Dear Gentle Reader
September arrived with a bit of chill in the air, rainy weather. It has been said that the Summer we had was the coldest and wettest since 2015. I can agree with that. So I suppose from now on we shall be looking for mild daytimes, chilling mornings and nights, topical Indian summer days.
However my garden doesn't care, plants flourish the best they can and giving me and my family small bounties.
Blackberries are ripening in bunches now and one has to be faster then some feathery beasties who are quite partial to some of these black bunches of goodness. But hey ho, plenty there for hooomans and beasties too. My blackberry plants are young and just started producing and every year it will be more and more, since I'm not making any jam anymore, we rather nibble while it's fresh and juicy. In the greenhouse my aubergines are showing their faces and I just hope I'll have 1 or 2 for my curry this year. We had a really cold spring and everything was delayed, most plants during the shitty summer played catch up.
However gardening is not just about outdoor plants, veggies and herbs....one can have a garden in one's own home, inside the house. I have mostly succulents on my windowsill, cacti/cactuses. The indoor cyclamen came from my mom's own cyclamen 2-3 years ago and now that they started blooming, I have to give them their own pot. I shall repot them once they stopped flowering. Caring for them it's pretty easy and forward: don't move them much from the spot they got use to, and ALWAYS water them from under the pot by pouring water in the saucer. Once they stopped flowering, I'll stop watering them too. Remove dead leaves, spent flower stems and don't be tempted to water them just because the soil got bone dry. Here the waiting game starts.....wait until you see new signs of growing (leaves, flower buds). The tuber of the cyclamen soaked up enough waterand nutrients to provide food for the next stage. Once the growing started water well but never leave water in the saucer. Succulents and cacti are the easiest to grow...they need water only once a week. What I do is, fill a container with water, then put my pots in the water and let them soak up the water overnight. Next day put them back on the windowsill. There's another plant I grow on the windowsill of the kitchen, orchids...I have 2 mini ones and a big one. They get every week as much water as 3 icecubes melted, I never let them sit in the water because their air roots will rot. That's all the indoor plants I have.
7th & 8th of September
I can't believe what I'm seeing, 24C-25C on the outside thermometer, the last hot flushes of the Summer according to the weather man, but he was gentle and kind enough to reassure us that after these few days of hotness the weather will change and it will slowly get cooler, with occasional sunny spells, but nothing dramatical. Oh well, it is what it is. God forbid, for Ireland to enjoy a few more days of heat, a real Indian Summer, that would be a "meteorological crime" 😜🤦♀️🤷♀️🥴
Anyway I enjoyed my garden in this heat, although I was sweating buckets, I managed to cut the grass, mulch the beds, tend my greenhouse. Even hubs enjoyed a 45-50 min snooze in the shade after a few hours of hard work helping me. Bless his soul 😘😍❤️
My Galia melons are ripening nicely, these will be the last delights of summer. I shall be looking forward to next year. Both Galia and Emir did well the way I was cultivating them and I shall use this method in the future too. I didn't break the record for Galia this year but I was close...ish😜. Personal record remains the same from last year.
Next year will be better, says she hopefully 😜😁 My tomatoes keep giving until the last fruit is harvested, hopefully ripened, not green. But it's not a bad thing harvesting it green, they'll ripen inside, no bother on them.
Again....close...ish. This cultivar is called Gigantomo (I kid you not) and it's known to produce huge tomatoes. Next year we'll do better 🤷♀️🤦♀️😁. I have another newbie, called White Beauty, it's a very light yellow, very juicy, sweet, fleshy tomato (you can see it next to the orange tomato and cucumber). Cucumbers got big enough to be picked and they ended up in a nice bowl of summer, homegrown, salad goodness (toms, cucs and spring onion). The contents of this heavenly, homegrown goodness was devoured with the dinner the same day. Another small handful of green beans, cleaned, washed and gone into the freezer and will be eaten with the dinner another day 😁. Huge melon got devoured and enjoyed after dinner
Also I harvested my only apple, and as they say the proof is in the pudding,it tasted delicious, crispy and joucy sweet with a hint of sharpness. Hubby who is a fan of Granny Smiths apples (have the tree, didn't fruit this year, although had a few flowers on) said that this was an excellent apple to eat. I was beaming, this is the compliment that will make every gardener feel special and appreciated. Happy out.
14th of September
I was nicely surprised to find this morning warm and bit breezy. The weather person did say that there will be a few days warm and nice with occasional showers, but nothing serious. I can live with that. That being said yesterday I started to wrap my little greenhouse in the inside in bubble wrap for winter. This will trap inside during daytime whatever warmth there will be during winter allowing my green onions and winter lettuce to grow. They don't need much heat just enough to produce a few leaves and enough growth to be eaten. Also harvested some chamomile (I was harvesting and drying the flowers all summer) which I planted with the toms in the big greenhouse. There are many benefits of this amazing little daisy like medicinal herb, such as being antiseptic, helping relax and sleep well, rich in antioxidants. Although there are many types of chamomile, if you grow them make sure it's the medicinal one, and also consult your gp before using any type of home remedy or medicinal plant.
