Asparagus in winter

You won’t believe me, but it’s true. This is the colour of my asparagus bed at the beginning of winter.  I take all my pictures just using an iphone. No filters, no doctoring.  My friend Neal showed me how to use some whizz picture programme – snapseed or something. But he flashed his fingers over the keys so quickly I never remembered what I needed to do.

So it sits as an app on my phone and will remain there until I next meet up with someone with photo skills. Or I’ll just ask anyone under 15.

For now this is what you get.

If you ever wonder just when you should cut back your asparagus fronds, here is a clue.

Not yet.

Yep.

Bright yellow fronds tell you it’s time to cut them back.

And of course it’s the time to weed the whole bed, mulch it, and then place the cut down branches over the top to stop the mulch blowing about in the wind.

But also because I just can’t resist this acid yellow colour and want to enjoy it for a bit longer.

After the ridiculous rain last week it is a slug fest up at the top potager.  They are lurking all over the fallen Brassica leaves.  And some were even hanging out on asparagus fronds.  Peer carefully and you will see the quarry.

And my other visitors are the horses.  They are in full greedy chestnut mode – I lob half a bucket of them each day onto their side of the fence and they crunch away like mad.  Yes, horses in this part of the Ardèche love their nuts.

I ignored the keen whinnying and got on with weeding.

And for an encore, I worked my way down the Brassica bed to make sure the largest of the slugs were no longer on my veg.  When I close my eyes I see them.  And no, I’m not telling you what I do with them.  (Hint. I have a sharp pair of secateurs on my person at all times.

There is plenty of kale for dinner. And my plod back down to the house was interrupted in the nicest possible way.  I had to drop my armful of kale first. But it was well worth the pause. Artur was waiting on the steps.