Vinyl Lockdown

 As the UK's second COVID-19 lockdown started on 5th November 2020, I thought I would take the opportunity of listening to my collection of LPs, mainly from the 1970s, in its entirety. By listening I do mean sitting down in a comfortable seat in front of the speakers and enjoying the music without any distractions. Today, everyone seems to listen to music either on the move or as incidental background noise whereas I prefer to spend time appreciating the music, albeit occasionally spoiling the ambience by joining in when I can remember the words!!

Many of the LP records would have been played on a Garrard SP25 MkIII turntable, Amstrad 8000 amplifier and original Wharfedale Denton speakers - a not atypical set-up for a student in the early 1970s. The turntable was upgraded (1977??) to a Lenco L830 DD and I'm pretty sure I upgraded the amp at the same time but to what I cannot recall. The Denton speakers continued to give sterling service for many years.

My current set-up is an audio-technica AT-LP120 turntable, Denon M38 amp and a pair of Wharfedale Denton II speakers as homage to my long departed originals.

Music playlist (in order played):

Bob Marley and the Wailers, Legend, the best of Bob Marley and the Wailers - a recent acquisition and not sure why I never bought any originals. Compilation of his best known work

Barclay James Harvest, Early Morning Onwards  - first saw in concert while at university (UEA) in Norwich in the early 1970s. Bought the LP but do not have the t-shirt. We had an excellent Student Union Social Secretary at UEA who overspent her budget considerably to get bands on campus. There were also a couple of music venues in Norwich (e.g. St Andrews Hall) plus the local teacher training college. BJH originated in Oldham not far from my home town, Eccles. Started in 1966 and still going albeit as two separate bands, each containing one original member! Wiki describes as 'progressive rock' but to me they were modern folk rock with orchestral overtones

Amazing Blondel, Fantasia Lindum - another band we saw in concert in Norwich & bought the LP. Difficult to categorize their music - acoustic renaissance folk is probably the best I can do. I still remember their description of the sound of a crumhorn as 'a well-tuned fart'. Surprisingly popular in mainland Europe depite their very 'Englishness'. Played a wide range of instruments including lute, theorbo, cittern, recorders, flute, crumhorn, glockenspiel, dulcimer, tabor, harpischord, mellotron and more. One of the best things to come out of Scunthorpe - no longer active

Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band, The History of the Bonzos  (double album) - first saw in the surreal 1960s' TV comedy show 'Do Not Adjust Your Set' - a trailblazer for Monty Python's Flying Circus. Cannot better Wiki's description "combining elements of music hall, trad jazz and psychedelic pop with surreal humour and avant-garde art". Had a top 5 hit with "I'm the Urban Spaceman" in 1968; co-produced by Paul McCartney

Barclay James Harvest, Barclay James Harvest and other short stories - see above

Bob Dylan/The Band, Before the Flood (Live) (double album) - one of the great songwriters and winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2016. Funny how two of the best singer-songwriters in the past 60 years (Dylan and Leonard Cohen) might have difficulty getting jobs as singers! Born Robert Allen Zimmerman in 1941, Dylan will be 80 in 2021 and still performing/producing. Famously 'disowned' by his 'fans' when he moved from acoustic to amplified/electric guitar. One of the many protest singers in 60s America, he went on to sell over 100 million records. You do need to sit down and listen to Dylan.

Duran Duran, Notorious - Absolutely no idea how this got into my LP collection as I'm not a fan. Pleasant enough as background but not something I'd sit down to listen to. There is a sticker on the cover that says ' British Red Cross' and '£1' which doesn't ring a bell so may have been picked up third-hand at a bazaar or fete. This an example of the 'New Wave' or 'New Romantic' in the 1980s. Interestingly, the album was made/produced in Bulgaria which explains the Cyrillic language/script on the record label/sticker.

Cat Stevens, Foreigner - From my wife's LP collection, I suspect, but one we both like. Before he became Yusuf Islam.

Captain Beefheart, The Spotlight Kid - Had a cult following without real commercial success. This album is one of his more commercial offerings. Collaborated a lot with Frank Zappa. Appeared in concert at UEA during my student days. Renowned for having a 5-octave voice range.

Carole King, Rhymes & Reasons -  One of the most successful female songwriters in the second half of the 20th Century; she wrote 61 hits that charted in the UK.  Born 1942, she is still working. Beautifully crafted songs.

I'll update the post as I work my way through the collection...

Asparagus Ferns in Autumn

We have a small plot, about 1 square meter, that was planted up with 5 asparagus crowns (Eclipse) some 3 to 4 years ago. This year was their first productive crop and we enjoyed fresh asparagus from mid-April to the end of May.  I'm guessing a yield  of about 2 kg over the 6-week harvesting period; sufficient for the two of us to enjoy twice a week.

At the end of May, no more spears were cut and the ferns were allowed to develop in order to build up the crowns ready for cropping in 2021.

It is now the beginning of November and the ferns have taken on their autumnal hue. In the next week or so I shall cut back the ferns to a couple of inches, remove any weeds, feed the soil with homemade garden compost and await next year's crop.

