17/24 August 2008 - Death or Glory

Two weekends in one I'm afraid. Standards are slipping but not for lack of will, just energy. It takes us all ours just to keep up with the courgettes at the moment let along share our feelings with you lot.

Last weekend, 17 August, saw the death of the peas. They had done heroically until the downy mildew got them. It is a nasty grey thing that just creeps up from the roots and even though there were still some peas at the top it clearly was near the end. It took a long time to dig it up, disentangle the various sticks and canes and netting and drag the peas back to our green compost bin at home for St Albans to deal with. We couldn't compost it because of the downy mildew but a commercial facility will be far hotter and be able to kill the bugs. We have 5 or 6 good size bags of peas in the new freezer (dragged up there using ingenious acrobatics and a good deal of nerve from Yours Truly who is quite short - the freezer is now also operational after a visit from A Bloke). RIP Peas. But we still have some growing on Bed 3 anyway.

We had to do a lot of strimming as the bloody weeds had threatened to take over in some far-flung corners of the plot.

Another RIP but not so tragic was that for the Volunteer Potatoes which showed distinct signs of some unpleasant ailment. They were accordingly dug up and were ginormous. They of course had been in the ground right from the beginning as it were. Very interesting as a biology experiment. A couple were donated to our Next Next Door neighbours who were delighted. We would enter one for the biggest potato in the forthcoming St Stephens Gardening Club Show (yes, it really is coming up again - thanks for sticking with us all this time) but it has minute holes which indicate The Maggot.

We also found time to make our very first courgette chutney - 4lbs courgettes, ginger, 2 heads garlic, 2.5lbs onions, 2.5lbs brown sugar, malt vinegar, cayenne pepper. God knows what it will be like. It filled about 14 scavenged jars and is safely stored in the garage. We will know in 3 months whether it was worth it. It took me back to the time I worked in a pickle factory for the summer before university - halcyon days. It is the first time that either of us has done anything remotely like this. Is it a natural part of the aging process? Or have we only now got with the real zeitgeist?

Today (24 August) was a different kind of trip. It was full of banter and wisecrack with our various friends and neighbours up on the plot, including a revelling in the mighty victory of N, Pat and Jan in the recent St Stephens Garden Club Quiz. In fact, Burydell took 1st, 2nd and 3rd prizes. Beijing forsooth.

Other than the normal weeding, we were alerted to the presence of bloody caterpillars on some of our protected cabbages. This led to a mild tantrum from one of us especially as we had spent so much on the mesh. However, it was a useful reminder of the importance of tending - general looking and checking. There can be interesting revelations. Tending the purple sprouting broccoli for caterpillars I suddenly thought - these are not purple sprouting broccoli at all - they are some kind of cabbage. Ho hum.

The other crop we mentioned last time as being on its way out was also duly shuffled off. Thank you broccoli - Ironman lest we forget - for your fabulousness. Mr G told us today that though he didn't like broccoli, he did like ours. Perhaps we should send some to George Bush. N noted that its root system was very complex and also threw up new shoots. Does this mean that if we had left it a whole other load of plants would have come up? We decide to experiment and plant a couple of shoots in the newly-cleared bed.

This means that we now have three half-beds clear. Beds 1, 2 and 4. We have raked them and got them ready for their next crop.

No-one had warned us how hard crop rotation is. We spent 2 hours going through Rubik-cube like diagrams and discussions, querying different definitions of plant groups, and generally panicking. We now have A Plan. And we shall share that with you tomorrow.