Mud on the Rooftops 2015 - the Fiddling goes On !

Your parents did well, Moonlight.

As for the weeds; I know what you mean. Three weeks ago, we nuked the Large Border in my Sisters front garden. It was back to bare soil. 3' deep and about 15' long.
As week later... just a WEEK.... the nasturtions where 1" tall all over it.

Daitheplant - you where asking about the Mulch ?
It is Westland Decorative Mini Bark, "Ideal for small borders and containers", and features Omega-3 oils to promote shiny and healthy fur !

I know one thing.... as a water retainer, IT WORKS ! My toms, beans and Caps where watered in the mornings, and where still moist (and even playing a little light tennis) when I returned in the evening, despite two SCORCHING days.

the peas, on the other hand, where NOT mulched (at that point), and where shrivelling up. (one entire branch turned brown and disintegrated).

In addition, it kekeps my teeth nice and clean, and degreases my pots nicely.

It's 19:14 in the evening as I read your post above, Dai.
I'm halfway through my first cigarette of the day !

Yup - I've already noticed that I can get up the stairs at work without being out of breath.

I cook all of my own food, so having enhanced taste ability is not necessarily an advantage however.

Well, I had my first harvest of peas.
I was plucking and cutting and washing and slicing and shelling and podding and pipping and tacking and shunting and tapping and skinning and ducking and diving for over 16 solid hours, and produced approximately 25 peas !

My goodness though, they DID have flavour. I'd forgotten that peas actually HAD flavour. As far as I was concerned, they where just a spherical lump of texture. If you put salt on, they tasted of salt. If you put mint in, they tasted of mint. If you put both, they tasted of Milt. But no, these actually had a TASTE !.

I have planted 6 more seeds, just on the offchance that we have an extended hot summer. (they MIGHT grow to harvest in time, you never know). Oh.. I also harvested my first courgette, and there are several more on the way between the two plants. As reinforcements, and on the same principle as the peas, I have planted another 5 courgettes seeds. This was two weeks ago, and they've already gone "SPROING"... so I transplanted them to their final large pots over the weekend, gave them a GOOD drink (with plant food in), and then mulched them to within an inch of their lives.

I've discovered that my Petunias and Pansies, whillst looking nice, don't attract bees. This caused me to burst into tears, throw all my toys out of my pram, and in the end I had to send myself to bed without any supper.

Still.. historically... pollination hasn't seemed to be a problem. So obviously SOME insects like my garden ?
Lets hope they tell all their friends, and create a buzz !

Or perhaps I am getting visited by Stealth Bees ? Or Ninja Bees that abseil down from the Pointless Chimney at night ?

ANYWAY... moving swiftly on.
I've decided that I like growing strawberries. I may look into getting some earlier/later varieties to complement my existing species. They make the polytunnel smell WONDERFUL.

I've bought some rabbit-hutch straw, and used it to bed the strawberries so that they don't rest on the wet soil and rot. I opened the straw package VERY carefully, and took pains not to spill the stuff. As an inevitable consequence I now have bits of straw EVERYWHERE. The polytunnel looks like a stable.

But in a nice way !

Oooooh.... Hollyhock News.....
My Hollyhock, having spent last year immitating a rain forest (huge canopy of leaves, but NO flowers or buds or seeds), has no thrown up stalks with large numbers of flower-buds on.
Three have popped open to produce... BLACK FLOWERS.

I've never seen the like before, and I shall be trying to gather the seeds, as and when it produces any.

Intriguing, certainly !

What with Banana Shallots and Black Flowers.... whats next ? A streetlamp in my furs cupboard !

New Gadgets !!

A couple of new gadgets for the Roofgarden.

The first is THIS nifty hi-tech looking thing.
(click to enlarge)


Made out of the finest Chinese plastic, and attractively priced at £9.99 from Wilko's. You just KNOW that this thing will break down within a week, assuming it even bothers to work at all.

And - indeed - it initally seemed to be a waste of time. It proports to measure three things:
Soil moisture level
Soil pH facor (acidity/alkalinity)
How light it is. (if you can't see the unit, it's dark... )
It has no batteries, so its difficult to see how it could possibly work. I guess it's something to do with the disimilar metals of the legs (copper and aluminum ?? )

But here's the thing... it DOES.. after a fashion.
The long prongs have proven useful checking that larger plantpots aren't drying out. It's not always easy to tell, especially when mulched !
And I've JUST started work on a seed/plant that explicitly requires acidic soil... so the pH function will come in use after all.

Hmmm.... I wonder if they do them in brass ? I've always fancied a really complicated brass control panel in the Polytunnel.

Overhead Storage

looks around surreptitiously to make sure nobody is waching.....

Alaaaaaaarrrrrmmmmmmm....