Tag Archives: carrots

Grow, Grow, Grow

I was as excited as any other birdwatcher when I read about the Bearded Vulture that has been spotted in the Peak District and Yorkshire. Also known as a Lammergeier, this is only the second time such a bird has been spotted in Britain this century. Which makes it almost as rare as a Cabinet Minister telling the truth. Or a Special Advisor admitting an error. It is thought that this is a juvenile Lammergeier that has simply got a bit blown off course – admittedly by a few thousand miles. The bird obviously thinks that we still live in a Europe of open borders and no distrust of foreign immigrants. Oh, the naivety of youth.

When I was a naive youth, the Lammergeier was top of my must-see list of birds on the occasions when our family French camping holidays took us to the Pyrenees. We saw lots of other eagles and vultures, but never a Lammergeier. It would be amazing to spot one, but I will not be making the trip to Yorkshire to try and see it. Even without the lockdown restrictions having been lifted (for those of us who abided by them in the first place) I will not be leaving the garden for any of length of time at the moment. Because this is the time of the year when the hard graft finally pays off. It is the time of the year when my parents would say that there was no way they could go on holiday, because the peas will need picking, then the beans, the courgettes and all the other veg that they grew on an industrial scale.

And I now understand their sentiments. The scale of my veg and flower patch is nothing to compare with theirs. Mrs B and I are not interested in the long hours of blanching and bagging veg which my parents engaged in, to enable them to freeze enough greens to see them through the winter. But we currently have more peas, sugar snaps, courgettes, kale, carrots and runner beans and french beans than we could shake a big Tory Lie at. Not to mention salad leaves, cucumbers and, this week, the first tomatoes in the greenhouse.

The sighting of a rare vulture in Britain is a relief from the other depressing news (although it also brought into focus the illegal persecution of birds of prey such as the hen harrier on nearby grouse moors). Being in the garden has also provided solace for me and Mrs B. The flowers are looking particularly fine at the moment and Josh’s Spursy Border is performing far better than I had any right to expect in its first season.

All this has happened not because we made any spurious promises or deadlines, or pretended we had seeds in stock when, in fact we had not. We did not double count plants or make up random straplines like “We will get digging done” or “pick, pick, pick”. No: we just got on with it.

And now, like the Lammergeier in Yorkshire, who must have been a bit tired after its long journey over half of Europe, we will take stock and enjoy the fruits of our labour.

Mid-Term Reports

img_20180808_084533092Deadline for reports was about three days ago but as I no longer have someone to swear at me if I am perceived to be late or include too many ‘gramatical errors’ (sic),  I have stuck to my usual report writing schedule, by submitting mine in my own time.

No More Bull Shit – herewith the mid-term garden reports.

Beans, Broad

A good start to the term, and working hard in the early weeks, they seemed to get lazy and did not capitalise on the good work early on.  The results were, frankly, disappointing with grade E across the board (or is it 1 now?)

Beans, Runner and Green

Runners and Greens have had a good term.  It is clear that MFL and PE are their strong subjects, and they have easily adapted to the European-style heat and the need to compete in hot weather.  They need to keep on, though as there have been signs of letting up in recent weeks and some of their work has started to look a little shoddy.

Courgettes

A truly memorable term for the Courgies, with early efforts, leading to excellent results to the point of being embarrassingly good.  I have rarely seen such excellent results with undoubtedly so much more to come.  Well done – a super effort.

Peas

Another one who looked to have settled into the new year, but seemed to become distracted and unruly, never really progressing.  It appears that there was some disruption with bullying by sparrows which might have been an issue.  The second intake of peas seemed to have settled this problems with Special Needs fleece being used to provide protection, but unfortunately the late start for these and lack of nursery education has meant lower than expected grades.

Potatoes:  Swift, Duke of York, King Edward, Sarpo Mira

Spuds have had a variable term.  Swift did do well to begin with, but could have done better with a more conducive setting as a lack of resources seemed to hamper development.  The Duke of Yorks have struggled too, with their results showing a wide fluctuation from 9 to 1 in grading.  It is too early to report on King Edward or Sarpo Mira.

