Small Yellow Taxi

First ripe tomato from the greenhouse! Taxi, a determinate variety, so all the rest of the tomatoes on this plant will likely ripen in the next week or two.
Notice the bank in the illustration on this old seed catalogue. The first and second questions on the 'FAQ' page of a site I happened on which offers courses on greenhouse tomato growing, "Are greenhouse tomatoes a good business for me?" "How many greenhouses do I need in order to get rich?" Photo (doctored by me) from the Smithsonian Institute Library.

Scorchio!

Scorchio,scorchio,scorchio

Solstice

"Longest day: a cold hard solstice! The rats have carried away six out of seven of my biggest Bantam chickens; some from the stable, & some from the brewhouse." Gilbert White 1792
We finished up the longest day of the year with a picnic at the allotment, the weather mild. The corn there - Inca Rainbow - is very cheering. Most of my crops seem to be progressing much slower than last year. Lots of green tomatoes but still no ripe ones. Perhaps it's all the cloud cover we've had lately - today is dark again. Oca that I got from Patrick (on the left) has just put shoots above ground and Yacon plants (right, also sourced by Patrick) are about 15 inches tall. Having never before grown these tubers, I'm not sure how well this measures up. Still, five eggs today, and the chickens are all present and accounted for.

Bespattered

Things I don't have to do this week:
1. Water the garden

A Noble Thistle

"But when the artichoke flowers, and the chirping grasshopper sits in a tree and pours down his shrill song continually from under his wings in the season of wearisome heat, then the goats are plumpest and the wine sweetest; women are most wanton, but men are feeblest, because Sirius parches head and knees and the skin is dry through heat. But at that time let me have a shady rock and wine of Biblis, a clot of curds and milk of drained goats with the flesh of a heifer fed in the woods, that has never calved, and of firstling kids; then also let me drink bright wine, sitting in the shade, when my heart is satisfied with food, and so, turning my head to face the fresh Zephyr, from the ever-flowing spring which pours down unfouled, thrice pour an offering of water, but make the fourth libation of wine." Hesiod, around 700BC

I've just harvested 15 artichokes (well in advance of their flowering) and spent a pleasant half hour preparing them whilst listening to Hooting Yard on Reasonance. But as with broad beans, at the end of it all there is a lot more for the compost pile than for the pot. I wish we had a pig.

Cold-Hearted Cicada

The feelings of a cold-hearted lover
are like a cicada:
it cries constantly
but never shows its face
Miwa no Sugikado

Found on BibliOdyssey along with a couple of woodcuts by Utamaro. Although we heard them all through the dog days of August, I only once found one, a mature wing-ed one, dead, when I was about 10. I pinned it to an acoustic ceiling tile and it was my bug collection. I'm just back from a visit to Toronto where I unearthed this while planting potatoes in my mother's garden.


Unless someone tells me otherwise I'm calling it a cicada. It still seemed to be in a state of suspended animation but definitely still alive, so I buried it again. It's not due to see the light of day until May 18th by this calculation - E=(19.465-t)/0.5136 - where E is the emergence start date in May and t is the average April temperature.

B is for Birds

...and R and... TypeNesting

Shook Swarm 2

Today we shook the bees onto fresh frames and foundation, about two weeks later than last year, but then winter seemed to hang about longer this year. The colony looks to be a healthy size but I'll find out if we were successful in about 10 days when I remove the two frames of grubs that we left as bait comb.

Under Ground

All my potatoes are buried now. Phew. Fifty seed potatoes at the allotment and 40 grown from true seed in a patch of the back yard. The little plants from seed are pictured below - quite promising I think, and hopefully big enough to fend for themselves in the great outdoors.

Happy Easter!

A few more cards from my collection of Victorian & Edwardian Easter greetings. Click on image to enlarge.

