"A late summer garden has a tranquility found no other time of the year." - William Longgood
There are lots of changes happening in the garden as the summer plants die down and autumn takes over. But the garden is still a place of tranquility, particularly on dryer days.
Volunteers have been watering when they can, and weeding and deadheading when they pop in. There seems to be a bit of a competition between them concerning how many weedsthey collect. With photos being sent as proof of how hard they have worked. Competition seems a good idea, if it keeps the garden tidy.
Some sunflowers were damaged in recent strong winds, so these have been cut down. The heads are being left around for birds to feed on. We have also been cutting back and pulling out many of the plants that have died down. But as we lose summer plants, our multi-coloured shrubs brighten the garden instead.
In the veg garden, the beans have been cut down. I’ve left the stumps of the beans in the soil as it is meant to add nutrients. The sweetcorn has finished, but I am leaving it in for a while. Then the birds can eat the kernels when their other food starts to get scarce.
There are still carrots and beetroot to be pulled. I hate waste, so have been using the carrot tops in my home-made soup. They are full of vitamins, so why not make the most of them.
We are keeping an eye on the 2 Incredible Edible beds we planted at Runcorn Railway Station. The staff there are looking after them.Most of the plants are doing well. The main problem is people sitting on them. The Station staff are trying to prevent this by watering the wood, when they water the plants. So that people get a soggy bottom when they sit down.
I’ve been asked about how my wormery is going at home. Well, I have a lot more worms than I started with and many are very fat and there are lots of young ones too. They’ve made one tray of compost so far. And I’ve just poured off a litre of the ‘soup’ they produce to use as plant food. The only problem I’ve had was taking the bottom tray of compost away. Although the worms are supposed to travel upwards as they finish eating the food in each tray, no one has told them this. And the bottom tray still had worms in it. So I had to pick out the bigger worms. But some of the baby worms got left in and are happily wriggling round my garden now.
The Blooming Old Gardener