This week has been a week of maintenance as well as enjoying some yummy produce! I am becoming an expert at providing ‘seasonal veg’– meaning small amounts of a wide variety of veg, whatever is ready basically. This last week we have had lettuce, broad beans, courgette, dwarf beans, peas and mangetout all coming from the garden or allotment, along with our organic farm box we’ve been really spoilt! The organic farm has also started allowing to pick our own soft fruit (as part of our annual subscription) so this week we had blackcurrants a plenty to add to ice cream and yoghurt. Even more excitingly, while at the farm, we got the chance to watch a fantastic barred grass snake which had been snoozing among the strawberry plants. It let us watch it for a little bit and then slithered away through the orchard. It was great to see and the children loved it, I did tread a bit more carefully afterwards though!

My allotment slugs got a supplement this week with another variety of peas planted out in the gaps left by their last raid. These peas were slightly bigger and I tied the tops in so they don’t fall onto the floor and into the path of the slugs, but I suspect they’ll be eaten anyway! Never mind I’m going to keep trying! I’ve also worked out one of the reasons that my daughter’s veg patch always looks a bit better than mine - she spends a lot of time collecting ladybirds while we’re there which sounds like a nice innocent hobby. However, I’ve realised that all ladybirds are subtly relocated to her veg patch so while she has a ladybird mass gathering going on, my plot is stripped bare of the little things!

Back in the garden we planted some late broad beans in the former lettuce bed (I just couldn’t keep the slugs off). I figured that even if they are too late to produce a crop they’ll work as a good green manure for the space (something that I think I might try on the allotment too). My earliest peas, having had a great season, are not flowering any more so once all the peas had been picked I removed these and used the space for my late sugar snaps. Again, it might be too late for these but I’m hoping not. The tomato plants now have little fruits so hopefully it won’t be too long until we can start having home-grown tomatoes! I normally have extremely limited success with tomatoes, but every year I keep trying, as shop bought tomatoes just can’t compete with home grown!

More about Lucy...
Lucy is part of the fantastic Heritage Seed Library team, working hard to grow and preserve seed varieties that are no longer available so that our members can enjoy growing them at home. Raising two young children, Lucy is keen to grow an array of fruit and vegetables to become more sustainable and to encourage her children to get involved in growing.

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