Sandgate Community Garden Team Diary Entry for 24th July: the absence of water.

So it is that the drought continues here in sunny Sandgate with perhaps a millimetre or two of rain just to tantalise, whilst the north and west of the country are treated to torrential downpours.  The grass is more yellow, and any growth is stunted and slow.  Having finished the carrots and had a good go at the beetroot, the badgers have turned their attention to the courgettes and probably been eating those as we have seen very few and what is left has teeth marks all over them. 

We have left a couple of bowls of water around the garden for any visiting wildlife, as the pond is fast evaporating.  On Saturday one of our gardeners noticed there was something lurking in the mud and last remaining water of the deepest section.  All we could ascertain is that the creature was quite large and had legs and as our knowledge of the Ukrainian language is worse than our gardeners grasp of English, we had to be satisfied with the information we had been given and just imagine what it could have been. 

During the same morning, the kind elderly gentleman who gave us a lemon tree came along armed with a container filled with water and ‘special feed’ for the tree.  We have now discovered his name is Abdul, and we hope he will visit again even though we did not manage to find out what the ‘secret’ ingredient was in the container.

The garden honey has literally been selling like ‘hot cakes’, and Ray the beekeeper kindly gave us two jars, so all our names were put into a lottery to win them.  Just by coincidence the winners were a volunteer at Fremantle and a volunteer at Enbrook Park.  There will be some of the garden’s honey on our stall at the Sandgate Sea Festival on 28^th August, so put the date in your diary and come and visit us there.  We are busy sowing seeds and potting up plants in preparation for the Sea festival, which is a great fund raising event for us, so our fingers are crossed that we can manage to keep the plants alive until then, and that the sun still shines on the day.

This week our list of jobs did get completed.  The fennel, lettuce and Chinese cabbage seeds got sown, and we spent a great deal of time watering which is unsurprising.  Basil, chives and mint got repotted into larger pots to grow them on for the sale.  In the meantime the tomatoes are looking pretty good with many of them now reaching six feet, however the object being to grow tomatoes not stems and leaves, we are hoping they will get to produce something bearing in mind that we will soon be approaching the time to be on the lookout for blight.  In preparation we have removed all the leaves below the first truss which should help when we are watering.  We have now stopped watering the rhubarb as it will have to fend for itself.  The time to stop picking rhubarb is the end of June so that the roots can put on plenty of growth ready to produce more stems next year. 

On Monday, which was a very warm day, we had an afternoon booked for some volunteers to come out from Napier Barracks to help us with some tasks in the Golden Valley.  The weeds all around the planters at the shops, and in the pavement crevices were removed, the beds were thoroughly watered, and a thick mulch of compost was put down.  We decided to do this now as we should have added more plants to this area, following on from the spring and early summer flowers, but it being so dry and hot we decided against that idea for now until the weather changes, as new plants would struggle to survive.  At the same time, most of us were struggling to survive too in the hot sun, however we were well looked after by the shop staff, being offered drinks.  The landlord of the Golden Arrow, Richard, gave us pint glasses of iced water which was most welcome.  Even a passing local took pity and bought us all a soft drink in the grocery store. 

Afterwards we moved on to weed at Fremantle Park, clearing the orchard area and park edges where the brambles encroach on the planted areas.  It is hard to believe that the planting there is looking good considering, with the plants still alive.  We probably have to thank Harmers, the tree watering contractors for that, and the fact that Fremantle Park is usually much wetter underfoot than Enbrook Park.  One of the trees in the orchard is a Pomegranate and it currently has several flowers which with any luck could produce a pomegranate or two this year.  It did grow one last year whilst it was living in a pot, but now that it is planted in the ground it might go berserk and make even more!   The flowers are very attractive, long waxy trumpet shaped and bright red.  The small family plots and the herb planters are really struggling, with most folk deciding not to plant anything just yet and to wait for the rain.  In the meantime we all have plants, plants, plants all over the place in pots just sitting and waiting.

What’s next?

• Water, water and more water to keep the smaller plants alive in particular

• May have to repot the chard as it cannot be planted yet

• Prick out the lettuce seedlings

• Watch out for blight and remove plant affected

This weeks update from the Sandgate Community Garden Diary.

Sandgate Community Garden Team Diary Entry for 17th July: Badgers, weeding, water and guerilla gardening.

Oh dear!  It is grumbling all round in the gardening communities, where the water butts have dried up and now resorting to having to use the washing up water and bath water or shower water!  Luckily the plants do not mind soft soap; in fact we have started to use a spray of soapy water on some of the dwarf beans that have been affected by blackfly.  Never like to use it if there are ladybirds around in numbers as they will usually tackle the job, but sometimes we need other help, and the soft soap spray will do the job. 

The only other spray we have had to get out is the bacillus thuringiensis, natural bacteria that targets caterpillars.  We only use this on the brassica plants such as kale, cabbages, swede, broccoli and cauliflowers as the cabbage white butterflies are now around in large numbers trying to lay their eggs.  As soon as any netting is removed to take a look at the plants, they make their move, dive in, and then have to be driven away before the netting can be replaced.  The cold frames always have to be checked as they manage to find their way into them but fail to find their way out again.

