Last year's potato test was a painful failure, barely a handful of potatoes, all about the size of a fingernail. But I've decided to run the experiment again, and with now a better amount of fair weather and rain, I've got four healthy-looking plants! Here's hoping we can at least make a meal out of them this year.
We won't be having cherries, like every year, because the stupid birds rip them off long before they're ripe, littering the back-end of the garden with unripe cherries. Pigeons are the main culprits. But now some of the invasive parakeets are starting to eat the blossoms in spring. Stupid bird-brains, the cherries would have been for you to start with (we don't net, because it 's a big tree and netting would trap and kill birds, which we don't want) at least let them become ripe so you can actually eat them!
We also seldom have walnuts, thanks to the squirrels, unless it's a real big harvest. But we do have a surprising amount of walnut saplings spread over the garden, again thanks to the squirrels.
Most of the flowers are gone now, but our efforts to invest in summer-flowering plants to ensure the bees and butterflies have continuous food are starting to pay off. There are still some splashes of welcome colour this summer. We have finally found a salvia that won't die off and by god it just keeps on flowering for months. I've actually gone and bought three more varieties, hoping we finally found what keeps them alive.
We won't be having cherries, like every year, because the stupid birds rip them off long before they're ripe, littering the back-end of the garden with unripe cherries. Pigeons are the main culprits. But now some of the invasive parakeets are starting to eat the blossoms in spring. Stupid bird-brains, the cherries would have been for you to start with (we don't net, because it 's a big tree and netting would trap and kill birds, which we don't want) at least let them become ripe so you can actually eat them!
We also seldom have walnuts, thanks to the squirrels, unless it's a real big harvest. But we do have a surprising amount of walnut saplings spread over the garden, again thanks to the squirrels.
Most of the flowers are gone now, but our efforts to invest in summer-flowering plants to ensure the bees and butterflies have continuous food are starting to pay off. There are still some splashes of welcome colour this summer. We have finally found a salvia that won't die off and by god it just keeps on flowering for months. I've actually gone and bought three more varieties, hoping we finally found what keeps them alive.
Oooh, that looks sturdy!Here's the Tomato Fortress:
Have you by chance read T. Kingfisher's The Tomato Thief? You may enjoy it if only for the familiar wish of the main character to enjoy tomato from her own yard.My war on tomato-squirrel-bandits has some history, but I’ll spare everyone the sob-story and jump straight to the ongoing conclusion. It was sheer desperation to enjoy a backyard tomato sandwich that influenced my choice of weapon: Strips of aluminum foil positioned here, there, and everywhere around the tomato plants finally ‘foiled’ the little bastard critters. (It seems squirrels find sheets of aluminum foil to be evil things better left unapproached.)