It’s been a week of noisy nights. In no small part, this has been down to tawny owls (the delightful sounding chouette hulotte in French) who seem to be going through a particularly busy and vocal phase at the moment. I love to hear them, the shrill female ‘kew-ick’ and softer male ‘hoo-hoo’ performed in a perfect call-and-response duet, but it’s no exaggeration to say that some nights they have been so loud, I’ve honestly thought they were perched on the bedroom balcony. There also seem to be one or two who haven’t quite got it together yet ~ youngsters perhaps? ~ and so have decided that our oak trees are just the place for prolonged choir practice as they sort out their twits from their twoos. Then there’s the acorns. It’s a heavy mast year and the oaks are literally dripping, but as a result of the drought they are shedding acorns by the bucketload. It has become almost impossible to walk along some of our boundary paths as the carpet of fallen nuts is less than comfortable on the feet! Not for the first time since moving here, I am driven to wonder why anyone would choose to build a shed around a mature oak tree, especially one with a tin roof: the clatter of falling acorns is a noisy percussion that continues all through the night, becoming faster and louder if the wind picks up . . . or the owl choir alights. Perhaps it’s time for earplugs at bedtime?
As well as acorns, there are wild fruits and berries in abundance, not surprising after the spring blossom was so prolific. The hedgerows are dripping with elderberries and blackberries, and where so many leaves (especially hazel) have already been shed, the hawthorn is setting the unusually bare branches alight in plumes of crimson fire. It’s time to forage and add some seasonal goodies to our winter stores. I’ve already started to collect rosehips, plump as little tomatoes, from the rugosa bushes. Last year, I made the mistake of following the guidance on a foraging website, drying the hips whole, grinding them to a powder and shaking them in a sieve to separate out the tiny irritating hairs. Bad plan: it only took a couple of brews to realise I was being left with a very unpleasant tickle around my tonsils ~ despite rigorous and repeated sieving, the hairs were very definitely still in the mix. This year, I’m being less lazy, halving the hips and meticulously scraping out the innards before drying the fruit. It’s a bit of a faff but with any luck, it should make for a more comfortable tea.
The heat and drought have hit our young fruit trees hard and we are doing everything we can to nurse them through; it would be sad to lose them just as they are getting established. The more mature trees have looked stressed at times, too, and it remains to be seen just what sort of a harvest we enjoy this autumn. The pear trees are covered in fruit but both have already lost many of their leaves so I think it’s unlikely that we will have anything worth eating from them.
A couple of the apples are obviously biennial bearers and have no fruit at all this year, the rest have a good crop but have been dumping fruit on the orchard floor for some time. We had been hoping to press enough juice to last us a year but in reality it will be a case of being grateful for whatever we can salvage.
There have been a few surprises, though. The poor fig tree, which looked so miserable last year, has enjoyed the hotter, drier conditions and responded well to having more light and air around it where we had cut back undergrowth and laid hedges; we are currently enjoying modest but utterly delicious pickings of luscious fruit, such an unexpected luxury. One of the rescued grapevines is also looking far happier and thick bunches of green grapes are steadily ripening to purple, although it’s a bit of a game beating the birds to them, and despite the drought really doing for the summer raspberries, the autumn ones are having a go. All is not lost.
I love colour and I have to admit I’ve found it hard seeing the garden so burnt up and bleached in recent weeks, not to mention the speed at which the hoped-for rainbow of flowers faded away. Still, there have been a few bright spots to make me smile this week. Of all the annual flowers I planted, the zinnias have shown themselves to be the toughest and cheeriest of survivors . . . and the bumble bees adore them.
The heavy crop of sweet peppers in many colours continues in the tunnel and now outdoors, too, the ‘Sweet Banana’ in particular making eye-catching splashes of yellow, orange and red to brighten dusty corners.
I’ve been harvesting piles of chillies for some time now, the long and skinny cayenne and the fatter but equally as warming Padrón, but this week saw the first bulk picking from our fish pepper plants. Buying a tiny pinch of seeds to grow these plants was nothing more than an indulgence on my part; after all, we already had more than enough chillies in the pipeline . . . but I loved the idea of the variegated plants with their attractive green and white leaves, the crazy array of coloured fruits and the fascinating history behind them. They haven’t disappointed, they really are quite beautiful and I just love those stripes!
The maize harvest usually takes place here in October, but the crops are looking so poor that many local farmers are cutting their losses and harvesting the fields already; given that it’s usually a pretty drought-tolerant plant, it just goes to show just what a tough year it has been. Thankfully, our sweetcorn has fared rather better and we have been tucking into the first fat cobs this week. In my (humble) opinion, there are two secrets to enjoying sweetcorn at its very best: having minimum time from picking to plate, so those wonderful sugars don’t have chance to turn to starch, and keeping the cobs well away from water. Why boil when you can grill or bake? Our favourite trick is to cook them over charcoal or wood, simply turning occasionally until the corn literally starts to caramelise; leaving a decent stalk makes them easy to eat ~ perfect finger food ~ and smeared in rich, creamy Normandy butter, they are a truly decadent delight. Sunshine on a plate.
The borlotti beans just keep on giving and I have been picking and processing a full trug of purple pods every other day, some set aside to dry for next year’s seed as well as eating, and the rest stored in the freezer. I’ve also been dealing with the fattened and dried pods from the first row of ‘Purple Teepee’ dwarf beans; they are a fiddle to shell, especially compared to the beefy borlotti, but it would be a crime not to harvest them. They are such a good food, packed with fibre and vegetable protein and a perfect addition to winter soups and stews. One row down, three to go.
