成人快手

A very busy bee

Post categories: carrot,听squash

Chris Howard | 12:46 UK time, Tuesday, 14 July 2009

Well, thank you Ann for depressing us all with your tales of perfect beetroot, garlic displays and bizarre flowers (although I do agree that bat flower is amazing!). There I was, all smug after last week's tomato triumphs, and you go and put a set of pictures up like that to really make me feel inadequate!

Having seen the carrot picture I decided that I would see what state my own crop was in. The results, as you can see, are quite spectacular! OK, not exactly an award-winning specimen I grant you, but it was certainly delicious and there's nothing like the taste of a raw vegetable straight from the ground (after a quick wash). I think that perhaps with the hot weather I may have been under watering slightly, so now it is time to up their quotient again.

On an unrelated note, when I opened my balcony doors this weekend I saw that I had another visitor. Once again, the natural world had astounded me and a butterfly was in amongst my tomato plants. Now I am fairly sure it was a cabbage white, and as caterpillars are no great concern for tomatoes, I wasn't worried.聽 But, it did remind me of the value of flowers.

With the tomato flowers out, and my squash starting to bloom magnificently (have a look!)聽there will be a glut of flowers around the country at the moment, perfect for insect life. This is particularly important for our bees which are a vital part of the food web in the UK and are in some serious trouble. I answered a question聽in the blog a few weeks ago about bees so I wont go on about it now, but do see what you can do to help聽our ailing bee population, or if you fancy taking up a spot of beekeeping (something I plan to do once I get a garden). They are magnificent creatures which we rely on to pollinate a third of the crops in this country. So we should do all we can to help them.聽OK, lecture over!

I am away for the next 3 weeks but will be trying to keep up with the blog as best I can. My better half Susie (seen here with carrot) will be keeping up the watering and feeding while I am away. Nervous? Me? Never...

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