September in France is all about new beginnings as well as profiting from the hard work of earlier in the year. With a lull in the hot weather, we were able to turn the soil in the old broad bean bed and get in the first of the winter crops, so that there should be something available in February or March in the garden. We have one bed where we can (normally) grow cauliflowers, so once the rotavator had done its job, we added a bag of well rotted horse manure and I planted 10 cauliflower plants. They will now be in the ground and carefully nurtured for about 7 months, so if you complain about the price of caulis, remember how long they take to grow and how much space each plant takes, and only produces one head of curds!
As the medium term forecast for the autumn is quite benign, I have also planted a load of salad/leafy crops to make October and November a bit more interesting. The seeds went in last Sunday, so it was encouraging to see that the Bright Lights chard and the spinach were well up and some signs of the mâche (lamb's lettuce) coming through as well. If I am watchful and we are lucky, we should be eating baby leaves in October.
But what of the existing crops? Well today I picked the best of our sweetcorn, as a snack to accompany lunch. Disappointing puts it rather mildly - as these were very short cobs at about 3 to 4 inches long, sparsely populated too, but very sweet and tasty. It just wasn't a good year for them, and I did sow about 2 weeks too late.
The cucumbers seem to remember now what their purpose in life is and have about 4 fruits set on them. Reading the packet details, the variety is a slim version, and hails from Poland. I have to hope that they do fatten up a little bit more than this, as it isn't totally appealing at the moment.
My fight against Asian hornets continues - this is the time of year when workers are on a feeding frenzy of finding sugar, while young queens need to really stock up on sugars to get themselves through the winter. The exceptionally hot summer hasn't been good for them, as once the temperature inside the nests exceeds 40 degrees, they die off. As we have had four periods when that has happened, we hope that they have taken a big hit. The other noticeable thing is that as food has been more scarce and conditions not to their liking, any specimens that have been spotted are a bit smaller than usual. On the one hand this is good, implying a weaker set of insects that may find it difficult to get through the winter. On the other hand, there have been instances where they are able to escape from the selective traps that are set for them, as they can squeeze out of the holes designed to let bees and flies escape. I have topped up the bait in my number 1 trap and have caught at least three of the beasties.
The star plant of September is the cyclamen and they are cropping up all over the place now, including random spots on the side of the road. These clumps are at the entrance to the Orchard, and always cheer me up.
Yesterday was the annual Mechoui of our local boule de fort club - a lovely Saturday given over to gluttony and fellowship. This year was a little subdued - the long, hot summer has taken its toll on people, and indeed the menu for the meal couldn't be finalised for a while until they got permission for the fire needed to spit roast the pig. Our glorious Leader hasn't been in the best of health so he was less lively and couldn't make his usual general toast. But having said that, the punch kicked above its weight, the wine was delicious, the starters were excellent, and the spit roast pig was all you could desire. Once we got home at 6pm, we lolled, trying to digest and rehydrate after a decidedly warm afternoon among friends.
That is lunch and here are the happy punters.
Another feature of September is a rush of arrivals who didn't want to come over during school holidays. The week ahead looks extremely busy with people, concerts, meals out, antiques fairs and the like and the blog will probably not be published until Monday.
Have a good week!
No comments:
Post a Comment