Autumn is on it’s way, and my daily jobs in the garden have shifted from weeding ‘nine to five’, to regrouping and moving plants around. Despite the fact that these jobs are tiresome, I really enjoy this type of destructive gardening. It gives me a better idea of what is actually meant to be in each of the beds. In the Cook’s Garden, for example, Sorrel and Geraniums had entwined so much within one bed that it took me three whole days to separate each small plant and regroup. I must say it’s very satisfying to be able to label each one individually now!
The Crab Apple in the Cook’s Garden had dropped most of it’s fruit now… mostly in the pond below, and when I went to turn on the pump last week there was a pungent smell of rotting fruit in the air and the water had turned black. With the kind help of my colleague Paul, we emptied the whole pond, sieving each bucket through a net so that we could fish out any wildlife into a separate container. After four hours of doing this in the pouring rain I was soaked through three layers of clothing, however it was definitely worth it, as we saved over thirty young newts, ten large dragonfly larvae and many water boatmen. Thankfully now the smell has gone!
A couple of weekends back I helped out at Audley End’s Apple Weekend. Garden Organic were giving free advice about apple and pear pests and diseases, so I frantically revised the week before for every possible question I might be asked. I’m now full of random facts about Codling Moth (a pest of the fruit) and Brown-Rot (a common fungal rot of the fruit), hopefully they’ll come in handy in the future! It was lovely to walk around the beautiful walled kitchen garden there, and see some of our heritage vegetable varieties growing. I was particularly amazed by all the different squashes they’d grown from melon-like ‘Bien Gusto’ to large pumpkin types such as ‘Cinderella’.
