Sandgate Community Garden Team Diary Entry for 30th October: Anyone for Slug Fritters?
Oh dear oh dear, with temperatures of 20 degrees this week and plenty of moisture, the slugs are having a wonderful time and have turned the Chinese cabbages to something resembling paper doilies, they are so full of holes. Our new routine of checking the cold frames for slugs has been most fruitful with several being caught each time. It is such a shame that slugs are not on the menu as we would have a fine crop. Apparently they are edible; and the flavour is a cross between chicken and calamari. Something to bear in mind but perhaps times will have to be really bad before we would choose to make a meal out of them.
Still there are plenty of caterpillars around, and a fine dusting of blackfly, the poor plants are being attacked from all angles. Below is a photo taken of a sighting of some ladybird larvae. You would certainly not be expecting to see them in late October and the hope is that they will have time to transform into their adult form as they are generally supposed to be hibernating from October until February and certainly not reproducing.
Where the summer annuals we grew from seed this year were planted, they have flowered, gone to seed, dropped their seeds, the seeds have germinated, grown, and now about to flower, all around the parent plants still flowering. We have never known anything like it. Looking forward to next week, temperatures will be lower, but with a promised minimum of 8 degrees, it will have little effect on the current situation.
One of our weekly newsletter readers, Rita, got in contact having read about the amazing array of fungi forms appearing in great numbers all around the park and garden. Rita sent in a photograph of what is believed to be a basket stinkhorn pictured in SW France where she is currently staying. You can see the picture she took below, and it has to be one of the strangest and most amazing structures to be seen in nature. On researching the distribution of the fungi, it has been found as close to us as East Sussex; perhaps we may get to see it in our county yet.
There was a little flurry of excitement when the Hythe Hops scheme treated its members to a gift of two beer glasses printed with the Hythe Hops logo, and a can of the new brew by the great Docker brewery, and made from hops grown by locals. All the names of our volunteers went into the ‘hat’ to draw out the winners of either a glass or a can of the brew itself, and with our two memberships of the scheme, six of our volunteers had a happy surprise – thank you Hythe Hop scheme!
What’s next?
- Water all pots, plus cold frames, check for slugs, clear leaves on plot and in pond
- Continue to make new plant labels
- Continue to pot up strawberry runners
- Keep checking on the broad bean sowings.
This weeks update from the Sandgate Community Garden Diary.