There’s not much to report on the plot. I’ve pretty much been stuck indoors so not a lot I can do. My eye continues to heal although there’s the odd occasion when it feels like it has broken glass in and the temptation to rub it is almost irresistible. We’re gradually getting over the cold that laid us low. I don’t know if it’s age or what, but the winter colds seem to hit us harder every year.
On the plus side, with being inside, I’ve got a load more back up on the web site including my allotment tips videos and the videos from Tatton Park’s gardeners. See Allotment Garden TV. Before the videos were being streamed from another server but now we’re streaming from our own server so things should be stable.
We’re also going through the old diary entries, fixing things like broken links and images that vanished when we updated the underlying software. It hardly seems possible that I’ve been keeping this online diary for 10 years.
There are some disasters, both in life and on the plot, but a lot of high-points. For example the visit to Flavourfresh tomatoes. OK, they’re not organic growing on hydroponics with a computer controlled chemical mix but I did pick up some tips that are useful for any home grower
Thinking about it, there’s so much more information on the internet now than there was when I started this site. Unfortunately a lot of it is rubbish and weeding out the rubbish from fact is no easy job.
There’s also the copy pattern – one person posts something which is picked up and repeated by another and another until the accepted truth is that original post. Purely because it appears a number of times. I’ve even had a mistake of mine (hey, I’m not perfect) picked up and repeated!
When I’m writing, I work primarily from knowledge directly acquired. Things I’ve been told and shown by my grandfather or by other gardeners or from my own experience. I do use the internet, but to confirm information, and then preferably from pages I trust like academic institutes. Mainly though I check my facts from books by respected authorities.
Then there’s the difference between theory and practice. For example, radishes are a member of the brassica family and, therefore, can get and be a reservoir for club root. In practice though, the radish is fast growing and out of the ground within 4 weeks. The presence of club root is irrelevant.
The weather continues to be unseasonably warm, wet and windy. Bit like my grandson! Yesterday was impressive though. A black cloudbank appeared on the horizon and an hour later we had hail bouncing off the roof and claps of thunder shaking the building.
Fingers crossed we get at least a couple of hard frosts before winter’s done or the slugs will be a nightmare again as they slither out of their winter hiding spots.
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