Sticking with the purple theme and the ‘Violet de Provence’ globe artichokes I raised from seed earlier this year have coped well with the weather, which is a valid reason for ensuring we grow as many perennial food crops as we can. One of them has gone a step too far, though, and produced a few artichokes already. Well, I’ve been told the purple varieties have a better flavour than the green ones so it looks like we’ll be finding out for ourselves a bit sooner than expected.
Although there is much to be celebrated in the garden, it’s a time of immense frustration, too. Having waited so long for rain, it was a relief to have an afternoon of storms last week which dampened everything down and put some precious stores back in the butts . . . but that was it. Despite numerous forecasts for rain ever since, we’ve had nothing, even when other people living locally have reported torrential downpours. Some days of cooler temperatures and cloudier skies have at least slowed down the rate of evaporation but we are still having to water on a regular basis to keep things alive ~ hard to believe under such glowering skies. At least we can use the captured rainwater for the time being which means we aren’t restricted to the ‘after 8pm’ watering rule and we live in hope of more rainfall, but the hosepipe still snakes across the garden just in case: this year, it doesn’t do to assume anything.
My limited mobility is also starting to drive me nuts, worse now in a way that I am on the mend and able to do a bit more so therefore eager to return to my normal zipping-about state. There is so much I want to be doing and not all in the garden; it’s over two months now since I rode my beautiful new bike and it grieves me to see it gathering cobwebs in the barn. I have managed a few sessions of light gardening and the benefits to my wellbeing have far outweighed the inevitable discomfort, it has felt wonderful to be out in the fresh air enjoying and nurturing our patch once again. It’s easy to wax lyrical about ‘connecting with nature’ but for me it’s a fundamental part of my life; if you want to punish me, shut me indoors! I’ve dragged a sun-lounger into the shade of the Love Shack veranda so I can take breaks when I need and simply watch all the life going on around me. Bliss. Observing quietly, I realise once again just how important the green manure flowers ~ both intentionally planted and random volunteers ~ continue to be a reliable food source for so many insects, along with several ‘weeds’ that have survived the drought whilst all around has shrivelled and died. It’s not just about insects, either; I had an incredible moment watching a huge hare lolloping about the potager, seemingly oblivious to my presence and happy to tuck into white clover and the buds from the tips of the tall cat’s ear stems while I watched, mesmerised.
In terms of gardening, I’ve managed to transplant a few lettuce seedlings and sow the autumn/winter seeds that really needed to go in much earlier, but they’ve all germinated, so let’s see what happens. I’ve also been pulling out a forest of dead phacelia plants, initially intended to be chopped and dropped well before flowering but which somehow (yet again) got the better of me. I’m spreading the plants on top of the bigger lasagne beds, partly as another layer of organic matter to help build soil but also because I know the seed will set and produce a useful green manure covering over winter without me having to lift a finger; all I need to remember to do is cut them back early in spring.
I did at least remember to cut back a short-term mix of phacelia, crimson clover and linseed before planting purple sprouting broccoli and red kale a few weeks ago but I’m delighted to see that new young plants plus white clover have grown back in their place. The brassicas will be in the ground for many months so it’s of benefit having the clovers fixing nitrogen at their feet (the crimson clover won’t survive the winter but the white clover is made of sterner stuff) and also the soil between them covered in growth to help retain moisture and prevent erosion. Bare earth rarely occurs in nature and doesn’t happen in our garden very often, either!
We’ve collected another load of free horse manure this week. Well, I say we but my contribution was to put together a veggie box to say thank you, Roger of course did all the hard graft. It’s wonderful stuff and will help improve the soil greatly over winter, as will the pile of compost that is ready to shift from the ‘finished’ bay. I desperately want to be getting on with that now so the overflowing current bay can be turned and we can start a new one; my physiotherapist has told me I can start doing some gentle yoga again but I doubt he’d be very happy about me taking a pitchfork to the compost heap just yet. At the very least, I can sort out the rogue squash that have popped their heads up and decided to trail in every direction. Honestly, they are unstoppable.
Speaking of squash, it’s been interesting once again to see what our Asturian Specials have thrown up. The seed we saved was from the last two we ate, so if nothing else we should have selected for good keeping qualities. They were both pale blue skinned and barely ribbed with dense orange flesh ~ becoming more and more like ‘Crown Prince’, in fact ~ and, although it’s fun to have the variety, I’m really chuffed that most of this year’s fruits have come back the same, simply because they make such good eating.
There’s always one, though. When a couple of volunteers appeared in the tunnel I should have nipped them in the bud but like so many other things, I never seemed to get round to it and once a couple of those beautiful blue fruits appeared, well, I didn’t have the heart. What I hadn’t noticed until Roger showed me this week is the one that got away under the potting bench; I really should have tidied up the chaos under there but it’s been too hot, I can’t bend and I hate disturbing the toad that lives very happily in the jumble of pots and trays (my excuse, anyway 😉). What a surprise squash. Cinderella would be proud.
I’ve never been a fan of rushing through the seasons so it’s frustrating to feel that we are hurtling headlong into autumn far too early ~ I’m not ready for bronzed bracken and leaf fall just yet. Nothing I can do about it, though, so it’s simply a case of enjoying the moment and appreciating all the gifts of late summer while they last: beautiful mornings and golden evenings, another flush of roses, clouds of butterflies, sharing good food and laughter with friends, melodious robins and acrobatic swallows, nature’s bounty on our plates . . . and yes, even the sound of those raucous owls (although the occasional night off would be very welcome). 😊
This Simple Life 