A Bit of Hacking

This is me last autumn deciding to cut a largish pine tree, grown from a tiny fledging pine I found on a mountain walk, a number of years ago, 

Why would I want to cut down such a tree, you might ask? We're living in a world that asks us to plant trees, not cut them down. Yes indeed.

The problem I was having with this largish tree was, that it was casting a dark shadow on the vegetable beds behind it.

But don't worry. the tree is very much alive. I just cut a large portion of its top, so now the light can get to the beds behind and the tree is still alive.

It does look odd, however, with its top off and cut. I'm not sure if it will produce a small shoot upwards to give its top a bit of balance.

I have included a photo of this injured tree. I'm not hiding my rough treatment.

Yes I do admit it must have suffered a kind of shock. It has survived the winter and is not showing any signs of weakness, so far.

It does provide a great windbreak to the plants behind it and absorbs the winds blowing from either side.

And yes I did make my apology to it before I put the first cut into it.

It was hard going with a bow saw, which got stuck halfway, because the angle of cutting was too high for my reach.

Fortunately sometime after, a very windy storm blew the rest of the uncut top down. Thanks Nature.

I used a lopper to cut up the larger branches into neat piles, allowing them to rot naturally over the winter. Some of these piles have provided ground cover to weeds growing underneath.

Pine needles, I understand are good for the soil, but can introduce a bit too much acid.

Sweet Scent

Narcissus  Scent

What a delightful scent, so sweet, almost heady. On these spring days when the weather is still like winter and the rain doesn't let up, this sweet scent is a great spirit uplifted. It's no wonder poets write in raving style about this flower.

I should plant more of these bulbs, but honestly, I just forget to do it in the autumn time. Oh dear!

Sweet Pine

Here's a little pine tree, rescued from the Christmas buying frenzy last year, on sale after the great festive day. I bought four in all as an idea of celebrating each of my grandchildren. I'm thinking some day they might come and claim their own. 

This is a fairly slow growing variety, nice bright green shoots appearing this spring.

I'll eventually have to move them from their spot if they get too big...a few years before that needs to happen though!

Pop-Ups in the Garden...Nature's Abundance

Raspberry pop-up.

They're everywhere. This little plant is probably a runner frim an Autumn fruiting variety, which originally cane frim a friend's left-over planting. These plants grow quite tall throughout  the summer. In the autumn, dark red fruits are in abundance. Very eady to grow and the plant in fruit lasts well into November, despite the cold weather.

A great example of easy growing fruit. 

Potato pop-up. 

There are many of these pop-ups around the garden. They have increased over the years. I used to dig them out, thinking they were in the way, until I realised Nature is helping me for free. Generally the pop-ups grow without much help. I will cover the growing plant, so the developing potatoes won't  be green when exposed to the air. Last year I had quite a good crop, in one spot, with some very large potatoes, as I forgot to dig them up. Quite tasty too.

And believe it or not, I'm not a great potato eater, maybe roast or oven baked being the best way I like to eat them.

Seeds on Standby

 Who’d have thought seeds can keep their potency.

I was surprised to use these ‘home-grown’ seeds...since 2019...this Spring(2021), and find out that they germinated without any problems. In fact they seem to germinate better than some shop-bought squash seeds, expensive and all!

I harvested the seeds from a mature courgette in 2019. Figuring when the courgette is mature enough to extract the seeds is a guess on my part.

Can’t wait to grow these on and see the mature plants and harvest great courgette. Thank you Nature!

Picking Parsnips Too Early

This year for the first time in a very long time I've managed to coax parsnip seeds into life. I'm not sure exactly, why parsnips haven't germinated before but I took the advice of Charles Dowding's you tube video on germinating all seeds in a modular tray. Sure enough and with moisture from a capillary mat, they germinated very well and so we're planted out and we'll watered and fed. In August I noticed the white body perming through the earth and couldn't resist pulling up...just one. This one was big...though you can see that the root part is quite narrow and needed more filling out. Tasted delicious,though, baked in the oven, sliced and oiled into mouth sized chunks. Extremely filling as a vegetable. I know this vegetable is best appreciated when left to be pulled after the first frosts or even later, when some of starch turns into sugar. I've left the rest, hoping for feast in November. ..if I can wait that long!

Insect Defense against Cabbage Moth

Each year I plan to keep brocolli and other members of the Brassicae family whole and safe from the devouring insects who love their fresh and crunchy green leaves. The biggest offender, to my mind, is the Cabbage Moth, or what might be commonly called the white butterfly. It starts it's attraction to these green veg sometime in July and remains vigilant till September. After many attempts to deter the insect with organic sprays and such like, I finally came across the idea of a finely knit transparent net. At first I found the purchase of said netting quite expensive, though very effective. As I grow lots of cabbages, broccoli, brussel sprouts and kohl rabbi for the winter, the purchase of said netting seemed too expensive for my purse. Further research from gardening articles showed the usefulness of builders netting. This year I purchased around 50m x 1m for about €35 including postage. It has UV resistence, so should last for a period of years. It has worked very well. Where I have to double up or treble up on a row of broccoli, I use pegs to join the edges. The brocolli are looking great...barely a hole in the leaves. The cabbage have many holes...due my carelessness in not tightening the joined up rows of netting. Although the netting is black and looks...maybe...a bit weird...it has provided some shade for the young seedlings. I've the netting on other young seedlings when planted out to prevent birds pecking at the ground looking for snails and worms. It has served a purpose as a bird deterrent for the strawberries. I ran out of netting for some of the brassicae ...which I deem a ''sacrifice'' row. The affected plants look so pathetic and I feel guilty for not buying more netting. That will be next spring's duty. The affected plants are still alive, though.

Battle with the Cabbage Moth