Sandgate Community Garden Team Diary Entry for 22nd July: the birds are obviously finding the tayberries irresistible.

How can it be possible that it is July already?  The rainfall for all of June was a mere 24.3 mm; a paltry amount, but welcome all the same.  It meant a little respite from spending so much time having to water for the Saturday session at least.  It is surprising how much more we can get done when watering is off the agenda, although we still have to check that the pots are not too dry.  This coming week looks to be cooler with a possible chance of a little more rain if we are lucky.  Sandgate is up to its usual trick of dodging the rain when the rest of the country is treated to a deluge.

The broad beans are now finished, so all had to be cut back and chopped into smaller pieces before going into one of our composting bays.  The creation of some space has meant we have been able to plant out some purple sprouting plants as well as two types of winter kale.  It seems hard to believe we are sowing and planting for the winter and spring to come.  We have more purple sprouting plants on the way which were pricked out into larger pots; they will be planted out in a couple of weeks.  The cabbage white butterflies can be seen dancing around the brassicas, and so starts the summer long battle with their caterpillars, which if we lose, will be the end of the plants. 

We sowed more trays of spring onions, some radicchio, and a few varieties of lettuce.  This time of the year it is often difficult to grow a decent batch of lettuces as they do not like the heat, so results are often a bit of a disappointment. 

Some of the potato leaves are starting to turn yellow, an indication that the potatoes are ready to harvest.  We have been watering them for the past couple of weeks to help the roots to swell into a decent crop.  We pulled up a few of them, and were pleasantly surprised that they are of a fair size considering how dry it has been.  We also decided to pull a few of the beetroots although they are still quite small, as we know it is only a matter of time before the badgers realize they are there and plunder the crop.  We had a few random beetroot plants dotted about the plot un-netted, which have already been found and eaten.  The tell-tale sign being the leaves and very top of the beetroot are left on the ground.   Talking of wildlife enjoying the fruits of our labours, the birds are obviously finding the tayberries irresistible and in spite of being netted with a fine close knit mesh, the birds have pecked holes into it to extract the fruits!

We are still experimenting with our compost making technique, and have spent some time organising the materials needed and mixing them together in some quantity.  Fortunately, with our association with Pent Farm, we have been able to access cow manure from the cow sheds where the cows were overwintered.  They were turned out into the fields a few weeks ago, and as they are a beef herd and not dairy cows, then the manure is good for our compost making.  The manure was also most useful when filling the second large planter at Folkestone West station this week.  The base was first filled with some cut logs and sheep wool, followed by several bags of the manure and topped with a good layer of compost.  The tomatoes, courgettes, squashes, cucumbers and beans should enjoy getting their roots right down into all that.  The first planter completed just over a week before has already started to flourish and is growing well.  Luckily there are a few volunteers living in a nearby street, happy to water them.

What’s next?

• Weed around the inside of the hedge line

• Turn out the two new compost rings

• Collect more manure

• Are there more seedlings around the plot to be potted up?

This weeks update from the Sandgate Community Garden Diary.

Sandgate Community Garden Team Diary Entry for 25th June: An incredibly busy week eating.

What an unbelievably busy week it has been, and most of it seemed to be all about food and lots of it!

It was refugee week, and on Monday we had a large group come down from the barracks to help us move lots of compost from the top end of the garden to the new composting area at the other end.  It was hot, heavy work, but they completed the task in what seemed like no time at all, and were rewarded with lots of tea and amazing cake, which all seemed to go down very well.  The old composting boxes were dismantled, and there will be a write up in a future newsletter all about what is happening with our new composting area, as there is so much to say about it.

On Wednesday evening there was an invite to a meal as part of the refugee week, hosted by the ‘Friends of Napier Barracks’ with food cooked by some of the men at the barracks – it was traditional food from their home countries, and very delicious it all was too.

On Saturday, the Disco Soup event took place, using food which could not be sold by supermarkets, for being ‘too wonky’, damaged, or at sell by date.  With the help of a chef from Folkestone College, and lots of willing hands, the food was prepared and made into all sorts of wonderful dishes, from soup, to risotto, delicious salads and pizza.  Several boxes of tomatoes, peppers and cucumbers were donated by Thanet Earth, and what a truly awesome experience it was to collect the food from them in Birchington.  It was a mile from the entrance to the main reception, driving past huge greenhouses where the produce is grown.  It was food production on a massive scale and so very different from our way of food growing, but fascinating to see if only from a distance.

In-between all the feasting, there were plenty of other things going on.  Some of us went along to visit Brockhill School to see how they were getting on with their lovely walled kitchen garden.  They have put up a rabbit fence as it seems that as soon as something was planted, it got eaten.  However something has worked out how to bypass the netting and has attacked the carrots.  It seemed such a familiar story to us!  The school also had one of the beautiful old greenhouses renovated, and it was looking truly splendid.  What a fantastic resource, and how amazing it will be for the children to be able to learn about horticulture as part of their education in such a great setting.

We did actually manage to get quite a few tasks done at the community gardens!  The planters at Golden Valley had a makeover, with some compost and new plants added.  The alley way at Meadowbrook got weeded and flowering plants added.  The hedge at Enbrook Park got another trim, more spring onions and beetroot sown, the bay trees tidied, the cucumbers planted, and any soft fruit we had left was netted.  It seems we are back to watering again, with the refreshing rain we had becoming a distant memory again, oh well, we are now into summer after all.

What’s next?

• Prick out the purple sprouting broccoli
• Plant out some of the kale
• Find space to create a windrow for the newly made compost
• Check on the potatoes

This weeks update from the Sandgate Community Garden Diary.