Horticultural

Christmas canned

Being a gardener makes for an easy time for family and friends with Christmas presents in mind. I'd say 75% of my gifts this year were garden-related, including this very fine watering can (for the garden - too nickable to go on the allotment) and a very groovy and compact plug plant trainer that's already been sown with some red baron onion seeds and (optimistically) some lettuce.

I also got a pole-mounted bird feeder that I braved the snow to set up in the garden today. I keep checking for customers but no sightings so far. I wonder how long it takes for birds to spot a peanut feeder and home in on it? Are they nervous at first? Can they smell the nuts? Despite being a YOC member in my youth, I have no idea and am hoping a budding Bill Oddie (or maybe even the man himself) can help me out ...

And I have a serious question for you about blight on tomatoes and potatoes, in relation to "the book". I've never experienced it but I am curious as to how much it impacts on allotmenteers and organic gardeners. Have your potatoes and tomatoes suffered from it? How do you treat it? Is it the worst disease you face? Answers on a virtual postcard please ...

Amphibious slug assault

This fat frog emerged sheepishly (if indeed amphibians can look sheepish) from the chard bed when I was weeding on Friday. Just a stare from this fellow should scare off the neighbourhood slugs, so I am hoping he'll hang about for a bit.

Then today I was weeding the bed in front of my house and lifted a mop of variegated grass to see a toad looking at me from a hollow he'd made in the shade of my porch. He'll probably be there until March now, hibernating through the cold weather.

Both sightings gave me a warm and fuzzy feeling inside. Now, I know this marks me out as a weird - if not completely unhinged - person, but I love the idea that a) I have two slug-eating machines on my side of the fence (although one's temporarily suspended his slug hunting duties for the winter), and b) that creatures like this seem to be thriving in a garden and on an allotment handled organically. Now all I'd like is to spot a slow worm in the pile of rotting wood behind my compost heaps ...

Fascinating fact: the European common toad's Latin name is Bufo bufo.

Furry friend

Once again I am in foreign climes, this time in Canada for a few weeks (pleasure, not business). Before I left the UK, a single Gardener's Delight cherry tomato was ready to harvest. I picked it and ate it without even the briefest thought of photographing it for Dr Charles's competition. (Sorry, Dr Charles: it tasted delicious, though).

Back home, the plot will be taken care of by some willing volunteers. Here in Victoria, I saw this little fellow today, pootling about on the window frame. It's some kind of tiger moth caterpillar, I think, but anyone with a more precise identification would be much appreciated.

I am hoping to check out a few gardens while I am here, including the UBC Botanical Gardens and the Abkhazi Gardens. Any other recommendations of gardens to visit in the Vancouver/Victoria area would be much appreciated.

Caterpillar update: by the power of the internet, I have just identified my furry friend as a spotted tussock moth ...

Calling all entomologists

Can anyone identify this beastie for me? When I was hanging out the washing in my garden a couple of nights ago at dusk - around 9.30pm - there were hordes of this beetle/bee-type creature buzzing around my neighbours' leylandii (don't ask). Actually the sound was closer to that of a dragonfly, but they were about 2 to 3cm long.

They were flying around the trees and occasionally landing on the grass, apparently not to visit the clover flowers as the bumblebees do but just to wander about before flying off.

I am not usually bothered by scary-looking insects - I used to live in Louisiana, home to the flying cockroach, remember. But these ones, to use a non-entomological term, gave me the heebie-jeebies, especially when one landed on my neck.

So, can anyone tell me what they are and whether they sting? Remember, I live in the southeast of England. Sorry the pictures aren't the clearest - I was barefoot at the time and trying to avoid stepping on one of these things.

Major discovery

For those who have been following the search for the Major, the good news is we spotted him for the first time in weeks today.

He was up the track a little way from our plot, hunting for food, but I decided to interrupt him because I had food of a more instant nature for him - a pouch of cat food. He was eating it even before I'd finished opening the packet. You can't really see from the picture but his back end is still very scraggly and he's extremely thin under the bushy fur that remains around his shoulders and head. I gave him a flea treatment that should help to protect his fur.

I can't work out if his owner has abandoned him or if someone is neglecting him. He certainly ate as if he hadn't had a square meal for a while. It's just good to see he's not dead, as I'd feared.

I've got more food in the gardening bag for next time we see him.

A spring day

This morning the weather was fantastic: as I planted the last few onions on the allotment I saw what I think was my first common blue butterfly of the year.

Despite my love of beasties generally, the larvae of the gooseberry sawfly are top of my hit list at the moment. If you have ever had your gooseberry bush monstered by these babies, you'll know what I mean, as they can munch their way through a bush and destroy any chance of you enjoying luscious gooseberries within days, if not hours. So in the lexicon of evil, they're on a par with the Borg, or the Daleks, or a BNP canvasser ringing your doorbell: you get the idea.

The only real organic solution is being eagle-eyed and carrying out search and destroy missions whenever they appear. You can also discourage them from turning up in the first place by making sure your bush is open and airy (they hate that) by pruning it in the form of an open goblet. The gooseberry sawfly also targets white and redcurrants, so it's worth keeping a close eye on them too. They'll come in waves throughout the summer season, so Tony Blair-style eternal vigilance against sawfly terror is crucial.

On a brighter note, everything is bursting into life now, putting out soft green foliage and, in the case of the blackcurrant bushes, flower buds, as you can see from the picture. Unfortunately I can't share with you the wonderful blackcurranty smell that emanates from the leaves when they're rubbed together. 

The first potatoes I put in are starting to poke through the soil, and the beetroots and cabbages have started to germinate. It's at this time of year like these I could spend all day, every day down at my plot, pootling around and enjoying the fresh air, if it weren't for that pesky concern commonly known as "earning a living".

A mystery guest

I decided to try out my rather nifty new copper hoe at the weekend by weeding the strawberry patch yesterday. It was looking rather forlorn: the netting placed on it all summer to outdo the mice worked wonders but didn't allow for easy access, and how the weeds - and strawberry runners - had taken over. Whilst clearing the weeds I came across this hairy caterpillar, presumably curled up to overwinter under the dry leaves. I safely relocated him to a spot where he won't be disturbed for the rest of the winter, but I wonder if anyone knows what he is: or indeed what he'll turn into?

The hoe worked a treat, by the way ...

Hoverflies

This piece in the Guardian about a sudden influx of hoverflies is interesting. It seems that the warm weather has bought thousands of the wasp-imitating insects over from warmer climes, but their black and orange livery has prompted confused holidaymakers, who think they're under attack from wasps.

I am keen to encourage hoverflies into the garden, as their larvae chomp through the hated greenfly. So included in my purchases this weekend as I finally got around to filling up the raised bed we refurbished weeks ago were some perennial statice and gypsophila, both of which are now alive with hoverflies.

There are some great hoverfly images here.