Budsandborders.co.uk

(Originally Posted 19 April)

Here are my Limnanthes Douglasii. I've put these in as pest control this year. Last year I was too late to put them in and the rain did for them.

They are loved by butterflies, hoverflies and bees and attract aphid eaters! I want my beans to be clear this year, so hopefully this will work.

They give off bright green foliage and yellow-and-white flowers. They are a hardy annual that grows to about 15cm (6")



I have about four of the plants and they should flower July-September.

They have started to flower now (May).



They have got even bigger now (19 May). Note the 'bald' patch in the middle:



I checked on them this weekend - 26/05/08 - and they were blowing in the wind.

I was going to take some video of the plot today, but unfortunately I forgot to take the memory card for the recorder. Oooops! So, you’ll just have to do with stills of my sprouts:

They are still small, but I have fully netted them this year as there seems to be a lot of birds round that are hungry.

I also put the cabbages in and gave them collars and slug pellets as there seems to be a lot of the little blighters around:

While I was there I also put in some parsnips, but I haven’t got time to post the pics now. I will show you tomorrow.

They say there will be a frost tonight. I hope not for the sake of all the people who put out their delicate seedlings today. I wanted to tell them it was too early, but, I’m not sure they would listen to little old me.

I was digging over the plot this weekend and found rather a lot of slugs - all of the large variety. I couldn’t believe there could be so many in such a small area.

As you can see from the picture below, I have killed them all. Well, it was them or my veg.

I’m not very happy at the moment. My sprouts are not doing very well. Quite apart from the variable weather causing havoc with their growth, they have been lunch for the pests. In this case either slugs or pigeons.

As you can see there is not a lot left. However, on the bright side, there is some green shoots in the middle of the eaten leaves, so we might get some sprouts later on, if we are lucky.

I had put up some tape to ward off the birds, but in case it isn’t working I was advised to move the stakes holding the tape into a zig-zag pattern along the line. This way the birds can’t crane their necks in and nibble. I would net them, but I don’t have enough of it to go round this year. Maybe if I ‘mug’ a fisherman?

These two pictures really give you a contrast with the recent bit of the plot that was rotavated. It doesn’t seem to have bothered the plants.

Anyway, you can see that I have put collars round the strawberries to stop slugs and also to keep them clean when it rains. Yes, that might not happen for a while if they are right about global warming, but you have to try. This is the first year I have really bothered with strawberries, so we will see how well they turn out.

Below is a better picture of the netting over the cabbage. It’s a good way to keep the birds off your plants. Of course the slugs still make for it, but the netting gives them a headache. I found a few slug trails on the netting and a few dead ones boiled in the sun. They had left trails as though they went round in circles until they gave up the ghost and just died.

You can also see how I improvised the hoops with wire.

Having slugs on your allotment can be a real pain. While you can catch them in the act and invite them to leave your vegetables alone, it is good to keep an eye out for them before you start growing. This is often best done when you are digging the soil over in preparation for planting.

In this video we can see some slug eggs waiting to hatch and eat the veg. They are not very large, but you can tell them as they are translucent balls. These could be from last year, but equally they can lay dormant for a long time.

My favourite method is to lightly salt them.