GardenBanter.co.uk - View Single Post

philgurr · 30-09-2015, 09:21 PM posted to uk.rec.gardening

"Janet" wrote in message
.. .
In article , says...

"philgurr" wrote

For us in the far north, this has been the year without
a summer. Some things have done well but there have
been disasters. The flower borders are looking as they
should have looked in mid July. The beetroot are up
and down, mostly down but the onions and leeks (grown
in a raised bed for the first time) have been stunning.
Peas have only produced in the last three weeks and the
runner beans were written off by late July. I have just
returned from a week 'darn sarf' to see the grandchildren
only to find one of the best crops of runner beans that
I have ever had. There was nothing there a week ago
and this morning my first picking of the season yielded
4 kilos of super beans. This must be high summer for us!

The problem we found (just south of the Thames) was that everything except
the peas were very slow to start into decent growth, for the first year I
can remember the outdoor chillies are only now flowering and fruiting so
will be too late for a crop. The aubergines we grubbed up last week, no
point in leaving them there. The onions and shallots, not a good crop,
seemed a bad year (or should that be good year) for white rot too. Carrots
have done well as have the Early Onward peas and beans and also the
cabbages. Good crop of potatoes but lots of slug holes and scab. Not sure
all the Butternuts will ripen enough for storage.

Considering the slow start my Hedychium greenii is flowering superbly this
year which seems to have bucked the trend.

I usually grow runner beans, but this year, instead, I planted climbing
black French beans (given seeds from friend). In cold wet conditions
they did absolutely nothing but crouch sulking throughout June and half
July. At the end of July they finally went up the poles but did not
start to flower until the end of August/beginning of Sept. No beans have
set so they are coming out today, for composting. Never again.

This is the first time ever I've not had a glut of courgettes; they
failed. Utterly. We've had 3 tiny fruit. Same problem as the beans.

Leeks and purple kale have done well and the potatoes have been great
(Nadine; first time I've tried them and definitely a repeat for next
year. Last year the blight on Estima was so bad I'd intended to skip
potatoes this year but weakened when I saw a heavily reduced bag of
Nadine labelled, blight resistant. No sign of blight at all this year
and they have a wonderful flavour and texture.

All the established shrubs perennials and potted succulents have put
on enormous growth this year, most flowering late but spectacularly.
Alstromerias,clematis, verbena and agapanthus have been gorgeous.
Phormiums have had a sparse flowering (maybe tired from their excesses
last year) metrosideros hasn't flowered at all, pineapple/Moroccan broom
flowered well (for the first time) and ceanothus went mad as usual.

The weirdest feature of this summer is the very reduced growth on
mown grass; I doubt we've done 8 lawn cuts all summer. Very worrying for
golf courses and contractors; my intake of other peoples lawn cuttings
is so reduced I haven't had enough mulching material.

Janet (Arran, West Scotland).

I'm a couple of hundred miles further north than you Janet and my
Ceanothus and Hydrangeas are just coming into full bloom!

Phil