Sandgate Community Garden Team Diary Entry for 15th October: Red/Green Hop and Greenstar.
At last the weather has broken and is feeling a little bit more like it should in October. We have had a serious downpour of water in the latter half of the week and perhaps it will be the end of having to water the garden for this year. We can at least hope! However one chore has been surpassed by another as we now seem to be in full swing leaf collecting, and being under so many trees it looks as though we shall be kept busy for several weeks to come. Not to forget all the sycamore seeds also adding to the work if we are not to be forever pulling sycamore seedlings for most of the spring.
This week, the plants around the pond got a tidy, and blanket and duck weed removed from the pond. More claytonia lettuces were planted along with a few extra parsley plugs. The broad bean seeds were sown, and the search was on for marauding cabbage white caterpillars ravaging the purple sprouting. We had a bucket of bean pods from the plot at Pent Farm, which had been picked in order to dry them, either for eating and/or for planting next year.
We must mention the Eternal Style Event last Sunday with the Sandgate Environmental Action Group. Some of us were involved either manning the stall and/or baking cakes for the amazing café. What a fantastic day, great people and fabulous tea and cake. Well done to Gemma and Heidi for their hard work.
Early in the week a group of volunteers from Napier barracks came out to help clear a lot of growth at Fremantle Park again – fighting with the brambles and ivy as well as planting more rhubarb in two separate spaces.
The hops we contributed for the Hythe Hops scheme have now been dried or made into the ‘Red/Green Hop’ ale by Docker Brewery, or into ‘Greenstar’ by HopFuzz Brewery, both now on sale at Unit 1 in Hythe, or from the Sandgate Village Shop, but be quick as it will not be around for too long!
Sorry to have to say that the newsletter will be taking a two week break and the next edition will be on Sunday 5th November. Apologies for the inconvenience however normal service will soon be resumed!
What’s next?
- Keep picking up the fallen leaves and sycamore seeds
- No watering the plots required this week but maybe the small pots
- More tidying of plots in Sandgate required
- Keep an eye out for more caterpillars
This weeks update from the Sandgate Community Garden Diary.