bolting

Karashina has already bolted although they were young and short. Shyungiku will be bolting soon.
Is it because light? or heat?

Chris and Misato made new beds and I transplanted lettuce and mustard right away.

more lettuce

Today's weather was unstable, on and off shower but still and warm. So it was actually perfect for transplanting lettuce when it was sunny while I worked inside, sowing lettuce in module when it was pissing.

Bird's eye view

lovely day

The first still, sunny, hot summer day for a while. Misato & I transplanted kabu, mustard and karashina. Chris cleared the beds after we cropped the potato and garlic. And we cropped our first carrot!!

Working party

We had 6 adults and 2 children for our working party this weekend. It was a joyful event to crop garlic, potato and broad beans with many people. Almost all ingredients for lunch was from our garden, which was great. We also weeded and mulched and feeded tomato.

Woofer from London

Misato has come from London to help us gardening for a week. We did weeding and cropping together.

Pepper harvest

First harvest sweet peppers. I found loads of lavae of ladybirds on pepper's leaves and all aphids disappeared. Well done ladybirds!

More harvest

Back from London, we found that the broccoli was passing its peak so we quickly harvested and sold them to Treehouse. Indoor sweetcorn has grown so well that it reached the ceiling and started fruiting. We also cropped a pumpkin (small sugar), courgettes, tomatoes, onions, broad beans, peas and spinach.

Our visit to Namayasai

Ｗｅ visited Ikuko, Robin and their young son Kazuo in Lewes over the weekend. They run their own company, Namayasai, growing various Japanese vegetables on 8 acres of land using a natural farming method. A lot of hard work weeding 8 acres by hand! Even using a selective weeding method it still takes time. They had 6 volunteers working with them, mostly young Japanese people.
We learned a great amount from them, especially in the way that they organize their work and learn from past experience and data. It is great to meet people who are dedicating their time to making something work that at times seems impossible. A wonderfully inspiring visit that we hope to repeat in the not-too-distant future. Thankyou Ikuko & Robin!

weeder

i weeded. all afternoon.
arse.

harvest

I thinned out and transplanted karashina and planted out more leek. Cropped tomato, courgette, onion, garlic, french beans & broad beans and cooked them. Delicious!

Food for plants

Peppers started to fruit but aphids still covered all plants. We gave up spraying soapy water and ended up rubbing them with finger every single leaves. I gave them comfrey juice to boost. I also basil nettle juice because they look pale. Potato look all right but they have small black spots on leaves. What a smell! The plants on outside row were particuraly small and I gave them organic potash. I also gave potash to carrot, beetroot and cucumber.

fruit

The Edamame (Soya bean) pods are growing! They look great. Courgette don't look very well with a few and small leaves unusually but were ready to crop. They taste all right.
Peppers look to be failing to fruit. I don't know what the problem is but gave them organic potash. Why are there so many aphids on them?
Today I sowed mustard seeds in module.