A Fridayes Pye

[Without eyther Flesh or Fish]
Washe greene Beetes cleane, picke out the middle string, and chop them small with two or three well relisht ripe Apples. Season it with Pepper, Salt, and Ginger: then take a good handfull of Raizins of the sunne, and put all in a Coffin of fine paste, with a piece of sweet Butter, and so bake it: but before you serve it in, cut it up, and wring in the juyce of an Orenge, and Sugar.
John Murrell: A New Booke of Cookerie 1615

Three Eggs

"A baked egg is good eating, and easy of achievement. Break a new-laid egg on to a thickly-buttered plate, strew it with pepper, and salt, and cook slightly in a moderate oven. It must be eaten exceedingly hot from the same plate, which may be attractively surrounded by a narrow frill of crinkled tissue paper."
Meals Medicinal

Diet of Worms

Today I did my worm survey. Pictured above are some of my finds. The chickens were utterly undiscerning when they dispatched them later, the different varieties are apparently equally tasty.
It was sunny and warm and I planted out some little pea plants (Magnum Bonum from Rebsie and self-saved Uncle Fred). Also sowed Champion of England pea in situ and, in modules in the greenhouse, Cabbage 'Mammoth Red Rock' and two interesting (new for me) brassicas from a Portugese friend, 'Couve Galega' and 'Repolho Bacalan Grande'. She says the stem of Couve Galega can grow many many feet tall and the head of Bacalan Grande will be 50 cm. across. Here's hoping.

A Place for Everything...

... and everything in it's place.


" Nothing shows more, perhaps, the difference between a tidy thrifty housewife and a lady to whom these desirable epithets may not honestly be applied, than the appearance of their respective store-closets. The former is able, the moment anything is wanted, to put her hand on it at once; no time is lost, no vexation incurred, no dish spoilt for the want of 'just a little something' - the latter, on the contrary, hunts all over her cupboard for the ketchup the cook requires, or the pickle the husband thinks he should like a little of with his cold roast beef or mutton-chop, and vainly seeks for the Embden groats, or arrowroot, to make one of her little boys some gruel. One plan then, we strenuously advise all who do not follow, to begin at once, and that is, to label all their various pickles and store sauces... It will occupy a little time at first, but there will be economy of it in the long run."
Mrs. Beeton

New Potatoes

This week's 'Food Programme' on Radio 4 discusses potatoes, with sound bites from our local Potato Fair. You can listen again on line if you've missed it.


Here is an update on the growth of my true potato seedlings sown January 18th. I've pricked out 50 - though there was no way of telling which ones might be of real interest - I had to limit the numbers as I haven't yet figured out where I'm going to grow them on.

Darwin Blogging

We had our own little Darwin 200th birthday celebration last night (it had nothing to do with my birthday being the same day - but I do support the movement to make it a national holiday). There are lots of programmes at BBC which can still be 'listened again' to, at least for a few more days. Also the folks at Agricultural Biodiversity have been busy on the subject.
Meanwhile, the sun shone today, temperatures soared to 8°, and the bees were out flying around. Which saved me the trouble of getting the stethoscope out to check for signs of life after this latest cold spell.
I won't keep a daily tally à la George Orwell, but - three eggs this morning! Two of the chicks we hatched are now laying regularly.

Candlemas Day

Gladys was the only one to venture into the snow today, the others stayed cowrin' and timrous indoors. At any rate, she didn't see her shadow so winter should be short. We took part in the 'mass skive', and spent the day wisely, having snowball fights and a walk in the woods. And the Met says there's more to come.


The RAF Arctic Survival guide can be studied here.

Home from the Hunt

...And here are the spoils. A total of fifty tubers of 7 varieties. Most are old favourites, but a couple that I haven't grown before - Skerry Blue & Shetland Black - which I look forward to trying. As it is recommended that the Shetland Black be steamed whole with the skin on, it might be just the spud for 'The Invalid's Mashed Potato'.
"Steam one pound of Potatoes, with their jackets on, until they are mealy; peel them, and rub them through a wire sieve; when cool, add a small teacupful of fresh cream, and a little salt, beating the mash lightly up as you go on until it is quite smooth, and then warming it gently for use."

