit of work and is a little way out from the garage roof so the squirrels can’t even reach it from on high. This one above is at least a ridiculous 10 feet or more! We’re going to try and save some seed and if anyone fancies a swap for something just as crazy we’ll be game. We go for anything labelled as “Giant” “Rare” or “Out of this world” so if you have anything to exchange, drop us a message via comments!

Another thing with this changeable weather is it is a breeding ground for slugs and these are the gits (above) we have to contend with in SE23. They’re sturdy old things and we think they’d return if we collected them all in a bag and slung them up the local park. These are not common or garden slugs these are south London slugs and they mean business!

At least the pond has been loving this present weather even though we haven’t. The fish and plants seem happy with the rising waterline and if you stand still for long enough you’ll see mini-frogs jumping about in the areas around it. Let’s hope they gang up all together and teach those damn slugs a lesson!

Caught in the act

We now have proof that it is indeed the squirrels that are having a go at the sunflowers (the giant “10 feet”ones we got off ebay) when we caught one today feeding off the flowerhead. At least they’re actually waiting now until they’re in flower as it was the buds they were nicking previously but surely it’s the seeds (that come after the flowers) they should be waiting for. Who knows?

Shaw Taylor we need you!

It’s been a funny old week, the weather did’t know what it was doing and we have sunflowers reaching silly sizes which is brilliant. As you know we love any seeds that say they’re “giant” or “massive”, half the time they don’t live up to their promise on ebay but the ones we got this year have.

The sunflowers down the side bed are doing well they’re well over 8 feet, a few have flowers. The ones that don’t have, have been the victim of the squirrels. They seem to be going for the buds this year rather than waiting for the large seed heads, very strange. We awoke this morning to one of the largest ones that was well over 9 feet, broken in half (below). To say we’re fed up is an understatement but they’re next to a fence so what can we do?

On a brighter note our Sweetcorn plants we got from Shannon’s and Chilli’s (Jalapeno) we grew from seed are coming on great guns! Whether we get any cobs on the corn to eat for ourselves are another thing. Squirrels aren’t keen on them are they?

And if you look hard enough you can see the Jalapeno’s we’ve already had a few off them and they’re great. Well worth growing.

This blog post was written whilst listening to This is a music show 125. Thanks to Dazman for putting it up on his cloud and cheers to Your Host for the selection. Some great stuff as ever including a lovely bit of reggae and some nice dub including the version of this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGZ-qwD8nG4

A show always worth listening to and it’s on the shortwaves! Have a listen below, you won’t regret it!

And the final result just in…

Okay, so something got to it before we did (pesky squirrels!) and it is looking a bit bruised but the excellent beefsteak Thompson & Morgan trial tomato is a winner. This specimen is next to a 50 pence piece and weighs 500 grams, that’s half a kilogram! You would be mad not to try these next year. The plant required minimum fuss, some support, regular water and a weekly comfrey feed. What a tom!

What difference a week makes

It’s been a week since we returned from our holidays in Turkey (the above taken at a local olive grove last week) and the weather in London has taken a turn for the worst, our tomato plants are on their last legs and two squirrels in as many days have had their lives cut short in our back garden thanks to our cats. Very sad indeed.

A few years ago we covered the subject of squirrels in the garden on our Sounds from the South podcast after one of our cats cornered one down the drive. At the time we wished we knew a bit more about looking after the young orphan but since then we found a good website called http://www.squirrels.info where there’s load of info about caring for injured ones. More info here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TtYmFcaOprA

On a nicer note here’s a lovely tune by Haruomi Hosono (from the Yellow Magic Orchestra) that was heard on last week’s Tom Ravenscroft show as part of his companion tracks series as chosen by Mac Demarco.  In 1983 Haruomi Hosono was commissioned by the Japanese retailer Muji to compose some in-store music and the track above “Talking” is off the released cassette called “Watering a flower”. Hypnotic is not the word!

Sunday morning nightmare

squirrel thiefWoke up at the crack of dawn this morning and went downstairs to make myself a cup of tea to bring back up to bed. Looking out of the kitchen window I was greeted with this little sunflower seed thief.

Rather than bang on the window I laughed, and had to admire the nimble robbing git! I’m sure this is the same one that had the bud off another sunflower two years ago (post here). A description has been taken and the details passed on to the nature police.

We’ve had more than our fair share of trouble with squirrels in the past and one instance is covered in this Sounds From the South podcast from last year.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqoIU10Izwc

Nice one Squirrel?

AK3WF8It hasn’t been the best of weeks when it comes to squirrels around these parts, as I’ve had to dispose of a couple of dead ones this week (not good when you’ve just come in from work.) I buried both of them in deep holes in the garden, then on top of the refilled soil, put a garnish of black pepper and some minced garlic (out of a pepper mill and a garlic crusher, of course!) to keep those damn cats away who we summise were the killers.

South London squirrels are usually the kings of the garden here, dodging and weaving away from cats and foxes, knackering them out into the process but it’s not so at the present moment.

This week I got in touch with the website www.squirrels.info who told me this time of year is when the mother kicks her young out to fend for themselves hence the amount of confused or sadly, dead ones around autumn time.

The website provides very good info on what to do if you find an orphan squirrel here. I could have done with that link last Sunday as I witnessed a cat versus squirrel stand off here after a nice afternoon in the pub.

More details of what happened is on Sounds From The South 9 – Too Much Too Young from The Dirt last night. Tune of the week is Dr Alimantado with Still Alive and the podcast is now up online here. It’s on after the animal sounds quiz at 5 minutes in.

There’s lots of great stuff on the show including Amie Sagar interviewing Squirrels about the situation at the moment, The Idiot Gardener on Sainsbury’s Bank’s “Crafty Gardening Ideas” tome (here) and The Gentleman Gardener talking topical among lots of other madness.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gKp0O60nW1Q

Thanks very much to Lindsey at www.squirrels.info for the advice.

Man with ferretHere’s another small mammal seen this week in Central London, a ferret on a lead. Is that legal?