Awful weather - typical Brits talk

-taff

goldfinches said:

Hello all, raining cats and dogs here so I've spent the day indoors on the sofa although I did go for walk with friends yesterday afternoon to see the lilacs along the river which are looking and smelling lovely.
While browsing various baking sites I ran across this page which suggests that one can use dried yeast to both kill slugs and speed up ones compost and wondered whether anyone had any comments.
5 Surprising Uses for Yeast | Baking Mad | Baking Mad

The slug control thing is just the same as putting a saucer or glass, depending on how much you have to spare, of beer in the ground under a cover for them to fall into and drown happily..

Apodemus

I routinely use yeast and/or excess sourdough starter in yoghurt pots or plant-pot trays for my slug traps.  (see https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/77405928/#Comment_77405928 ). It works very well and saves wasting beer on the slugs!  

Since this is MSE, I'd suggest that you don't waste fresh yeast on this task, but make up a yeast/flour starter mix that you keep feeding in a  jar in the kitchen.  1 sachet of yeast to 120g flour plus 80g water, then keep adding flour and water in the same ratio as and when you need to top it up.  Then use that starter 50/50 with water to fill your slug traps.

Added bonus is that the same starter mix makes wonderful sourdough pancakes!

Farway

Never rained here yesterday after all, supposed to today but who knows?

Up to the volunteer centre early on, message about some donated sunflower plants, so I went to collect them & will keep them safe until the person who can actually bend is available, she's away daughter's dog sitting  now.

Things are looking well up there, the Stargazer lilies I planted in pots last year or storming away and so far lily beetle free, possibly because they are isolated from other vegetation and adjacent to a main road and perhaps the beetles choke on the carbon monoxide?

With all the wild garlic talk, we have it in the volunteer border, but it looks very nice right now, here's a pic I took this morning. Can anyone identify the yellow flowers? Donated so name unknown

Paspatur

Osteospermum maybe?

twopenny

It was dry but too wet underfoot this morning and - raining again this afternoon sigh.

If you put oatmeal for slugs they swell and die and if you use salt they shrivel and die. So if you put salted oatmeal? I'm beginning to feel sorry for them. I wonder if I put out beer (drip tray leftovers) will the hedgehog get drunk?

Dave sadly I don't have the right set up for PSx and it's only 'free trial' now. I used to have photoshop. I'm a lot better looking in some of my photos now.

I did see the chairman of the tennis club take tomato plants up there today. By the time I got around to looking which they were they'd gone. With the hard landscaping sun rain I haven't got mine potted yet. Raining for the forseeable future. Looks like another visit to the roadside/charity stalls.

Farway, that's pretty.

Davesnave

We managed to do our walk despite Met Office radar warnings of a huge rain blob arriving between 14.00 and 16.00. Did about 6 or 7 miles, most of it reasonable surfaces, but some tough sections and steep gradients. The rain arrived bang on 17.00 and we were soaked completing the last hundred metres!

There were bluebells, though not so thick as those in the woods near here....

Pictures later

quirkydeptless

twopenny said:

I did see the chairman of the tennis club take tomato plants up there today.

Playing tennis with tomatos is not recommended - very messy

RAS

Thursday was volunteering to the north; short light rain shower at about 3pm. Got home to find there had been an unpredicted downpour at lunch-time, just over the watershed.

I've had better summer weather in the Lofoten Islands than here this year. Very cool and little sun.

Davesnave

Yesterdays walk (hike?) started at a NT property, but being cheapskates, we only used the car park, walked past the entrance, down a lane and then accessed the estate via a bridleway. An old sign indicated the route we should take then, but the crucial arrow was missing, so we guessed which way it might have pointed.....and got it wrong. This eventually led to some animated discussion, and to us doing the walk in reverse order, but we still found the bluebells.

On  a  tramp along a lane I spotted a plant I didn't recognise in the hedge bank. It seemed like  some kind of twiner/climber, with very shiny, cordate leaves, but it appeared to be travelling downwards, not up. My walking friend has little no interest in botany, so I wasn't able to stop long, but I grabbed a photo. Any ideas? An asarum perhaps?

phoebe1989seb

Farway said:

With all the wild garlic talk, we have it in the volunteer border, but it looks very nice right now, here's a pic I took this morning. Can anyone identify the yellow flowers? Donated so name unknown

This is where I'm going to show my ignorance, lol, but the above white flowers aren't the wild garlic, are they?

We have both wild garlic and those white flowers above in different parts of our garden. They are definitely different (flower and foliage) and as we planted neither I had no idea what the ones that don't smell of garlic are.....

The unknown plant (same as above)....
The wild garlic....