September is the month when you still can sow some perennial flowers and some veggies.
I brought in a big bunch of flat leaf parsley from the small greenhouse, and I want to try an idea I saw on FB. The lady on the video just washed it and split the huge bunch she had in 4 after that she packed the leaves in a freezer bag, squeezed the air out and rolled it up in a sausage. She would take one parsley sausage like that out the freezer and with a bread knife she'd cut the amount of parsley she needed for the dish. I'm gonna try this and let you know if it's yay or ney.
After lunch the weather turned breeze and drizzly, but in the bubble wrapped, small greenhouse there was 22 C. I have seedlings of lavender, mixed yarrow, catnip and blue flax that needs replanting in a bigger pot.
15th of September
This 7th day of the week, the one that is between Saturday and Monday, the one that marks the end of the weekend and the one that we call Sunday started with patchy, drizzly rain and nice, warm sunny spells, temps 18-19 C.
I just love that every raindrop that settles down on my garden has a different story and like tiny magnifying glasses will reveal a tiny world to whomever dares to have a glimpse through them. I'm sure if you look closer you'll notice some rosehips in the raindrops, or rows of tiny glistening pearls settling down on the green of the Chives or just adding more glamour to the featheriness of the bronze Fennel just long enough to bring a smile to my face. This fairy display is shortlived because once the Sun steps out from behind the clouds, these magical droplets will become a thought of the past. On my way back in I stopped for a nibble, enjoying a few offerings of the Autumn yellow and red Raspberries and with 2 cucumbers in hand I stepped in the house thinking of a lush sammich with toms and cucs. Yummmm 😁😋🤪
Once September starts bird buffet opens and since I have these arches for the runner beans and pumpkins I shall put them to good use. Feeders full with sunflower hearts and fat balls for the feathery beasties. Lush, packed with Vit C (sour as F!!, excuse my French) seahawthorn berries. Ppl who have these dry the berries, juice them and use the during winter to boost their energy levels and immune system. I eat 5 berries per day, that's all I can handle 😜🥴. I spite of this weeks heat and high temps, leaves are turning, trees putting on their autumnal frocks displaying a symphony of fall colours, which will be plucked by gusts of cold wind leaving the trees like skeletons in the night. Yet good to see blue sky even if it's peppered by a few clouds, indian summer is not that bad after all. Enemy is lurking, must have smelled my sprouting broccolis. I'm not worried because caterpillars won't get a chance to munch on my plants wihh the frost and cold weather coming. But there is another enemy, its a feathery beastie called wood pigeon. Now that bird can strip your brassicas like no other, only leaving the main hard veins. But I have a surprise for them too 😈 it's called bird repelling string and ribbon. More of that at a later stage. My tiny Berberis bush started flowering again, which could be a good sign of longer autumn, offering beas and other hibernating insects extra nourishment before the 1st frost puts halt on everything.
26th of September
This day came with wind, rain and cold weather, September really showing its colours now.....literally speaking 😜 the leaves are turning and desperately hand onto twigs and branches but the wind is stronger and plucks them one by one, laying them down on wet footpaths, gardens and grass after a short dance in the cheeky wind. I'm not complaining, just saying that we could have done away with a few more days of warmth, but according the the weather person October will grace us with a few days of warmth too. Through the rhythmical tapping of the rain pen and paper comes out and I start planning for next year....carrots will go here, cabbage there, and beans in between with pumpkins on the arches and so on and on.... For a gardener life never stops, it's like a perpetum mobile, there's always something to do, even in mid December, except when everything is covered by snow.....
Harvested a few rosehips from my dog rose bush, which I'll dry and use it for tea. Excellent for sore throat and its packed with vit C. Cucumbers are still giving in the greenhouse, so are the runner beans. Foggy mornings reveal another type of magic in the garden, making it look like almost frosty, frozen in time. Cobwebs being decorated with droplets of dew spelling in the early sun like strings of diamond. Autumn berries getting ripen, bit on a sharp side, but still nice to pick. In the greenhouse my Emir melon stubbornly produces messes of tiny melons hoping for another crop just beg fore everything goes dormant. After googling about Emir I've found out that this type of melon wilI produce well into October live in hope :)
Read all about it here.
The last day of this month ends on a wet note, it's raining and it's cold. Yet I've managed to bring in a humble harvest of cucumbers and tomatoes.
I can say these are the last ripen ones from the vine, the rest are green and will ripen inside. The cucumber is still producing, chilies have a few fruit on them, eggplant 1 fruit, a tiny thing.
However we can say we are privilaged weather wise compared to the devastation Hurricane Helena caused in Florida and other region. I mean we have gale storms that lift roofs and rain that floods parts of Ireland, but nothing the scale of hurricanes and tornadoes. Please Dear God keep this little emerald rock in the middle of the ocean, we call Ireland safe from all the atrocities of the weather.
You all take care now, be safe, stay safe.
All the best
Annamaria