Talking about nets and plant protection, we have had several visits recently from what we believe is probably the badger population.  We put netting over the carrots mainly to deter carrot fly, however the badgers decided they would care to make short work of our carrots, tore through the netting and ate the whole lot, creating several holes in the ground and generally making a mess.  Last year it was our beetroot patch that suffered the same fate but this year we grew less beetroot and managed to get most of it up a couple of weeks ago, so it seems next to beetroot they also like carrots; guessing that these root vegetables are sweet and contain more calories that green vegetables, which is just as well or perhaps the entire garden would be stripped in no time!

Not surprisingly this week has mostly been about keeping things alive.  No new plantings will be attempted until the weather breaks, and therefore to keep the seedlings alive that should have been planted by now, we have had to resort to repotting them into larger pots and stock piling them where a close eye can be kept.  As soon as the weather does change it will be all hands on deck getting them in the ground, but until then some beds will have to remain empty.  We are just about managing to keep what we did plant a couple of weeks ago alive, but they are struggling and not growing perhaps as well as they should be.  However, the cauliflower and broccoli seedlings did get pricked out into separate pots, all the compost heaps got turned and we are in full flow of sweet pea picking.  We have to make sure all the flowers get picked every time we visit the garden or else they will quickly go to seed and stop producing any more.

The planter outside the Ship in the High Street got a makeover as did the two seafront planters, with a dressing of new compost and plenty of water, hopefully they should be alright.  The new orchard at Sandgate Park was looking a little crowded by weeds which will be competing with the trees and herbs for water, so they got removed.  Next week we will turn our attention to Fremantle Park and the orchard there. 

Last but by no means least, the guerrilla planted verge in Golden Valley is looking quite spectacular thanks to Rita’s watering.  The picture below does it little justice, and a local commented that her children like to walk past that way as they go to school and look at the flowers, I would think that is reward enough for us. 

What’s next?

• Weed at Golden Valley and Fremantle Park

• Mulch Golden valley planters

• Maybe sow some lettuce, bulb fennel, and Chinese cabbage

• Keep up the watering

This weeks update from the Sandgate Community Garden Diary.

Sandgate Community Garden Team Diary Entry for 10th July: Insufficient water, ants, bees and the incredible Cardoon.

It certainly has been a warm month and how very glad we are to receive a bowser full of water every week or we would surely be in trouble trying to keep the new plantings alive.  The trouble is, the courgettes are trying to swell as are the tomatoes and the beans, but with no rain such crops would suffer if we did not water.  We are now planting crops that mature in autumn through winter and into spring, such as kale, swede and purple sprouting broccoli, and of course, should they fail, then there will be nothing for later.  It makes you appreciate how fortunate we are not to have to rely on the success of what we grow, not so for many parts of the world.  We are not so sure about the outcome of many of our other sites in Sandgate which do have to rely on rain and the occasional can of water we try to bring which never is enough.  All we can do is hope things survive which is their instinct to do, and that this weather breaks soon.  In the meantime the grass has turned to yellow and the only good thing about that is it requires no cutting.

On Saturday morning, Jay, one of our new volunteers, got into the pond as the water has all but evaporated, to cut back some of the pond weed which had seriously grown since last year to create a huge spongy mat.  A few buckets of water were spared to put in the pond which we are sure the wildlife will appreciate.

Earlier in the week we were concerned to see a very young green woodpecker, looking vulnerable and not wary enough of dogs and people; we kept an eye on it until eventually it managed to fly up into the trees.  Green woodpeckers love to eat ants and there are certainly plenty of them around as we watched hundreds climbing up our fencing and marching along the top rail for some reason better known to them.  It was quite fascinating to watch and realise there is plenty of blackfly in the garden now and the ants must be on their way to ‘milk’ them for the honeydew they produce and to protect them from any predators. 

Ray, our site beekeeper, has been working hard this week to extract more honey from the garden bee hives.  Many of our gardeners and friends of the garden have put in their orders for the honey currently in the process of being put into jars.  Today (10^th July) is National ‘Don’t step on a bee day’, so to help mark the event, Saga has asked Ray to put some jars of his honey in the canteen at Enbrook for staff to purchase.  One of the messages about this important day is to support local bee keepers – 85% of the honey we consume is imported, and as we have been reporting, the quality of such imported honey is not always that good and cannot be compared to the local stuff.

Perhaps the largest flower in our garden is currently that of the cardoon.  One of our plants must be around 10 feet tall as it absolutely towers over everything.  The flower is quite spectacular and loved by insects but before it breaks into colour, the flowers can be picked and eaten just like globe artichokes.  The scales of the outer part of the flower are not as full as the artichoke, but the fleshy middle section of the flower is very tasty with more flavour than the globe artichoke.  We were originally sold our cardoons as being artichokes from a well-known DIY garden centre and since then have decided to grow artichokes from seed as they are easy to grow, you know what to expect, there are different varieties, and they look architectural as a plant within a garden.  They feature in the Lower Leas Park this year again, and certainly make a show although not sure as yet if they are actually cardoons!

What’s next?

• Continue the turning of the compost heaps
• Keep a close eye on the watering situation
• Prick out the cauliflower and broccoli seedlings later in the week
• Sow the autumn lettuces

This weeks update from the Sandgate Community Garden Diary.