Howgate Wonder

We’re almost at the end of the apple blossom and the embryo fruits are beginning to form. I’ll need to thin out the fruits to two per cluster and I think most growers would then recommend just keeping the best of those as they develop. If I leave five in each cluster the tree will shed several as they start to grow.

Opium Poppy

Himalayan poppy

This opium (not Himalayan) poppy had seeded itself on one of the veg beds, so I’ve transferred it to my plants for pollinators bed and it seems to be settling in.

foxglove

This foxglove rosette will be relocated too, when we put in the runner beans and dwarf French.

chard
Chard

Beetroot

Alongside the chard I drew the other day there’s a row of beetroot, although I suspect by now they’ll be far too woody to use.

Chard

chard

What’s left of the chard will be coming out soon when we start with the runner beans and dwarf French beans in this bed. This morning I put in 50 Setton onion sets, which we covered with netting, not just to prevent blackbirds and pigeons pulling them out but also to prevent foxes rolling about and digging on the veg bed as they did last year.

I forked a sprinkling of fish, blood and bone before planting the onion sets and it’s probably the smell of it that attracts the foxes. I’ve set up the trail cam to check on whether they turn up as expected.

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Maris Bard

Maris Peer potatoes

Maris Bard are first earlies, so in six weeks time, by the beginning of June, we should have a crop ready to use.

Maris Bard potatoes
Maris Peer second earlies ready to plant

We bought the potatoes back in January or February but we’ve been waiting until now, when there’s less risk of a heavy frost.

Bunyard’s Exhibition

sowing beans

We’ve gone for a traditional variety, Bunyard’s Exhibition, for our broad beans which I sowed this morning.

leeks

Last summer a fox family flattened our leeks. I harvested the last of them today but didn’t get much off them as they were starting to produce tough flowering shoots. We planted a second crop so I used a couple of rows of those instead.

leek soup

They were smaller but perfect for leek and potato (and celery and pea) soup. Barbara found a leek and cheese muffin recipe on the internet.

Fox, Sparrow, Wood Pigeon

Thanks to Browning, I’m back in business with a replacement Strike Force Pro XD trail cam, so I’ve been catching up with the soap opera that is the wild side of our back garden.

As you can see, a male house sparrow has laid claim to the sparrow terrace nestbox, ousting the blue tits, who nested in hole 1 on the left last year. I love the puzzled expression on the blue tit’s face.

A persistent pigeon is waddling past the daffodils in pursuit of – he hopes – a mate.

Night visitors have included a cat and a vixen. I wonder if I’ll succeed in catching the cubs on camera this year?

Pulmonaria

trug

2 p.m., 20℃, 69℉ in the sun – cloudless: I cleared a square metre of what will be a wild flower and plants for pollinators bed, discarding the creeping buttercup and chicory but keeping the knapweed, dog daisy and teasel.

Woodpecker drumming, wood pigeon cooing. Coma and peacock butterflies basking.

pulmonaria

The pulmonaria was self-sown. It did so well under the hedge that it started to encroach on the path, so we moved it to the pollinators’ bed.

bees

A small, 1.5 cm approx., dark bumblebee with no obvious stripes visits the pulmonaria flowers, shadowed by a smaller, 1 cm, light brown bee, watching, hovering a few inches away, in fact acting like a drone in the modern sense, It then briefly pounces on the larger bee but is rebuffed after just a second.

The larger bee checks out another pulmonaria flower and the smaller bee pauses at a nearby flower, but doesn’t continue shadowing the larger bee.

I’m guessing this is a male, a drone, following a female.

Snake’s head fritillary, planted in sunken pots for its own protection against rampant chicory.

Pulmonaria sketchbook page

Crow and Newt

In the formal pond at Harlow Carr a carrion crow picks a newt from amongst water plants.

Hellebores on the Winter Walk and in the woodland.