and so... we have raspberries! i am freaking out over the whole forage/harvest shebang as usual. the downside of living within such abundance is that nothing is ever enough.
while my beets are making a comeback and growing new, tiny leaves, all my peas have now been eaten to the ground. or down to the level of the basket on a bench where they grew. needless to say, i dream of a fenced garden... in the raised bed, everything but the lamb's lettuce has sprouted, and so far no thieving creature has found it, but i worry, i worry...
nasturtiums are ridiculously tiny again, every day i ask them: "y no gro?" there is something suspicious about that patch, the soil was brought from who knows where when the council water pipes were dug in long ago, and nothing grew in it for ages. i always try and grow nasturtiums to cover the plastic tube sticking out from the ground, but they never get past a few inches, and few flower. i've even added good compost around the tube, but it's no different. and anyway, i chose nasturtiums for the job because they're supposed to like poor soil, anyway. i just don't get it.
on the other hand, gooseberries have doubled in size this year. last summer i threw all the weeds i pulled out nearby under the bush, that is the only fertilization and difference. i hope it's not the swan song of it, the shrub is ancient. i should probably take cuttings just in case, and save some seeds. it's the only purple gooseberry we've got. some green ones grow wild here and there, just appeared one year, either from dormancy or via bird droppings. and some new bushes are growing where i remember throwing out rotten berries, but they are yet to reveal their true colours.
