Old Blighty

Finally after months of nurturing, watering, stringing up and much adjusting of the automatic greenhouse louvres; we are starting to get crops.

 Beautiful, earthy rainbow chard.

A delight and a joy to look at and eat.  A fairly new delight for Jean-Luc who still can't quite believe the full flavour of home grown veggies and leaps upon each new item with the cry of 'oh now can I use this tonight?'  or 'have you photographed it?'. 

I wonder why he thinks we're growing it if not to use but am thrilled at his enthusiasm for these humble yet tasty vegetables.

Our first cucumber of elegant proportions. 

This was combined with yoghurt and mint to become a cool and soothing raita which accompanied leftover lamb curry and chickpea and pepper curry.

Courgette (slightly overmatured) - another willing victim for my courgette and feta loaf, mwah ha ha.

and now we come to the sad, sad reason for the possibly puzzling title of this post.

Scroll down dear reader but please try to control your cries of dismay at the poor creature I place before you.

Yes this poor tomato is but one victim of the terrible plague which is working its way through the innocent crop in my greenhouse.  My tomatoes have........... BLIGHT!

I don't know if they were infected when I got them, whether we over watered, whether the greenhouse was too humid.  I don't know what's gone wrong but something has.  

I've spent two evenings picking out all the infected leaves, stems and fruit;  the tomatoes look fragile and denuded but I'm hoping that this will keep it under control if only for long enough for the tomatoes that have already grown to ripen up.  

I guess my harvest isn't going to be quite as epic as I'd hoped - in fact it may be almost non-existent.

The good thing is I've learnt from this.  Not to be so greedy and cram so many plants in next time; to space them out more to allow the air to circulate; to keep on top of thinning out the side shoots and nipping out the tops; not to over water them and basically not to think that tomatoes forming their own personal jungle is a sign of health and well being.

Jungle Fever

There's nothing like it.

The heat, the humidity, the smell of green growing things all around you.

The dappled light shining through the leaves, the feeling of hidden eyes staring at you through the dense vegetation.

The sound of water as it drip, drip, drips through the canopy.

The knowledge that if you step off the path you could be quickly lost.

The uncertainty of the path ahead as you peer through the green wall of leaves and stems.

Yes I've been into the greenhouse and the tomato plants definitely need their leaves thinning out.

In a greenhouse that is 8 feet long, their leaves are so dense I can't see the other end of the path, let alone the back glass wall.

I'm fairly sure if I listen carefully I can hear parakeets squawking in the distance and the steady chant of ant work parties as they move deeper into the jungle to build more sugar cube temples.

I think some well judged defoliation is needed, if only so the tomatoes can ripen up; oh yes there are some in amongst all that leafage.

Growing Green

One of the things I want to do at this new house is to grow veggies now we have a garden; part of this includes a greenhouse for the obvious suspects – tomatoes, peppers and chillies – so with this in mind Jean-Luc and I (mainly Jean-Luc) spent the latter half of our holiday week after Easter sorting out the base for said greenhouse.

This is where it's going - next to the summerhouse at the bottom of the garden.

 

The trenches for the sleepers which the greenhouse will sit upon and the sleepers that will go in them.

The sleepers were originally all 8 foot long and Jean-Luc cut two of them down to 6 foot with a handsaw! My hero.

                           

The path dug out and the edging in place.  All we need to do now is break up the base soil and get the greenhouse up.  

The greenhouse arrives on Friday, just in time for us to spend the May bank holiday weekend putting it up.

This has all happened due to the wonderful Jean-Luc who has worked like a Trojan and done a fantastic job of building this foundation.  It's amazing watching a man build something from scratch; having the skills to do this - even more so when you know his day job is desk jockeying in IT management. Guess that's why I love him.