[27th June]
Spent much of today out in the garden, but trying to do jobs that didn’t matter when the weather turned ugly or could be abandoned easily — it’s varied between lovely warm sunny skies and driving rain here today. I do plan to get stuff done in the veg plot this weekend, but most things required time so I restricted myself to weeding in the polytunnel. Otherwise my daughter and I spent a fair bit of the day feeding chunks of a large shrub into the shredder prior to putting it on the compost heap. We did a few small pieces of it last week and were somewhat taken with the amazing almond smell when it was shredded. Today we had enough to fill a trailer with the shredded material. It wasn’t until after this evening’s dinner that we thought we should try to work out exactly what plant it was. As things turn out it’s most likely a cherry laurel and the reason it smells so strongly of almonds is that it’s rammed full of cyanide. Bit late to start worrying about that now 🙂
I did lift one of the first early potatoes (International Kidney). The crop was a bit underwhelming though. I think they need a couple more weeks at least. Quite possibly we won’t have a decent crop until the end of July. We’ll have to see how the weather goes.
On the subject of compost heaps I’ve decided to open up a second one. I found some scabby wrinkly tin to put over the top of the first to keep the rain out, held down with some offcuts of concrete block. The new one has started with the laurel chippings followed by some rotting grass clippings, then some of the stuff from the third compost bin that my father-in-law filled last year that hasn’t broken down yet, and some more grass clippings.
The forecast for tomorrow changes every couple of hours, but I’m hoping I can get a bit of planting and other maintenance work done in the veggie plot if the rain will hold off.