[Oliver]

Ever poked your eye out with a bamboo cane? (Well, nearly). She did - just finished staking the tomatoes and tieing them in and was about to go and get the green mushrooms (which don't often fit properly anyway) when she saw a tomato and bent down to pick it, and ouch - took the skin off the side of her nose, just missing her eye.

Suddenly she had an idea - empty benecol pots - they fit beautifully over the cane, the hole is as big as you need and are deep enough so they won't blow away. Only trouble is, don't use benecol, or actimel, or whatever the stuff is called. Well fortunately a friend's husband has one every morning so she saves the pots for them. They are brilliant. So recycle your pots - Take the label off before you use them because it just deteriorates and you end up with bits of plastic all over the place - the white pots look fun too and accumulate quickly.

Other uses:
in the polytunnel - on the ends of canes to stop the cane poking a hole in the cover
outside on the enviromesh framework - the pots are 'waisted' so you can tie them on to horizontal canes to make a house for the brassicas - protects against butterfly caterpillars and the dreaded pigeons.

He says she sould send a picture to benecol - perhaps they will send her a case.  Shudder. Have you smelt it?
Oliver :?

[GrannieAnnie]

oliver, honeybun, welcome back!!!!   I was only thinking about you lst night!  Still alive and kicking then?  Spent much time on the shed roof this summer?

[GrannieAnnie]

I was afraid someone had scared you off!  The allotment sounds lovely!  My veg garden is a mess, looking after 500 odd chickens and turkeys of differing ages takes up a lot of my time, and the weeds killed off most of my carrots and parsnips, and I didn't get my cabbages in!  But the polytunnel full of tomatoes and chillies is doing well.  My yellow brandywines are getting bigger!!!!!!

We had to have our Sooty Cat put to sleep a couple of weeks ago, she wasn't very well at all.  That's one reason why I was thinking, I hope Oliver is well, haven't heard from him for ages!!!!

[Oliver]

chillies .... doing well.

The tomatoes in the poly are doing very well:
growing tropical ruby (small plum type),
ildi (yellow plum),
golden sunrise
Principe Borghese (an italian variety) - a 'vine' type and
because I know they will work - gardener's delight (in case the others went belly up)
the Inca - our door plum type - are doing really well this year. Lost them all last year due to blight s I just hope they ripen and beat the blight.

She sowed lots of chillies this year with a view to making chilli jam and sauces for Christmas presents - red ones, and Hungarian hot wax. she kept 6 of each back for herself and gave the rest to a friend for her plant sale. When it came to potting on she could not find any chillies. Funny that, what had happened to them? turns out she gave them ALL to her friend! what a twit.  Well, fortunately said friend had 2 left, and they turned out to be one of each. so they were duly potted on and were growing nicely, when He came to help move the plants to a better location in the poly. The red ones had an accident ( :evil:!!) and so only Hungarian hot wax to show for the trouble.  So she bought 3 plants: Long Joe's cayenne, Thai chillies and Red Rooster. So far they are thriving ...

Oh well. What a busy life!
Oliver