Harriet unearthed wildlife under plastic in the greenhouse, initially fearing it was a rat.

Beady eye appears

then she saw hedgehog spines, and breathed a sigh of relief.

Kiwi Fruit in flower

Plenty of flowers on the new kiwi fruit plant – will have to see whether we get fruit from it.

A good productive work day on Sunday – plus a bit of drama! We all had to run for the shelter of the greenhouse when a swarm of very angry bees descended on the oak trees by the stream. Plenty of friendly wildlife though.

Bob Salter showing off a newt

Newt found in the compost bin

A visiting toad

Another busy Third Saturday workday. What did we do with our time ? Early and Maincrop potatoes were planted, Jan brought down a bird house, which Mark critiqued, and Andy then set about enhancing. Marcos brought down and planted some excellent onions, grown from seed.

The bed for some of the maincrop potatoes had been shelter for 4 or 5 toads, some of which hopped away, others were relocated. Mark highlighted that toads tend to have dry skin, frogs tend to be damp. So no need to kiss them then.

Mark displaying a toad which was sheltering under the plastic

A serious business working out the spacing for the crop. Fliss wielding the tape measure whilst Harriet supervises. The potatoes were laid on a bed of comfrey leaves, to provide instant food to the corms. A layer of grass on top is supposed to help with reducing the risk of scab (according to Bob Flowerdew!). And a thin layer of soil. To be banked up once the plants are well established, and not before, or too much energy goes into leaf rather than root (and potato) production.

Fliss and Gary Planting maincrop potatoes

What Gary forgot to mention until the  two beds had been planted was that there were two varieties of potato in the same paper bag. It will be interesting cropping them to work out which was which !

Comfrey for food, grass over potatoes and a bit of earth

An unusual level of supervision, even for us ! Kat, Mark and Marcos looking on whilst Fliss, Ken and Adam get on with the planting. Harriet wandering off to sort another priority.

We had copious amounts of tea, a great venison stew, and as usual, a good mix of other homemade food to share. I let the side down by bringing a bought cake, but it was from a stall at Broadstone Farmers Market, a delicious St Clements cake from the Putticks at Lychett Maltravers.

Gary and Andy fiddled with the water system. The overflow from the third greenhouse bath towards the pond is leaking a bit, and we were not sure whether it was flowing. An extensive search for a rubber washer unexpectedly revealed a blackbird nesting in the compound. She’s found a great hideyhole, but that makes extracting any useful stuff from around her difficult for a while.

Andy Hadley

Patch Workday – Sunday 3rd July 2011

A hot and sunny workday saw Gary, Sandra, Harriet and Manuela down at the Patch weeding the beans, harvesting potatoes and sowing peas. Oh yes, and checking the quality of the first bottle of “Chateau TOP Unremarkable” – which was surprisingly drinkable! A light, fruity red.
We also welcomed a visitor – Chris from the New Leaf community allotment site in Throop came over to take a tour of the Patch and exchange thoughts and ideas.

Cinnabar moth caterpillars

We were delighted to find these resident Wolves supporters munching their way happily through the ragwort. They are the caterpillars of the lovely red and black day-flying cinnabar moths. The toxins that they ingest from the ragwort make the caterpillars extremely distasteful to predators. Great to see so many this year.

Workday Lunch

Aside from the Firepit construction, we had a good turnout for the Third Saturday of the month Workday in August.

Mark cleared the pond. Harriet, Ken and Ruth did sterling weeding and cropping, and whilst Tat, Brendan and Andy worked the firepit, Suzanne was busy clearing space in the wildlife garden. Gary made lots of tea.

In the process, Suzanne uncovered a nearly fully developed Elephant Hawk Moth caterpillar, soon to make a cocoon and pupate

Elephant Hawk Moth Caterpillar

Mark digging out the pond, regularly overgrown