Modern asparagus varieties are much easier to grow and do not require the specially-prepared raised bed systems of the past. A sunny level bed with good drainage is fine. A little patience is needed because it takes 3 years or so for the plants to establish themselves before you get your first crop. On the plus side your asparagus bed could be productive for the next 20 years!

In the background, you can see the sign for William Earp & Son discovered in our cellar. William Earp was a local nurseryman in the 1890s who went bankrupt. Apart from the fact our garden was once part of his nursery, we know very little else about him.

Is it worth sieving your compost?

 It depends! For years I have use my compost 'au naturel', i.e. lumpy with plenty of woody bits in. Used directly on the soil as a mulch or hole/trench filler before planting out fruit and vegetables, it will enrich your soil, improve its structure and help retain moisture during those inevitable dry periods. This is by far the best way to use compost because it retains all the good things you have nurtured during the composting process: worms, bacteria, fungi, invertebrates, soil carbon, nutrients and humic acids.

On the other hand, I have to buy in seed & potting compost which is an added expense. We have been very happy with the coir-based products bought in from Fertile Fibre, a local Herefordshire company that delivers nationwide. Peat-based products are a definite no-no here. An alternative we can also recommend is the Dalefoot range made from composted bracken and sheep's wool. While my opinion of upland sheep farming is that it is unsustainable (both financially and ecologically), Dalefoot gets my thumbs up for its work restoring degraded peatlands, an important carbon source for mitigating climate change. It is an excellent growing medium which also acts as its own slow-release fertilizer.

I have sifted small amounts of compost with a hand sieve but this is slow and hard work. A rotary sieve can handle larger amounts and easier to use. My Clarke rotary sieve arrived a few days later. Simple to put together it was sieving compost with 30 minutes. Easy to use by putting a couple of spadefuls of compost in the basket and then turning the handle in a clockwise or anti-clockwise direction or a combination of both. I'm still not sure what the purpose of the spring is as it seems to fulfill no useful function. The black handle can also unscrew during use. You can either collect the sieved compost in a container (wheelbarrow, trug, bucket) or just place the sieve on the soil where you want to apply it.

The photo below shows what can be produced in less than 10 minutes sieving. Starting material in the black trug, sieved product in the yellow trug. Material left in the sieve (about 10%) will be recycled through the next composting process.

When sieving, take care to rescue any worms and invertebrates which can be added back into the compost heap or sieved material.

The rotary sieve costs about £40 so could pay for itself very quickly. Half-an-hour sieving produced about 200L of sieved seed/potting compost with a commercial value of at least £25.

Loofahs - Update

 In a previous post, I described our first attempt at growing loofah plants. At the time (July 2nd), one of the two plants was growing with good vigour while the other had a lot of catching up to do. Since then I have discovered the vigorous plant is producing only male flowers and it is the weedier specimen that is yielding the all-important female flowers. My understanding was that every loofah plant would produce both male and female flowers in the ratio of about 10:1. I read somewhere that nutrient balance can affect the male/female dominance of the plant; high nitrogen favours male flowers while high phosphorus favours the female variety. Since both of my plants are receiving identical nutrients, it clearly is not as simple as that.

Both plants have put on considerable growth although the male specimen still gives the impression of the lushier plant. The plants are now taking over the polytunnel and have now come together despite starting on opposite sides. I have decided to just let them get on with it, whatever 'it' is.

 Some promising female flowers first appeared in late July/early August but came to nothing. However, there are now (mid-September) a number of young loofahs developing and these look more promising. Will there be enough time for them to grow to full size? Here are a couple of photos of the same loofah taken on the 6th and 10th September.

Home Composting - Prelude

I plan to do a series on home composting covering both theory and practice. The course is designed for small/town gardens, where space is at a premium, but is easily scaled up.

There are many reasons for producing and using your own compost: (i) adding soil nutrients, (ii) improving soil structure and drainage, (iii) increasing water retention, (iii) mulching, (iv) encouraging beneficial soil microbes/bacteria/fungi/minibeasts and, if that is not enough, (v) saving money by fewer trips to the waste recycling centre and/or the garden centre.

The science (biology/chemistry/physics) of composting is complex and not fully understood. There are no rules, merely guidelines, and all home composters are empiricists! Commercial composting operations have a wide range of appropriate materials available to blend the perfect compost heap, backed up by a bevy of instruments and analytical tests to ensure the process is optimised and the product uniform. The home composter has to make do with whatever organic matter is available; instrumentation, if any, will be limited to a compost thermometer. Composting at home is best suited to those of a phlegmatic character because not every heap will be a success. Knowing how to 'recover' a compost heap that has gone wrong is an essential skill.  

The simplest and cheapest form of composting is to dig a hole (at least 30 cm deep), fill with cooked/uncooked kitchen scraps (no meat or dairy which may attract unwanted rodents/dogs/etc), replace the soil and leave. It does require the availability of bare soil somewhere in the garden but, otherwise, is ideal if you only have small amounts of stuff to compost. Trench composting is similar but on a larger scale.

