Patch:
It’s been a challenging week weather-wise. Extreme winds which caused some damage, particularly to our runner beans. This despite the fact that I grow them up a tepee shaped support, which helps. The first year here in west Wales I made the mistake of growing them in the traditional strait line and they blew flat in a summer storm. The problem with high winds in the summer is that plants and trees are in full leaf. The tepee shape overcomes this problem, but they don’t like strong winds and it has checked growth. However they will hopefully recover. Runner beans are one of the easiest and most reliable crops, so I’m optimistic they will come through. Other veg survived pretty well although one butternut squash simply blew away! Looking on the bright side, the winds efficiently completed the June drop of undersized or diseased apples and pears saving me the effort. Cherries cropping well and so prolific the birds aren’t getting them all like most years.
Candled our incubating duck eggs. This involves shining a bright torch through a toilet roll in a dark room and seeing if eggs are fertile. You need to do this as unfertilised eggs can go rotten and explode in the heat of an incubator. Fertile eggs show a spidery shape as the embryo starts to develop. 100% fertility. The drake is clearly doing the business!
Slugs pretty active due to combination of warm weather and rain – perfect slug conditions. You no doubt saw this week’s depressing You Gov poll which found that 73% of slugs over the age of 65 agreed with the statement that their lives will “significantly improve” as a result of Brexit. Of course this may change, if, as seems likely, the Tories bow to US pressure to allow the use of Napalm and Agent Orange as slug control methods.
Self sufficiency requires a lot of forward planning to ensure a good winter veg supply. Have now got Jerusalem artichokes, leeks, chard, broccoli, spinach, kale, swedes, sprouts and turnips on the go for autumn and winter eating. All progressing nicely.
On the Wild Side:
Having foiled the rook attack on our duck eggs by collecting them before opening the duck house in the morning, we are now losing eggs to some other predator. Not rats - they haven’t got jaws wide enough to break into eggs. This is clearly demonstrated by the copious teeth marks on otherwise undamaged eggs. I’m thinking maybe stoats or weasels. I did see a weasel last year. Not quite sure how we will overcome this new attack. I will try to block up any possible means of ingress and hope that does the trick.
Candling duck eggs
Nature can certainly surprise you when you least expect it. One of the secrets of bee keeping is to remain cool and calm when doing anything to the hive, and I like to pride myself on being calm in a crisis. I was an A and E Staff Nurse for God’s sake and am used to dealing with pressure. What a complacent fool I am. Jane normally looks after the bees but she was very busy and asked me to check on them. No problem thought I. I donned full bee suit including hood with built in wire mesh visor. I had calmly lifted off the lid of the hive was examining the bees to see how many frames they were using for honey in case we needed to add more. All going smoothly when suddenly, across the inside of the visor, ran the biggest spider I have ever seen in my life, at least six inches across, which stopped dead about an inch and a half from my nose and coldly stared at me with its hundreds of eyes. Absolutely terrifying! The only comparison I can make is to the scene in Alien when the creature attaches itself to John Hurts face. How I managed to resist ripping off the hood with 20,000 bees wondering what I was up to, I will never know. I have no clear recollection of how I got to a safe enough distance to remove the hood. Moral of this tale – always check your bee suit for enormous spiders. On the plus side the bees appear to have recovered from there drenching last week and are making honey like good’uns.
Tip of the week:
You can make an effective anti-aphid spray by boiling rhubarb leaves in water and adding a bit of soap. It works well, but handle with care as the leaves contain oxalic acid which can be toxic to humans, as well as aphids, if ingested.
Thanks to Nicky Scott who suggests the way around the truly appalling comfrey feed smell is to dispense with the water and to ram the leaves in a barrel and the feed will drip out into receptacle after 7 to 10 days. I will definitely give this method a go. Keep ideas and comments coming.
Happy gardening and don’t let the slugs get you down!