Potato Fair

A balmy 8-10°C this weekend, the bees were making flights and I got a good deal of the garden and greenhouse cleaned up and ready. Perhaps a bit rashly I have started a few seeds in trays in the airing cupboard. Yellow Hinkelhatz, DeRata & Jwala peppers, Thai Long Green & Japanese White Egg aubergines, Matt's Wild Cherry, Copia, Olirose, Persimmon & Riesenstraube tomatoes and self-saved potato seeds.
Only a week now until our local annual potato fair and seed swap!


The Excelsior potato from The $100 Prize Essay on the Cultivation of the Potato with instructions on cooking the potato furnished by Professor Blot, 1870. It can be read online here.

Bumper Crop

"One of my neighbours, shot a ring-dove on an evening as it was returning from feed, & going to roost. When his wife had picked and drawn it, she found it's craw stuffed with the most nice and tender tops of turnips. These she washed & boiled, and so sate down to a choice & delicate plate of greens, culled & provided in this extraordinary manner."
Gilbert White (again)
I remembered this passage while eviscerating Henry. I removed the crop still warm and stuffed with grains and I wondered just what sort of a porridge could be had by steaming it like a pudding, a mini-haggis, if you will. However, it looked to be very gritty, so I chucked it out.
By amazing coincidence though, on Tuesday, in Soho, at a leaving drink for a friend, I met Sydney, who, I later discovered, is responsible for posting 'The Natural History of Selbourne' blog - one of my favourite daily reads.

Roast Rooster

We ate Henry.

Big Chill

"Farmers are in pain about their turnips, both those on the ground, & those that are stacked under hedges. The frost has lasted now just seven weeks: it began Nov 23."
Gilbert White January 9, 1789
The garden has been frosty now for over 2 weeks, which is more than we've had for the past 10 years put together I think. The ground is crunchy and won't easily let go of the leeks and parsnips. Every morning it is necessary to break the layer of ice off the chicken's water basin and some days it has been almost solid throughout. Over Christmas, I put a thatch around the beehive to help keep the heat within and now can do little more than wring my hands and fret. The MET says it will get warmer tomorrow.

Ring in the New

T-E-A!

"Before I was aware of it, Tookoolito had the 'tea-kettle' over the friendly fire-lamp, and the water boiling. She asked me if I drank tea. Imagine my surprise at this, the question coming from an Esquimaux in an Esquimaux tent! I replied, 'I do; but you have not tea here, have you?' Drawing her hand from a little tin box, she displayed it full of fine-flavoured black tea, saying, 'Do you like your tea strong?' Thinking to spare her the use of much of this precious article away up here, far from the land of civilization, I replied,'I'll take it weak, if you please.' A cup of hot tea was soon before me - capital tea, and capitally made. Taking from my pocket a sea-biscuit which I had brought from the vessel for my dinner, I shared it with my hostess. Seeing she had but one cup, I induced her to share with me it's contents. There, amid the snows of the north, under an Esquimaux's hospitable tent, in company with an Esquimaux, for the first time I shared with them in that soothing, cheering, invigorating emblem of civilization - T-E-A-!"
Being a narrative of an expedition in search of John Franklin, 1860-1862
by Charles Francis Hall

Cock-a-Doodle-do

This morning at about 8 o'clock Henry made his first attempt to crow.
Illustration by Randolph Caldecott

Merry Christmas

Image from Agence Eureka.
Go see some very funny animated dancers at Elliot Cowan's Sandwichbag. Well, it makes me laugh.

Bring Out Your Dead

On mild days in winter, such as we've just had, the bees have a bit of a clear out. And one mustn't be too alarmed to see a pile of a few hundred dead bodies lying outside the front door of the hive. After all, in mid-summer they die (and are born) at a rate of 1000 a day. They just don't all expire at once. In a heap. In full view.

Mrs.Snooke's Tortoise

December 17th, 1774 - 'Mrs. Snooke's tortoise, after it had been buried more than a month, came forth & wandered round the garden in a disconsolate state, not knowing where to fix on a spot for it's retreat.'
Listen out for 'The Portrait of a Tortoise', a Hooting Yard holiday season special on ResonanceFM to be broadcast 12:20 on Boxing Day. I know that I will be tucked up in front of the radio with a turkey sandwich and a cup of tea for the occasion.