The summer has been very busy at work. I have had very little time for anything else. Despite the weather at the moment it has been a very dry summer. I also have several big Willows growing in the hedge and it roots have been found in Bed A. The trees have sucked all the water out of the bed. The crops in that bed have done very poorly. We did get some nice peas but not as many as we should have.
The spuds have done well enough. I did go to the trouble of watering them now and then. The nice thing is that we not see any sign of blight this year. When the spuds were dug up and the soil being so dry, the spuds came up clean, not needing washing. The crop has been better than fair. I dug up a two rows of spuds today and despite all the rain we have had over the past few weeks the soil an inch down is still bone dry.
The Calebrese did really well. I got a second and third cropping before digging them up this weekend. The freezer is full for the winter. We had a fair crop of French climbing beans. The freezer is bulging with them.
We have a small crop of Pears from the tree at home. They are a bit small but Pears after only a couple years is encouraging. My neighbour gave me access to their Pear tree. It has given us a big crop of really nice Pears. H made several jars of smashing Pear jam.
The bees have come good. One hive lost its Queen but the other two are on double brood boxes. This makes them very strong. I have had a decent crop of Honey. because all the Rape round the hive means the honey solidifies in the combs. I have damaged the super frames trying to extract the honey. In order to extract the honey I took to extracting the honey much earlier in the year and before the honey solidified. It has worked well. The farmer tell me they have sown Rape this autumn, so it is likely I will have adopt the same strategy next year.
The poo runs have continued throughout the summer so I have fair supply for winter digging. The wind has given the netting a beating so I have a repair job to do.
