I am now ready to start the winter digging, it is like getting in the water at the beach, you want to get in but you know how hard it is at first and then the enjoyment after. We have got the areas that we need to dig almost all cover in the compost that we need to dig in. A few more areas have opened up after two nights of hard frosts and another one tonight may take out a few more areas. I have got what I want. A hard frost does make a garden look so sad first thing.
Well we got the frost last night that they said we would get. I was happy to draw back the curtains and see the world out there white, well a dusting of. You always know that after a hard frost you are going to have a beautiful day out there. We may be getting the same tonight.
As we move into the month of December it seems that we are going to get cold, tonight they say it is going to be a frost of -2. Because of this we have covered over things that need the protection, one of these areas being the cold frame next door with the pelargoniumes in. It is going to be interesting to wake up and see how cold it really is, we do need some cold weather soon.
A perfect moon to draw back the curtains and see this morning. Hope it is a good sign about the fair this weekend.
We are now ready for the fair, the tree is up and dressed. The doors are open at 10am and the weather is going to be good.
We have now cleared a lot of the ground floor of the house to get ready for the Christmas Fair this weekend. We will have some 26 stall holders here selling their arts and crafts. I did find something that I love, it was a chopping board made by our very own Simon, it looks perfect with my fruit cake on it. It looks like we are going to have the weather on our side. Hope to see some of you here.
It is great to have the pelargonium’s in the cold frames next-door for the winter. Over the years I have found them to get problems with green-fly in the heated glasshouse so it will be interesting to grow them a lot harder this year and just cover the cold frames when we get a hard frost and then try to keep them vented the rest of the time. I do see a lot of plants grown very soft which is a waste of energy and does not make great plants in the long run.
We are now ready for the cold weather. We have cleaned up the kitchen courtyard and moved the plants that are not hardy. It is good to see what the tulips are looking like, some have started to grow up now they will really start to move because they will get some light and water. I have left the plants out that I do not mind killing in the frost, if we get a major frosts this winter, they are mostly annuals.
It was great to receive in the post today a selection of seed from Australia. As part of my book I have given a list of good seed suppliers and Diggers Club is the supplier that I have listed for Australia. They also sent a new catalogue which I enjoyed having a look at, there are so many seed varieties I would like to send to my nephew Kosta. It is interesting that Kosta grows a lot of tomatoes, it seems that no one in his house eats tomatoes, my sister brings this from our childhood, time for him to get some other crops in.
The meadow has had a second cut and the hay that I saved from the GD meadow is now down, that was after I planted some different bulbs to give more interest through the season. It was great to be out today because as I worked snow fell around me. We have seen a change in the season over here now, about time.
Great Dixter Vegetable Garden 