Life on the wild side

It’s going to be hot this forthcoming week, we’re looking at nearly 30°C in SE23 and we think the garden is going to enjoy it. So get the watering, weekly feed and any fiddling with a hoe out of the way early and then park yourself in the shade and enjoy the weather.

The courgette/zucchinni plant we stuck in a pot as we couldn’t find any space (above) is doing well, giving us some nice flowers. The area around it with the raised beds of potatoes (below) are also on their way but impatient as we are, we keep looking around the plants and still only getting golf ball sized spuds.

The one raised bed of tomatoes are now setting fruit and we’re checking that there’s no side shoots forming and tying the main stalk to the support canes when we remember.

And on the wildlife tip, we’ve put another “pothole pond” down the wild bit (below) after being influenced by Bill Shimmers’ great pond here. We stuck some wood leading into the water after Bill mentioned in his reply of our effort on Twitter. “Any water body adds extra wildlife habitat to a garden. One thing I always include, any steep sided ponds need a sloping shelf or ramp to allow critters to get out as well as in. Stones or branches will do.” Our one is not exactly steep but we’re including the sticks to add further disguise to the former B&Q product container.

And in our main pic this week are the inhabitants of our pond, well part of the mob that are in there at the moment. And the big question is where do they disappear to? Enjoy this great weather when pondering on that thought.

Oi! Get off me stamen!

Here’s a pic of one of the courgette/zucchinni flowers yesterday. We’re keeping the plants well watered, feeding them weekly and finding anything that resembles finished compost at the bottom of the dalek bin and sticking it around the plant as mulch. We’ve just found out this tip online as well: “Don’t use a fertilizer too high in nitrogen; it will diminish your yield.” We didn’t know that! Know any more good tips?

More on growing them here. #zucchinniinlockdown

And the question is…

It’s been lovely weatherwise this week and now it’s a Saturday, why has it decided to rain? To tell you the truth the ground is a bit dry so we could do with a bit of rain but as long as it clears up later we won’t hold it against mother nature too much. 

As for the garden we’re loving that we’re getting the first tomatoes ripening (above), the plant isn’t at its best looking as a few of its leaves have been taken off so the sun can reach them but as the great Bob Flowerdew says below at around the 4 minute mark “I don’t eat the plants.” A video worth watching.

Things are hotting up in the raised beds too even though plants are battling it out with each other (that reminds us we’d do a bit of a thin out of the veg there tomorrow as we’re sure there’s some carrots we can pull up.) We weren’t sure if the below was a chilli pepper at first but it now looks like it’s a pepper pepper (so to speak). We’ll be keeping up with the watering and the weekly feed of comfrey liquid as those beds tend to dry out well quickly.

And it’s only taken a day or so for the first courgette/zucchinni to show after its first flower. We chucked a bit of organic matter from the bottom of the compost heap around the plant and a good feed won’t go amiss either. Never mind the lockdown, keep on gardening! #gardeninginlockdown #londonlockdowngardening

And here’s a nice and chilled tune if you’re stuck indoors this morning from Adriak called Sandalo (original mix), it’s a tune to cheer you up if it’s dull outside. Eight and a half minutes of nice ambience with a lovely bassline.  #lockdownambience