Swiss chardless

Other animals on the farm have not been so accommodating.   Deer have visited my vegetable garden and bitten off more than I would like them to chew.

There are animal tracks all over the cleared bits of the garden, and one of the smaller deer managed to get in under the cloche and eat all the swiss chard to the ground.

I have put the net in place properly now, but it’s a bit too late for this season, unless we have a super mild winter. Today was just perfect, but I can’t expect the temperature to stay in the teens for much longer.

Luckily my New Zealand spinach was tucked in a bit more tightly in another part of the garden.   But this is a good reminder to me: I must get round to harvesting it before a cold snap or a hungrier deer gets to it.

I did manage to pick cavolo nero, red cabbage and a winter white cabbage this afternoon; not a huge amount, but enough for a few meals.

I really should accept that brassicas just don’t do well on my acidic soil.   But it’s so much fun trying.

But I only managed to get three cavolo nero plants through the season; which is a shame as it’s one of my favourite greens.   But if it weren’t the cabbage moth butterfly laying eggs, it was the gendarme bugs climbing all over the plants.

I think I might try planting some indoors in the potting shed next year.