Salad

In general salad has a had good term, although the dry weather has affected their ability to concentrate for too long.  Too often they have complained that slugs and other bugs are distracting them and hampering their progress, but when they have established a good working routine the work produced has been of a fair quality.  There is no doubt that they could do better if they tried, particularly the chard and rocket which have had a particularly disappointing term.

Tomatoes

What an excellent set of results.  Tomatoes have been a revelation this term.  They have been excellent individually and have also shown the ability to excel in small group work as sweet millions have produced some very impressive early results with the Jersey Devils promising to submit course work of very high standard.  Mrs B, the head of tomato assessment and monitoring has been particularly impressed with this years tomato cohort and they will undoubtedly be contenders for the the “most improved” prize on speech day.

Basil

Well done to basil on yet another excellent year.  Italian has been a strength of this year’s intake – “molto bene!”

Squash: Crown Prince and Blue Kuri Kabocha

Squash have been very active this term, bordering on the unruly, although they have seemed to settle into the new premises.  The work produced has been extensive, though it remains to be seen how focussed and concentrated this has been and how this is actually going to translate into favourable results: i.e. good sized ripe squashes.

Kohl Rabi

Kohl Rabi were late starters this term with a lack of nursery time leaving them behind other veg in the early years group.  Only time will tell if they are able to make this up but they are trying their best, with an A1 for effort, despite the distractions of cabbage white butterflies.

Kavolo Nero

Early work was hampered by the bullying sparrows while their later efforts have seen no homework handed in for weeks due to the destructive influence of cabbage white butterflies.  Between times there have been some excellent pieces of work and when the butterflies have gone there might perhaps be more good work to come.

Mixed Ability Class: Carrots, beetroot and chard

This has been the best ever intake of carrots.  They have been well-mannered and orderly and have delivered excellent results showing the way to beetroot and chard which have sadly failed all their exams so far.  Beetroot tried re-sits later in the summer but once again succumbed to exterior distractions.  Chard appears to be doing better in working towards some re-takes in the autumn for which we hold out high hopes. While this, along with the success of carrots shows that the standard of gardening is at times excellent, overall  there is a feeling that it “Requires Improvement”.

Next report deadline: some time in late summer / autumn-ish.

 

“Lack of early years education stunts intellectual growth”
Second attempt for peas
Heads of School material
Potatoes – needing to try harder
Kohl Rabi – late developers
Top of class
Kav Nero – showing signs of getting back on track
Mixed ability salads
Excellence in French and Running
First peas – failed to graduate

The Dry

Two weeks ago I started this post.  I don’t know what got in the way of me completing it.  Perhaps it was the end of term which passed in a whir of school trips, successive cover lessons involving repeat showings of Blue Planet or feature films and the year eight boys going mob-handedly feral at lunchtime.  Family matters have also been an issue with Mrs B’s mother slipping from this mortal coil (four days after celebrating her 70th Wedding anniversary).  But the circle of life was shown to be rotating strongly with the graduation of our little girl to the rank of qualified medical practitioner.  That’s a doctor to you or me. (No, not a nurse, nor even a pharmacist.  A proper doctor).

Time is passing so fast these days and yet what I wrote two weeks ago unsurprisingly fits well for now:

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Today I saw the first rumours of hose pipe bans coming into force – though not, thankfully down here in the wet West Country.  Surprisingly, they are talking about the North West being the place they will need to impose the restrictions.  I always thought Manchester and Liverpool got more than their fair share of rain, but then I guess they also have more than their fair share of residents to drink all the water from the tap (like the Tiger Who Came to Tea).

I am not sure how the garden would cope if I were able to water it regularly via a hose pipe.  When I started the garden in the winter, it was chucking down with rain and I was more concerned with drying the clay soil out rather than retaining water.  But regular watering is a fact of life at the moment and the veg have hit their stride.  We now have courgettes, potatoes, green beans, runner beans, mangetout, kale, carrots, onions and shallots.  And we have salad coming out of our ears as well as raspberries and blueberries starting to ripen.

Tomatoes will be in plentiful supply soon, but we’re just waiting for the first sweet million to ripen, then they will all go off like a firework.

Yields have not been as good as I might have expected at the old place, but for a first season on a new plot I feel pretty pleased.

 

French, Runners, carrots, mangetouts, courgettes
Blueberries
Sunflowers – in their element
Greenhouse – peppers, lettuce and toms
Green Millions
Jersey Devil