Sandgate Community Garden Team Diary Entry for 10th July: Insufficient water, ants, bees and the incredible Cardoon.
It certainly has been a warm month and how very glad we are to receive a bowser full of water every week or we would surely be in trouble trying to keep the new plantings alive. The trouble is, the courgettes are trying to swell as are the tomatoes and the beans, but with no rain such crops would suffer if we did not water. We are now planting crops that mature in autumn through winter and into spring, such as kale, swede and purple sprouting broccoli, and of course, should they fail, then there will be nothing for later. It makes you appreciate how fortunate we are not to have to rely on the success of what we grow, not so for many parts of the world. We are not so sure about the outcome of many of our other sites in Sandgate which do have to rely on rain and the occasional can of water we try to bring which never is enough. All we can do is hope things survive which is their instinct to do, and that this weather breaks soon. In the meantime the grass has turned to yellow and the only good thing about that is it requires no cutting.
On Saturday morning, Jay, one of our new volunteers, got into the pond as the water has all but evaporated, to cut back some of the pond weed which had seriously grown since last year to create a huge spongy mat. A few buckets of water were spared to put in the pond which we are sure the wildlife will appreciate.
Earlier in the week we were concerned to see a very young green woodpecker, looking vulnerable and not wary enough of dogs and people; we kept an eye on it until eventually it managed to fly up into the trees. Green woodpeckers love to eat ants and there are certainly plenty of them around as we watched hundreds climbing up our fencing and marching along the top rail for some reason better known to them. It was quite fascinating to watch and realise there is plenty of blackfly in the garden now and the ants must be on their way to ‘milk’ them for the honeydew they produce and to protect them from any predators.
Ray, our site beekeeper, has been working hard this week to extract more honey from the garden bee hives. Many of our gardeners and friends of the garden have put in their orders for the honey currently in the process of being put into jars. Today (10th July) is National ‘Don’t step on a bee day’, so to help mark the event, Saga has asked Ray to put some jars of his honey in the canteen at Enbrook for staff to purchase. One of the messages about this important day is to support local bee keepers – 85% of the honey we consume is imported, and as we have been reporting, the quality of such imported honey is not always that good and cannot be compared to the local stuff.
Perhaps the largest flower in our garden is currently that of the cardoon. One of our plants must be around 10 feet tall as it absolutely towers over everything. The flower is quite spectacular and loved by insects but before it breaks into colour, the flowers can be picked and eaten just like globe artichokes. The scales of the outer part of the flower are not as full as the artichoke, but the fleshy middle section of the flower is very tasty with more flavour than the globe artichoke. We were originally sold our cardoons as being artichokes from a well-known DIY garden centre and since then have decided to grow artichokes from seed as they are easy to grow, you know what to expect, there are different varieties, and they look architectural as a plant within a garden. They feature in the Lower Leas Park this year again, and certainly make a show although not sure as yet if they are actually cardoons!
What’s next?
- Continue the turning of the compost heaps
- Keep a close eye on the watering situation
- Prick out the cauliflower and broccoli seedlings later in the week
- Sow the autumn lettuces
This weeks update from the Sandgate Community Garden Diary.
