The missing blog - August

James Kightley - 14 August 2011

I wrote this on the 14th of August, but didn't quite get round to putting it up here and now, coming to write my blog again, found it and thought it was worth posting, so here it is, more soon, including how cold it hasn't got, and some big news.

It's been raining today, and cold, words which I'm sure that I will live to regret when the real cold and wet comes but it's the first time since April that I've felt chilly outdoors.  A late sunset broke through the clouds though so I reckon it'll be a better day tomorrow.  It's strange though, for all it seemed to rain and rain all day and get me wet when I was picking, or strimming or whatever i was doing, when I dug some potatoes this afternoon not even a centimetre under the top of the soil it was dry as a bone.  It really has been a phenomenally dry year so far, it's a wonder that anything is growing at all.  But grow it does, tomatoes, cucumbers, sweetcorn, kale, onions, French beans, spinach, the farms are seriously abundant at the moment and it's sometimes hard to get your head round the fact that these are the same plants that we planted, watered, side shooted, weeded, it's crazy really, I want to find out how to do time lapse photography so i can try and get a handle on when all this growing happens!  I probably sound a bit stupid but I hope I never lose the wonder that is: tiny seed + soil + water + sunshine = food. It also = weeds and there has been a lot of weeding going on on both farms. 

Cat's blog made me chuckle with her reference to ministry of silly walks and it is true you do end up in some weird poses trying to pull up that nettle/fat hen/creeping thistle etc etc, while trying not to stand on a tiny almost invisible row of carrots/salads/brassicas etc etc. But there has also been some seed sowing, all the Autumn salads have gone in, and I continue, rather unsuccessfully at present to cultivate some peas in the poly tunnel.  The first lot I put in didn't show up at all, and now we've tried to pre-germinate in some water and sow by hand, fingers crossed they'll come up, but the mice are doing their damnedest to spoil my first shakey steps into horticulture.  I have therefore decided to wage war with peanut butter and mousetraps as my big guns, I've notched up three so far, but I've got a long way to go before I catch up with the farm cat which despite it's relatively small size weighs 7 1/2 kilos (of pure, mouse fed, muscle).

Some animals were harmed in the writing of this blog.  Sorry.