Sunday 31 July 2011

The last day of July

lawnmowing

How can it possibly be the end of July already? It's not fair.

It's been a fantastic summer's day. Warm, still, clear blue skies and quiet all around. A bit too hot really but I'm not complaining even if it has made mowing into sweaty exhausting work and the flies have driven me indoors more than once.

first ceps of the season

I went out for a walk this morning and found loads, and I mean loads, of ceps. Unfortunately I was a day or two too late and slugs and the heat had pushed most of them past a point of no return. A pity, although I'd never have been able to eat that many mushrooms by myself anyway. About 10 days ago I found a few hedgehog mushrooms in the woods but so far haven't been able to emulate my Swedish relatives who have been bringing home bucketfuls of chanterelles for the last couple of weeks.

papalo

The papalo is looking good for now. I'm awfully anxious for it though as these are my last few seeds, and if I can't bring them to flowering size and fruiting before the autumn I'll have lost the selection. So fingers crossed there.

runner bean White Emergo 2

The first reasonable sized runner bean on the White Emergo. Deer attack permitting it's looking like there'll be a good harvest here in a couple of weeks.

broad beans for drying

The Martock and Ful broad beans are now mature and I'll be cutting them soon to hang up and dry before shelling and sorting for store. They'll make good eating in the winter. I would have had them in already but I've only just cleaned the spinach seeds and hung the garlic that was taking their space in the drying area.

Bronze Arrow lettuce beginning to bolt

And finally, the Bronze Arrow lettuce is beginning to bolt, pretty good going considering the temperatures and drought we've had this year. I'm hoping to save plenty of seed from them as they've been an excellent salad for months now.

3 comments:

Rose said...

I don't know where July has gone either.

I love the photo of the half mown lawn/field. It makes me daydream about living in the country someday. Must be heavenly.

Matron said...

What a great selection of varieties there. I get inspired visiting other blogs... but there are just too many to grow all of them!

Catofstripes said...

Hi Rose, it is heavenly but all that mowing can be a chore. Sometimes I dream of a courtyard garden :)

Hello Matron, there are so many varieties that one could grow a different selection every year forever but some sorts are good enough to come back to again and again. I love reading other people's garden blogs too, just to see what they're up to.