Sun's out ... as are the weeds
Isn't it glorious? And it's May! After moaning about the rain, we've had the best week of weather and the garden and allotment have had their fiercest weeding ever.
The first day the sun came out, the notorious power-napper, baby Bonnie, seemed to decide that perhaps I deserved a break.
She snoozed in her car seat at the allotment for a blissful and uncharacteristic two hours, while every dandelion on the plot was ripped up whole. There were so many they filled a 30-litre compost bag.
Don't compost dandelions, burn 'em once they dry, as they have a knack of surviving.
I decided not to use weedkillers when I started gardening and, so far, I've managed to stick to it, although the temptation to nuke dandelions and couch grass on the allotment with glyphosate is often difficult to resist.
This year I'm already making better use of the hoe. I'd been repeatedly told by fellow allotmenteers how important it was to hoe between plants, but when the whole site was a complete mess of weeds, it felt like fighting a fencer with a toothpick.
Now I've got fewer weeds, and understand the importance of spacing rows, the hoeing has become less of a chore, whisking away weedlings around my onions and garlic in a few easy minutes.
I'm getting better at recognising weedlings too, with the worst culprits being dandelion and the dreaded bindweed, which need pulling by hand to get the whole root up.
There is a school of thought that says if you keep hoeing the green bit off, the plant will eventually give up, but I don't have that faith or patience.
Those hoeable weeds at the allotment include groundsel, chickweed, a ridiculous amount of speedwell and lamium dead nettle.
However, so far, there's no sign of the fat-hen that covered the entire site last year and had to be laboriously removed by hand. It looks like the effort was worth it.
There's the odd thistle, shepherds purse, and plenty of couch grass, but I'm slowly learning which ones I can and can't live with.
Know your enemy early. For online identification, try theseedsite.co.uk/weeds.html or invest in the Pest and Weed Expert by Dr Hessayon.
After allowing a spot of satisfaction that I'd actually completed a job, in went the rest of my potatoes, in a trench dug in soil that was virtually weed-free, thanks to the black fabric laid this time last year.
It accepted digging, with my now beloved Terrex spade, like a warm knife through butter.
The soil may be compacted, being constantly walked on, but the black fabric had worked a treat.
Apologies, though, to my gardening neighbours, who on several occasions had to tether it down in my absence after strong winds pinged the pegs out.
The garlic looks well, considering it was my first attempt at growing it and my final job during the latter stages of pregnancy.
Ditto the shallots and onions, plus Second Son's precise sowings of beetroot and radish.
He learned from last year the secret of seed spacing and straight rows, and I have high hopes of success for him as the one least bored by my green leanings.
Back at home, the lawn got its first mow of 2008 and, a year after it was freshly laid, it looks pretty good, barring the odd bald slide mark made by the heels and knees of the family's would-be cricketers.
In the long bed, running from the shaded patio to the back wall, I've made up for lost time on the weeds.
Three or four months' neglect meant nettles, baby brambles, something I think is a willowherb, hairy bittercress, spurge, and a truly astonishing amount of creeping buttercup had taken over, with the perennials and bulbs fighting for room.
Creeping buttercup can be deceiving for a new gardener, as at first you mistake it for a hardy geranium, then may think it's providing good groundcover as it spreads so quickly, and the yellow flowers are pretty.
But you soon realise it just takes over with its runners, which produce daughter plants.
And for goodness sake, don't let it set seed.
I spent an entire afternoon digging it up with a trowel, and spreading it on the path in the sun to shrivel and die.
Smallest son, trying to be helpful, had to be dissuaded from gathering up all the weeds to compost. Poor lad, first I tell him to tidy up, then tell him not to.
During my border rampage, I took the chance to chop the new sedum shoots back down to just a couple of inches, which feels destructive but stops the plant getting leggy, centrally bald and flopping in the autumn.
My lilies, left in situ over the winter, are well up, and I'm already checking for the bright red lily beetles that were everywhere last year.
Find them and squish them, however squeamish you may be.
After three years, my peony is covered with buds, which seems to prove they don't like being moved. Hopefully they will make it into flower, although the ants are very partial to sticky peony buds.
Flowering this week in all its glory is the white clematis grandifloria, which has now managed to send shoots out the entire length of our longest wall, despite a dreadful lack of proper supports.
Even indoors there's plant action, with the seeds Son Three and I planted last week germinated and growing away thanks to my newly-cleaned windows, allowing an extraordinary amount of light into the house, three years after they were last cleaned.
Busy, busy, and really rather happy...
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Weather for Northampton
Friday 10 February 2012
Today
Sunny spells
Temperature: -6 C to 1 C
Wind Speed: 13 mph
Wind direction: South east
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Sunny spells
Temperature: -5 C to -0 C
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