Enjoying the Sun ☀️

 

                                       This morning's beautiful Sunrise .

The meadow is starting to surge away and from now until it is cut and baled , the rule is no romping dogs ( or people 🤣) allowed .

We want the hay to be as clean and sweet as possible .

We cut the wibbly wobbly path so that we can walk out and look at a couple of wild Orchids growing there .  They are not rare ones , but beautiful all the same .  It is also so nice to go and lie down in the long grass in middle of the meadow in high summer and watch the Swallows swooping overhead .

We spotted our first Swallow here yesterday .

The Sand Martins arrived down at Poldhu earlier this week , they nest in the sandy banks before the cliffs .

I am busy reorganising the plants in the greenhouse . I have to make room for the cucumber vines .

Tomatoes are doing well . 

My daughter who had said that she didn't want any Tomato plants , changed her mind and now I have to try and separate some from this pot of spares . Fiddly ! 

I separated out four and have planted them deeply into pots of fresh compost and perlite .

They will put out roots from the stems and should make good strong plants .

These are Tomato "Roma" they are a very strong growing variety . Lovely plum shaped tomatoes .

  We grow our Tomatoes in the greenhouse . I have never had much success growing tomatoes outside .

I began clearing the African Keyhole bed of weeds , but my ankle trouble flared up again . So I have only done about one third of it . I have covered it over with cardboard for the time being and will come back to it when I can .  Bindweed and Hairy Bittercress  ..... and one or two huge thistles . 

  For some reason I forgot to cover this bed  over Winter . I think I was focusing more on a couple of the other beds.

  I have to get this bed sorted soon  . This is where I grow my Butternut Squash and Pumpkins . 

                Anyway, it is what it is !   

I'll begin sowing my Butternuts ,Courgettes ,Climbing French Beans , Sweetcorn next week .

        Resting up for a bit now . Hope you are enjoying the glorious Sunshine !

                                                         🌿☀️🌿

🌿Yellow Archangel 💛🌿

 

               On the kitchen windowsill ....

Garlic , glass with Celery , Bottle of Baby Bio house-plant food , empty little jar for collecting seeds , Staghorn fern baby , candle for when I'm chopping onions , St Francis , strange stones found on the beach , little pottery vase with wild flower of the week , pretty picture of a Robin ,  ancient pottery sherds found in the garden , piece of a Rhamphorhynchus upper beak found at Charmouth , nice piece of red serpentine and a nice view of my bird feeding station ......while I'm doing the washing up .

💛My Wild Flower of the Week  

 How I love this golden wild flower .

                              💛   The gorgeous Yellow Archangel  💛

Proper name -  Lamium galeobdolon ssp.argentatum  .......the one with pretty variegated leaves .

✨✨✨Said to protect against evil spirits ✨✨✨

"galeobdolon "- meaning smells like a weasel - I have not yet investigated this fact - I will up date you on this !  

 If I can catch one ! 🦦🦦🦦

Actually , these are the cheeky Polecats that we saw playing in the garden last year (end of May/June).

 I have yet to snap a good picture of the Stoats ......I am guessing that Polecats , Stoats and Weasels all smell pretty much the same .

                                              Polecat 

                                       Anyway ... Yellow Archangel 💛

                One of my favourites and I don't care where it rambles ! 

                                                        🌿💛🌿    

Cucumber update and Epiphyllum news 🌿

 

All but one of my "Beth Alpha" cucumbers withered away . I sowed another lot and now I have three .

I bought a packet of another variety called "Party Time" which also produce a smaller size cucumber .

These came up pretty much over-night  and I always prick these type of seedlings out at this stage ....

 ......carefully gently holding one of the cotyledon leaves  .

The reason I do them so quickly at this stage is because as you can see here the roots have already become huge !  If I leave it until the first true leaf emerges then the roots are in danger of tangling up and getting damaged as I prick them out .  

 I guess you could sow them one seed to a 3" pot , but I wouldn't have space on my propagator !

This works for me .  

You can just  use a fork , teaspoon , a pencil or your fingers .....but ....

These little tools are so useful if you are doing lots of seed growing and they are quite cheap too .

The little fork is to gently prize up and pull apart your little seedlings roots . 

 I use this little dibber to make a perfect size and depth hole to drop that long root down into and gently fill in around the seedling with the compost .

  This compost is not the best , with sticks and nasty bits in it .  I will use a better quality compost when I come to put these young cucumber plants into their final pot/bags  under the bench on the other side of the greenhouse . 

I gave them good drink of water to settle them in and I'll be feeding both the tomatoes and cucumbers , from time to time , as they begin to flower .

Today I also potted up my Sweet Peppers into their final pots .

I am shuffling all the plants around in the greenhouse to make room for the Sweet Peppers, Cucumbers and Tomatoes . 

My greenhouse is primarily for my Cacti , Epiphyllums and other strange and fascinating plants .

 The Epies , some of which belonged to my Grandmother .

 They didn't bloom at all last year because I had moved them to a different location , while we were trying to solve the problems with the new greenhouse leaking roof . ( Let's not go there ! )

Anyway...

 Epies prefer not to me moved about , especially while they are forming their new buds .

I can see lots of new growth .

I need to fix up more shade netting , they really don't like bright hot sun . I have them on the North side of the greenhouse . Soon the cucumber vines will be scrabbling about in amongst them which will provide more shade .

                                Oh ! My ! I can see buds !

I will give all the Epies a good tidy up after they finish blooming . Prune , repot and take cuttings.

                                 Oh ! Wow !  There's another gorgeous bud !  🤍🌿

                                                        Watch this space ! 

                                                             🌿 ☀️🌿