SO - THE HARVESTING BEGINS!

24th JUNE - CENTRAL PORTUGAL

Surfeit of cucumbers, eighteen plants producing one cucumber per day – result large quantity. Currently the menu is cucumber with everything or on a more genteel  basis ‘What would you like with your cucumber’. Very healthy diet of Cucumber Soup (hot or cold, better cold); Cucumber salads (with green peppers as these have  become reckless in their daily supply), Cucumber Sandwiches (about to contact Buckingham Palace and enquire if it would be permitted to quote for next garden party), stuffed cucumbers (no suggestions as to where and with what) – note from Head Gardener ‘Plant less Cucumbers next year’. Will the balance ever be struck?  Still have Chillis from 2014 and frozen Courgettes from 2013!

Mostly cucumbers - with a few courgettes, green and the wonderfully flavoursome Violette beans (see below)

  

The singularly magnificent weather of the last weeks has encouraged growth and fruiting in every quarter of the garden. The first plums will be ready to pick next week; enjoyed the apricot (yes one only, but it is the Damascus variety and the tree has been very upset during the past months). Raspberries must be now picked daily in competition with the birds (tried nets but only caught the HG). Strawberries keep a steady supply (saving a few exceptional specimens to eat whilst watching Andy Murray win Wimbledon next week). Have consumed all the Haricots Verts - very tasty but small crop this year due to sudden heat (day time temperature last week soared to 38 degrees plus and remained in the high twenties most nights). Both the green and purple runner beans now on line, masses of flowers but heat certainly minimises the setting of  the beans.

Aubergines and Sweet Peppers are spectacular, with Courgettes and Patty Pans on course for a bumper season (just water and feed). The F1 Cristal Tomatoes are currently setting their sixth truss ( average eight tomatoes per truss with eight plants, should have 75 kilos of fruit), the Sweet Baby variety are now setting tomatoes (each truss around twenty five fruits) and the old work horse ‘Money Maker’ is enjoying the competition from these modern ingenus.

Geraniums are full of flower and colour, have even managed to persuade the Ivy Leaf varieties to grow like they do in the window boxes in the Austrian Tirol. The secret seems to be continual watering and feeding, accompanied by a the daily inspection of a comely ‘Haus Frau’.(HG redoing splendid work in this department).

Just a selection of geraniums - demand for cuttings is high!

Dahlias are uninhibited in their flowering glory; Fuchsia flowers are undulating in the gentle evening zephyrs; Petunias are amazing, Buddleia is majestic and Roses just keep going.

Roses all the way

Pink and white dahlias backed by white buddleia

Simply Buddleias - heaven for butterflies and other insects

The high temperatures, lack of rain and wall to wall sunshine are nature’s way of controlling the weeds and the growth of grass in the orchard - just a little reciprocation to the hard pressed gardeners for all their efforts throughout the year.

There goes the Bell, fluids being supplied not only to the plants in this heat. Off for the HG’s coffee and who knows what else?

Must dash, see you soon,

Stuart.