We are halfway through June, summer is just about here and there’s some rain about. Whey-hey!! But the lack of Jupiter Pluvius has been a drain and my lawn is rather beaten by it. I’m looking into drilling a well… I need to do something now our little part of South London has decided to holiday just outside Naples…
The vegetables, uniquely for this year, are exploding in the new potager bed. It’s pretty full with a line of 200 peas at the back with French beans in two rows in front. Tucked underneath are squash for later cropping.
Next in line are sunflowers and corn that will frame the three sweet pea towers. At one end onions vie with chard courgette and beetroot, while the front of the bed has tomatoes calendula and cornflowers to draw the eye as the summer develops.
It’s a lot of work but undeniably satisfying and perfect for a year when we won’t be going away and neither will the family who can enjoy the produce. I doubt we’ll do this again, but you never know. After all the purpose behind digging out this and the corner bed, moving the roses and peonies in the process was to prep it to turn it over to meadow grass and fruit trees to reduce the work and maintenance.
The corner bed mentioned above is currently a narcotic of poppies, quite the most intense bee experience currently. It might be short lived but it’s worth it for the joy just now.
Otherwise so much is pushing on. In colour terms, this part of June sometimes feels like a pause, but that ignores the roses and early lillies, as well as some other delights like foxgloves and yellow loosestrife…
Oh and Dog, too. Natch.
TanGental 
Beautiful, beautiful …. Dog
The garden looks good too 😜…💜💜💜😀
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Thanks. Both scrub up well right now
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Yes indeed 💜
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Have you sent a film of your garden in to Gardener’s World yet? that’s my favourite part of the programme, having a nose at other people’s gardens!
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Yes. I loved last weeks with that super enthusiastic woman on her allotment. And there are some real eccentrics like the guy in north London with a full grown banana tree by his kitchen…
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As always, everything is lovely, but those poppies do indeed steal the show. Such colors! And they all look like they were made out of tissue paper — I wonder if poppies were the model for those tissue paper flowers my children brought home from day camp/Sunday School/elementary back in the day?
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Yes there’s a thought. We had no idea they would work so well. Guess it’s luck…
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Looking fabulous. Dog steals the show again!!
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He’s such a vain mutt, wont stay out of the camera..
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Splendid results – the lawn should recover
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Yes it’s getting better though the top piece is on notice… I think it will be all change this autumn (if I have my way…)
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Gorgeous!
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Thank you. It is
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All beautiful, Geoff.
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You make me blush… oh, the garden? Yes that too. And Dog..
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Yes all of that.
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Your garden is the ultimate dream. I always think you have unlimited space. This spring we completely reorganized our garden. Now I have a little herbal garden too (many healing plants are already spread all over the place actually)… calendula as well but also chamomile and many others I needed to check how they are called in English… lol
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We have planted a lot of calendula this year as should b3come apparent in the coming posts…!
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Do you process the calendula? I will make oil for skin care of it.
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We don’t. Is it easy? I’m being lazy, you understand. We always have masses of both French and English varieties
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Actually it is easy! You can put the petals in a glass and fill it up with (for example) olive oil. Let it stand for 4 weeks (shaking it a bit daily) and then you are having a fantastic skin healing oil (inflammations, dry skin, rash,…)
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Thanks!
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You are welcome, Geoff!
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I would just pitch a tent in your garden and live in it, if I were you two. It looks stunning.
200 peas!
Derrick is right – grass will recover.
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But I’m not sure, with the top lawn, that I want it to. I now want it gone and a dry garden, Beth Chatto style… as for camping, tomorrow I make a teepee…
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Gorgeous garden. Is drilling your own well allowed in London?
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Anywhere in the UK you can build an artesian well and take up to 20,000 litres a day without needing permission. What are the rules your way?
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I should not have admired your vegetable garden just before supper! I was ready to pluck the peas off the video vine. Fortunately although our property is filled with blueberries and tomatoes(he who gardens gets to apportion the lot) we pick up our first share of a local farm’s crops tomorrow.
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That sounds grand. It would be interesting to know where your crops are compared to ours…
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There are so many blueberries coming on that some of the branches have now bent to the ground.
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We have a similar situation with our gooseberries…
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I forgot all about gooseberries. I haven’t had them in years, or even seen them anywhere for that matter. Red currants also seem to have become rare around here.
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Funnily enough I was given a punnet of red currants this weekend from a friend allotment!
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The first jelly I made was red currant, my grandmother’s favorite.
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Yummy
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I guess people now like fruit sweeter than currants and gooseberries.
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‘It’s true and such a shame
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I had an Italian student whose family owned a bakery and were appalled by how much sweetness their American customers demanded in their baked goods.
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Your vegetable garden is lovely! Such a nice amount of space you’ve been able to devote to it. And your flowers are amazing. I’m sorry about the lawn. I don’t know anything about grass, but looking at it, I’m not sure it’s about water. Grass comes back after a drought; just hunkers down until water is available. This looks like you need an investigation and some research…Dog, of course, is refreshingly doggy and pleasing.
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You’re right. The problem with the, erm, problem patch is it’s on barely any soil as it was laid on the foundations of the Victorian house that was here until it was pulled down in the 1920s probably because of neglected after WW1 and maybe, given the London clay problems hereabouts, subsidence. In normal years it just about holds its own with a high clover content but this year and 2018 it’s turned to dust v quickly. The head gardener and I are seriously considering a dry garden instead with another pergola to match the existing. If we do I will take the opportunity to introduce a water capture system. Based on average London rain falls over the last five years I could harvest about 30,000 litres of rain a year off the roof or if I had a well drilled I’m allowed to take up to 20,000 litres a day! That way we wouldn’t have to use potable water on the garden and keep the bills down, albeit with an upfront capital cost…. sorry, long answer…
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Ah, yes, that’s areal problem with some multiple solutions. I’d try water capture first. Lots of people here have rain barrels and use them in August when it’s so hot everything needs daily watering or so hot AND dry…But it sounds like you’ve thought through the options. Have you thought of just trying to build up the soil there with lots of compost? A lot of work and an ugly lawn during that process, but, thought I’d mention as another option…Sorry about it, though, as it’s a really beautiful lawn (and I’m not partial to lawns as a rule, but yours is a thing of beauty).
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The bigger lawn, that will stay but the little lawn may have to go… we shall see. Thanks for the ideas…
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What a feast for the eyes and the tummy Geoff. Your garden is a triumph.
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Thanks so much. Hope you’re feeling perky and getting outside a lot. The recent rains have helped haven’t they?
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I was so glad for the rain on Thursday/Friday. Happy plants and happy gardener.
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Indeed joy is a thriving plant…
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Glorious!!! 😀 … you never know, you might be wise to keep that veggie garden going for a few more seasons yet.
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It’s so much work! I’d forgotten. It’s pretty much only going to succeed because we’re stuck her the whole summer so can shower it with love…
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Oh, wow! Your “narcotic of poppies”–gorgeous, and I’m still laughing at that one!
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Glad it generated a laugh…!
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Your garden must be the envy of all the neighbors. Lovely!
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Not sure about that. Maybe not the work involved!
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