Help MBE grow his dinner 2012

Pre-war_babe_33

MBE I would love it if you came round and helped me construct a stumpery, and mow my lawn too while you are about it - I`m good at tea making but not very good at cake - would Jaffa cakes do? Unfortunately I am rather too far from Walsall for you to pop round as I think I am just north west of Annie and Lolly.

My news for today - I ate a tomato! Not just any old supermarket tomato but one I had grown from seed (Maskotka) and jolly nice it was too. Only people like you lot would understand what it felt like to be eating the first tomato of the season. Plenty more where that one came from too - in fact the plants have slithered down their canes with the weight of them all. At least six more will be ripe by the end of the week too.

Picked the last of the broad beans today - definitely not a good year for beans but maybe enough to last me through to Christmas - there is only me here to eat them now.

Like you Annie, I have the promise of loads of blackberries on my thornless bush. They have got themselves interwoven with a couple of raspberry bushes so a bit of pruning and tying back will have to be done there I think, but not until I have picked the blackberries though.

annie123

lolly5648 wrote: »

What part of London are you - I'm in North London and didn't have thunder or lightening and very little rain.

I'm not posh enough to live in North London, I down south, not far from Crystal Palace but not as far as Croydon.
Have a look at http://www.raintoday.co.uk/ once you get pink squares, it's fairly heavy rain, and blue to white squares over you it's heavy/very heavy rain and often thunder, speaking of which it's just rumbled again.

EDIT: http://weather.lgfl.org.uk/default.aspx this is a good site for comparing weather (I'm a weather nerd, on weather forums too:o)
Rainham had 9mm, greenwich 5mm, westminister and enfield 0mm

annie123

Pre-war_babe_33 wrote: »

My news for today - I ate a tomato! Not just any old supermarket tomato but one I had grown from seed (Maskotka) and jolly nice it was too. Only people like you lot would understand what it felt like to be eating the first tomato of the season. Plenty more where that one came from too - in fact the plants have slithered down their canes with the weight of them all. At least six more will be ripe by the end of the week too.

That's great, please tell me they're in greenhouse.

Pre-war_babe_33

No Annie, they are not in a greenhouse. I raised them on a south-west facing windowsill, came down one morning in May and found them all flopped over and some actually fallen off the windowsill so gave them a quick drink and shoved them outside where they have been ever since.

I can`t understand why they seem to be so much in advance of everyone else`s. They were planted in re-cycled bought compost with Miraclegro granules added if that is any help.

mrbadexample

Pre-war_babe_33 wrote: »

MBE I would love it if you came round and helped me construct a stumpery, and mow my lawn too while you are about it - I`m good at tea making but not very good at cake - would Jaffa cakes do?

No, I'm really sorry but Jaffa cakes, nice as they are, just won't cut it. It has to be real home-made cake.

Pre-war_babe_33 wrote: »

Unfortunately I am rather too far from Walsall for you to pop round as I think I am just north west of Annie and Lolly.

Annie, Lolly, can you pop round and help?

Pre-war_babe_33 wrote: »

My news for today - I ate a tomato! Not just any old supermarket tomato but one I had grown from seed (Maskotka) and jolly nice it was too. Only people like you lot would understand what it felt like to be eating the first tomato of the season. Plenty more where that one came from too - in fact the plants have slithered down their canes with the weight of them all. At least six more will be ripe by the end of the week too.

I'm really, REALLY jealous! :T Mine are still a way off yet, and that's in the greenhouse. The outside ones are really struggling - plenty of flowers but precious little in the way of fruit.

lemonjelly

mrbadexample wrote: »

I'm really, REALLY jealous! :T Mine are still a way off yet, and that's in the greenhouse. The outside ones are really struggling - plenty of flowers but precious little in the way of fruit.

Be grateful man! I have a small number of flowers on a couple of plants. That is it!

Finally some sunshine! Hopefully the rays will do my plants a little bit of good!

Drea

I would just like to point out that I have 5 whole fruits on my tomato plants that I nearly killed off... and you all laughed

I have another 10 or so on the big plant I bought from the farm shop, they are now proper tomato size and just need ripening

The first flowers are appearing on my runner beans, I'm surprised after the slugs have been attacking them.

Everything else is getting drowned or eaten!

aliasojo

annie123 wrote: »

EDIT: http://weather.lgfl.org.uk/default.aspx this is a good site for comparing weather (I'm a weather nerd, on weather forums too:o)
Rainham had 9mm, greenwich 5mm, westminister and enfield 0mm

I want that for Scotland.

I can be nerdy too.

djohn2002uk

lemonjelly wrote: »

Speaking of which, how's your recovery going? Been playing at all?

The recovery has come to a bit of a slow down really.Been on painkillers again for 2 weeks,finish today with no lifting or bending or "pottering in the garden", then see the surgeon again next Thurs. Then 3 options, either 1. it's ok and pain free, 2. Hydrocortisone injection, or, 3. go back in and have part of it done again.
Been cheating a bit and playing a gentle game now and again. Otherwise I'd go mad.

annie123

aliasojo wrote: »

I want that for Scotland.

I can be nerdy too.

Best I can come up with so far for Scotland is

http://www.weatherstations.co.uk/aws_map.htm

Click on one of the markers and it takes you to the local weather station but each one produce it differently, some are good like this one http://www.drumriach.plus.com/Current_Vantage_Pro.htm but others are more basic.

It was so nice to wake up to bright blue sky this morning, so nice I took the brolly off the courgette
New raspberry canes are now tied in bundles out of the way, taken some of the leaves off toms to allow more air to circulate.

Whilst pulling weeds I stepped on and broke a large courgette leaf, this one is in the ground but the leaf stem that broke is now an open funnel, worried about water getting in and rotting it, there's only so many umbrellas I can put in the garden.
Should I cover it with a plastic bag maybe? wouldn't have given it a seconds thought other years, it's only because of the amount of rain I'm worried.

Off to try and mow the lawn before it rains again as the grass is long and wet and makes my ankles soggy, yuck!