Ze round up part deux

So, weeding. Heaps of it. I wanted to have three major areas of the garden done before I left: the vegetable gardens both upper and lower, and the calabert garden.

Pretties first:  the little shrubs in the calabert garden – planted in December – are all thriving.   The lavenders and cistus are romping away, and all the other plants are fine.   The rosemary hasn’t decided whether it is happy here, but the caryopterus are plump.   I left the wild flowers about for the first few months.   You can’t pull out a beautiful poppy thicket before they go over.   And I thought the plants were a bit small to cope as the focal point of this garden.  

Most people would have put down a weed proof fabric and planted through.   And I did consider it.   But I wanted to try the gravel mulch method instead. It does make it easier for self sown seedlings.   And on this steep slope it looks less unsightly. Well, if you aren’t tired of the look of the beach.

I’m so pleased that the santolinas have taken well. They are even flowering. And unlike most santolinas, the flowers aren’t vile. Just a pale. pale yellow.

I’m taking cuttings like mad, and hope I can get as many small plants of this mother one like I did last year.

And now that I have done a proper weeding, you might even be able to see them now.   It’s hard to photograph them as the sun was so glaring. But I’ll try close ups later in the season.

And then there was the dull old day job: weeding the veggie garden. Not something I could put off for any longer. But it’s way too warm for this sort of thing. But needs must. I just didn’t sort out the mulching properly this year.   But here are some action shots of the happy results.   You can even see the cabbages now. It’s a mixed bag growing cabbages here; they never thrive as much as the top vegetable bed, but it’s less of a distance to walk when you need some for dinner.   The greyhound variety are usually my bankers for summer greens, but they were so parched from the May neglect and heat that I’m not sure they will heart up now.   But they are starting to put on some good growth.

And I found the cucumbers thriving under all this mess.   I put them here as a deer baffle, thinking that there was no way they could weave their way through this maze of cloches.   But actually (touch wood) I haven’t had a deer visitation yet.   And am almost starting to get cocky.

It’s a shame all the coriander has gone over to flower and seed – one of my favourite dishes is sliced cucumbers with coriander with chilis in a sugar and vinegar sauce.   But the little green seeds are a powerful flavour, it just makes for a crunchier taste sensation.

One of my rules is to mulch the soil with something after weeding. It would be dreadful to put in all this work to get back to bare soil and then watch in dismay to see it all coming over again.   In a world of endless garden mulch I would go to my bins and cover the entire garden with about 10cm of the stuff.   But I can never make enough.

So I had to do a spot of mowing to get enough grass cuttings to put down.   It’s not a perfect mulching medium, but I have quantities of the stuff.

So as a quick break from the hiding under the umbrella and ruining my nails, I went for a lovely trudge along long lengths of grass to collect my spoils.

It’s wonderful exercise. If a tad noisy.   And I even strimmed the orchard area as I obviously hadn’t got my dose of noisy petrol driven machines.

It is so necessary here as the chestnuts will self seed in a few months. Turn your back and there will be a tree.   And if there is one thing we don’t need on this farm, it’s more chestnuts.   Especially ones growing out of rock walls on a steep slope.

So that was my day: if it was weeded, mulched and netted I was happy. Aching and sneezing, but happy.