Thursday 30 June 2016

On why we will never be self-sufficient




French beans.


Courgettes.


Red cabbage.


Runner beans.


Happy snails.




Perhaps this would be a match for them.
Crambe maritima or sea kale.
Leaves as tough as neoprene, but the stems are delicious blanched and
eaten like asparagus apparently.

16 comments:

  1. It is much the same story here. Your post is quite a relief to read actually, it shows I am not alone! This 'summer' seems to be dire in the garden. The weeds are doing well though. Why is it we never see slugs and snails on those?

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  2. That is quite some destruction! Little sods. I cannot account for it, and perhaps I shouldn't mention it because they will all come over and have a party, but I have not been troubled by either of my usual pests this year, slugs and mice. It could be that there seems to be an army of frogs in the garden, I have no idea where they have hopped from and the neighbour has a cat.........

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  3. Self-sufficient with veg sadly not, but les escargots look promising!

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  4. Like Jessica, it's the same here and good to know I'm not alone. The weeds here are in a league of their own. I have a 3m square patch of strawberries at the plot, and the mice are having every single berry. Pounds and pounds of them. They are stashing them under the broad beans, where they are gently rotting. CJ xx

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  5. Oh my goodness - snail heaven.

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  6. I'm getting snails on my first-floor balcony !

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  7. they make a bee line for two bulbs I am trying to nurture.
    I think, they have won. Sob.

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  8. Lucille, kale was the one dreaded vegetable of my youth. When I was able to establish my own young adult kitchen, kale never featured.

    And yet, as it has become a trend in the past few years, I have given Tuscan Kale a bit of a chance and it was all right. (I still would not go out of my way to grow any in a garden though. Not quite there yet.)

    Even so, your photographs are grand! You almost convinced me to pick some kale up at my next farmers market visit. xo

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  9. Not just me, then. I've been tucking mint sprigs into my pots and window-boxes to keep them away. So far so good: the odd intrepid snail but not the extended tribes of them that used to descend over-night before I took action.

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  10. Kale. I'd rather eat neoprene.

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  11. Almost all my cosmos seedlings decimated. Quite significant though that they leave the kale alone...

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  12. My word, it looks dreadful. Snails are rapacious aren't they?

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  13. I used beer to rid my garden of slugs and snails. It's too bad aphids and rabbits are such teetotalers.

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  14. At the Hampton Court Flower Show, the hosta specialist suggested putting slug pellets inside jam jars laid on their sides. This means that the slugs and snails can get them but birds and hedgehogs can't. Am considering trying this...

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    Replies
    1. I've always thought that the danger to wildlife remained if the birds ate the poisoned slugs and snails. Ok I suppose if they stayed in the jam jar to die. Someone else says they hate coffee grounds. Might try that in future but will have to increase my caffeine consumption.

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    2. Your local coffee emporium would be more than happy for you to take away as much as you want - they haave difficulty in getting rid of it.

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