At last my fruit and veg are thriving

by Andrew
(Near Cambridge, UK)

Hi everyone,

Finally it looks like our fruit and veg are putting on a burst of growth to make up for the long winter and cold nights of late.
The French Beans have been relocated from their pots and after a week or two where I thought they were going to wither and die - they're now climbing like 'Triffids'
I sorted out the greenhouse too as I wanted more space to grow peppers etc. The aluminium staging has now been moved outside which now supports troughs of various lettuce now kept out of harms way from snails and slugs. These critters seem to avoid climbing up the aluminium legs. Perhaps it gives similar reaction as copper tape? Been a few years since high school chemistry so am trying to remember metals reactivity series...

Anyway, we've had first small crop of strawberries although this was from an indoor plant. Very sweet almost like a wild strawberry but is a third generation plant from our original plant bought (and still thriving) about five years ago.
Our thornless Blackberry (Bramble) has flowered and now producing tiny unripe fruit which should be ready in august/september. Our patio apple tree has also been fertilised and is laden with small apples. Can't wait to see them ripen!

Only tiny blot on the landscape is a damaged water butt. At the moment it's doing a great impression of 'The Leaning Tower Of Pisa' It was bought from Tesco two years ago but despite being carefully sited on level ground and on correct stand, it's partially collapsed at the bottom because it seems the heavy duty polyethylene plastic isn't heavy duty enough. Trouble is I can't move it until I pump it out as it's holding 175 litres of rainwater and as you know from school physics - a litre of water weighs a kilogram. I've had to prop it up until I can get hold of a pump and another much stronger water butt.