July Garden



Once again it's raining.

A typically English summer.

Cornflowers grown from seed

A fuschia already here when we moved in

Lavender

Geranium

a waterlily - only a few flowering now 

Nicotiana grown from seed

Cosmos grown from seed by my sister in law

The vegetable garden is benefitting from all the rain even if we are not

We have been harvesting lots of courgettes, which taste so incredibly different from those in the supermarket, so much sweeter and tastier.

One sneakily managed to achieve small marrow size before I spotted it - just a few days not checking, and this is what I found.......

The sweetcorn is growing tall, and now half of them have both silks and tassells - fingers crossed that they pollinate (I must confess to giving them a helping hand - I wonder whether it will work?)

The tomatoes are very slowly getting there - we've had lots of flowers for several months, and a few tomatoes are coming, but despite spraying the flowers to help them set and keeping the sideshoots pinched out, it seems to be very slow - I wonder whether we shall run out of time and end up with pots of green tomato chutney as opposed to red tomatoes for eating.

The greenhouse tomato plants aren't significantly more advanced than the outside ones in terms of number and size of actual tomatoes, but the plants are definitely taller and more vigorous.

Baby cucumbers from bought in plants, one planted in a grow bag and one direct into the ground - the growbag plant is more vigorous and has loads more baby cucumbers and flowers - its all a learning process

The first broad beans are ready, so we should taste those this week

The dwarf beans are just about big enough too, so later this week we should be eating those



More climbing french beans - the first ones have already been enjoyed

The grape vine along the back wall of the house is prolific, and has many bunches of grapes. I need to read up on what to do!

Last year, having just moved in, I did nothing to them and yet still had an incredible amount of ripened black grapes which I made into Grape Jelly. This turned out to be very good indeed.

The honeysuckle over the arch continues to bloom and smells wonderful as you walk under, and on a (rare)warm summers evening the fragrance reaches the terrace where we sit

The nasturtiums I grew from seed have gone rampant in the vegetable plot, keeping the black fly at bay

 

Haven't yet taken any pictures of whats happening in the front garden - maybe tomorrow if the weather improves, but I think more rain is forecast. 

Edited 21st July to add a few more pics:

The first dwarf beans picked this morning - surprisingly I think there are actually enough for a meal!

I grew so many tomato and pepper plants I had to resort to putting some in hanging baskets!

But they seem to be doing alright.

sweet pepper plant with tiny peppers forming

baby peppers on hanging basket plant

baby tomato on plant in hanging basket

And yes, it is lightly raining again here this morning!

Hope the weather is better where you are!

 

Don't forget to enter my Giveaway on the 11th July post - ends 31st July!!!