Week 31 - Bed 12

Most of this bed has grown well aver the past month of rain, though the lighter feeding plants are doing better than the others.

The tops of the main crop carrots are growing well, and need to be thinned a bit more.

The 11 week old main crop carrot on the left is significantly larger than the 14 week old early carrot on the right! The different weather conditions during sowing seem to have made a lot of difference.

The parsnip plants are growing well.

The lettuce is in need of harvesting. Note the volunteer poppy plant in the middle of the photo.

The leek seedlings are growing very slowly, there is not enough fertility in the ground for them.

Week 31 - Bed 11

This bed has developed quite a bit over the last month.

The slow growing flat leaf parsley is finally starting to produce.

The bulb fennel is fairly strong and in need of thinning.

The shallots are ready for harvest.

The onions are almost finished.

Week 31 - Bed 10

After a month of neglect and rain, the plants in this bed are in poor shape. The surrounding vegetation is certainly doing better.

One of the only lettuce plants that has reached any size next to a few very small onions. We will have to replant this bed.

Week 31 - Bed 9

Four weeks after transplanting the brassicas are doing reasonably well. The very wet weather has helped the transplants become established, but has prevented them from growing very quickly.

One of the broccoli plants has produced the central edible head, but it is a shame that the plants had not grown larger before flowering.

The kale plant is well established.

We harvested the remaining turnip, which have become quite large, to give more space for the other plants.

Week 31 - Bed 8

The Cabbages are growing well, but the peas have finished producing and died back. They were removed to make room for more transplants of kale plants (not shown) that were left over in the seedbed.

Cour di Bue Summer Cabbage looking healthy but not large enough to start forming a head.

the beautiful colour of the Red Drumhead Cabbage.

Week 31 - Bed 7

Over the past month of rain, the vegetation surrounding this bed, and much of the rest of the garden has grown significantly, but the contents of the bed have not. The radishes have come up, though perhaps not as big as expected, and here is only one small swede seedling at the far end of the bed.

Radish seedlings.

Week 31 - Bed 6

This bed is starting to decline and looks remarkably different from when we were last at the garden a month ago. The potatoes have died back, the beans are almost finished and the peas really have not produced anything.

The potatoes should have continued to grow for at least another month, but were killed off probably by a combination of the very wet weather and possibly blight.

Week 31 - Bed 5

This bed has changed considerably since the last post at the beginning of July. The potatoes have died back (probably due to a combination of wet weather and possibly blight) and the broad beans are basically finished.

Rust and dead patches have formed on all of the bean leaves, and the plants have been pulled out.

A reasonable harvest of well formed potatoes from 2 plants, which are unaffected by scab or slugs.

Week 31 - Bed 4

This bed has become very overshadowed by the abundant growth to the left against the wall. Most of the bush bean plants have failed to survive - possibly slugs that are hiding in the neighboring vegetation.

The bean plants that did survive are starting to flower.

The tall climbing peas are growing well but have not started to flower.

Week 31 - bed 3

The runner beans and climbing french beans are starting to climb, though many of the bean plants failed to survive.

A climbing french bean plant starting to spiral up the support.

Two runner bean plant sharing a support cane.

The courgette seedlings are doing well - three plants out of 4 seeds sown. It is time to thin to the strongest plant, which seems to be the one in the foreground.

Week 31 - Bed 2

The squash plant that used to occupy the south part of the bed (space in the foreground of photo) has disappeared without a trace! The courgette plants have grown reasonably well considering the wet summer so far, and are starting to fruit.

The Genovese Courgette is a smaller plant but still has several light skinned fruit forming.

The Nero di Milano Courgette is a larger plant with the first dark skinned fruit forming.

The Yellow Straightneck Courgette is not as strong and the fruits are starting to form.

Week 31 - Bed 1

After a month of rain and very little sun, this bed is doing reasonably well, except that one of the squash plants is missing (not visible even in the blurry photo) as are the direct seeded courgettes among the sweet corn. I suspect slugs had a feast during the three weeks that no-one was watching the garden!

The sweetcorn is taler than expected, given the incredibly poor weather conditions over the last month. There was certainly enough water, but not nearly enough sun.

The Butternut Squash plant looks healthy, though a bit small for this time of year, and it has plenty of room to grow with the Blue Ballet Squash plant missing.