Another form of small-scale composting is Bokashi where kitchen scraps are pickled/fermented by bacteria to produce a solid soil improver (added directly to soil/wormery/compost heap) and a liquid product that can be used as a drain cleaner (neat) or plant feed (diluted).  I found this system ideal for small quantities of kitchen waste (cooked and uncooked) though quite expensive to run. My old Bokashi bins are now used to prepare comfrey tea.

Some years ago, I bought a Wormery on the understanding it was suitable for recycling cooked waste as well as other kitchen and garden waste. After only partial success, I learned the hard way it was not really meant for cooked foods. On the plus side, it produced excellent vermicompost and a liquid feed on the occasions it did work. 

Over the years I have also used many of the more common types of static compost bins whether made from old wooden pallets or recycled plastic (often free from the local Council) including a cheap plastic tumbler variety. Nowadays, I opt for a Hot Composting process followed by maturation in static bins. Further details in a future post.

Potato Harvest (Part 1)

Growing Potatoes in Raised Beds and Potato Bags

 

After hearing good recommendations for the Sarpo potato variety, I managed to get hold of some seed potatoes for this season (2019/20) from Marshalls. The previous year (2018/19), I was far too late ordering in the autumn and every supplier had run out. This year I bought Sarpo Una (second early) and Sarpo Axona (maincrop).

Sarpo Una Potatoes

A dual-purpose potato with pink skin, white waxy flesh, delicate flavour and good blight-resistance can be harvested in June as salad potatoes or left to mature for a bigger crop of baking potatoes.

Seed potatoes were ordered in autumn 2019, arrived sometime in February 2020 and laid out in egg cartons to chit. Planted out in late March, when the weather was warm, by dibbing a hole about 8 inches deep (20 cm) before popping the chitted potato in the hole. Soil was then drawn up and over the potatoes to form a ridge, partly for frost protection and partly to increase soil depth for a bigger crop. In mid-April, the ridge was reinforced with a topping of garden compost to a depth of about 2 inches (5 cm).

Apart from watering twice during the very dry Spring of 2020, there were no other interventions apart from removing the odd weed before the plant foliage had chance to cover the soil surface and suppress them. Some frost damage occurred in May which is unusual in this part of the world.

Around about the first week of July, the foliage started to die back. Salad potatoes could have been harvested in June but I decided to wait and see what sort of yields were possible. In the second week of July, I trimmed off all the remaining foliage and recycled it to the compost bin.

On the 15th July, Mary dug the first plant which yielded 1.15 kg (see photo).

This is sufficient for our immediate needs so we will leave the other potatoes in the ground and dig up as required. See comments below for further yield data as we dig them up over the next month or so.

Sarpo Axona Potatoes

A maincrop potato with pink skin, great flavour and best-in-class disease resistance. These are still growing so I will report on them later. They were ordered, delivered and chitted along with the Sarpo Una potatoes but planted out about 3 weeks later (mid-April) because the chitting process was much slower. They suffered a little frost damage in May as did the Sarpo Una.

I planted two rows in the raised bed and split the six 'spare' potatoes between 2 potato bags (filled with a mixture of coir and homegrown garden compost). Plants in the raised bed have been left to their own devices to a large extent whereas the potato bags have been regularly watered and fed with diluted comfrey tea (200:1 dilution). I will report on the yield and quality of these potatoes in a later post.

 

Growing Loofahs and Sunburnt Raspberries

Growing Loofah (Luffa) Plants 

In everyday parlance, loofahs are the dried fruits of a tropical/subtropical luffa vine, a member of the cucumber family. When harvested young, it is a popular vegetable especially in India, China and Vietnam. If the fruit is allowed to fully ripen on the vine, it becomes very fibrous and takes on a new life as the well-known scrubbing sponge in bathrooms and kitchens.

On a visit to the 2019 Malvern Autumn Show, we bought a packet of seeds to see if we could grow them in our polytunnel using the Quadgrow system. Two seeds were germinated in an unheated greenhouse using Dalefoot seed compost then transplanted out into the polytunnel in late April/mid-May in Quadgrow pots filled with Fertile Fibre coir (reconstituted from a 5kg block). Two out of three seeds germinated. The seedling transplanted in late April was very slow to develop and is now way behind the seedling planted out in mid-May. The photo below, taken on 1st July 2020, shows the luffa vine's vigorous growth along the polytunnel frame. A small yellow flower can be seen on the luffa; the first one to open. In the left foreground is a cucumber plant with its own yellow flowers.

Our four cucumber plants have already produced over 60 edible cucumbers by the time the first luffa flower opened! Close-ups of the luffa flower below.

We are hopeful the vigorous growing luffa will produce some fruits; less hopeful the rather weedier-looking specimen has enough time left to be productive though it is still growing. The plan is to use the dried loofah sponges as pan scrubs to replace for the ones we bought last year. 

Sunburnt Raspberries

Can raspberries get sunburn. The answer is yes!

The high UV levels and sunshine during April and May caused some fruit to get sunburnt (sunscald). It is known as White Drupelet Syndrome or Disorder. It affects those drupelets most exposed to the sun, usually on the top of the fruit or on the sunny side. Although unsightly, the fruits are still edible.