If scorcher was last week’s word, this week’s is downpour.
Listening to the rain last night I was remembering an ill fated Duke of Edinburgh camping expedition many, many years ago in deepest Devon. We woke to find our small tent afloat. It wasn’t that we picked the wrong spot; the whole field became a lake.
So whilst the Duke was presumably shaking his cornflakes out of the Tupperware, blithely unaware of the havoc being wreaked in his name, we were bailed out by the kindly farmer and his wife and sat drying out in their warm, fuggy kitchen watching the farmer drink his milky tea out of a Pyrex bowl whilst their grey parrot watched us, the damp intruders.
But heavy though it sounded, turns out last night’s rain wasn’t nearly enough to float a tent of luckless D of E’rs. I now keep a measuring jug on the garden table (weighted with a pebble) as an unscientific means of measuring rainfall. This morning’s catch, less than 50ml.
It seems though I’m not the only one with water on the brain.
Tomato Daily has helpful advice on how to care for tomatoes in a rainy patch, whilst Veggiegardener has a detailed piece on Dry Farming tomatoes based on the concept of stressing them to maximise flavour ( I know who’s doing the stressing here at Tomato Towers…it’s not the tomatoes !)
Another gadget to consider over at London Vegetable Garden. A support for tomato that sits underneath a grow bag.
Urban Veggie Garden has lots of tomato pictures including some pruning before and afters –work those secateurs !
Looking at the photos of the upside down tomatoes I wonder if Tumbler would be a good variety for that method. Their habit seems to be to grow downwards, reach a certain length and then curl upwards.
My Island Garden is awash with green tomatoes – Brandywine, Black Krim, Japanese Trifle and Patio whilst Down on the Allotment (post dated 4th July) has a tomato which I really like the look of, Great Wall of China. There is something ancient about its appearance. Just the tomato to fill the sandwiches for a Terracotta army.
Today’s photo is of Garden Pearl. I like the way it shoots up and then tumbles down with lots of shoots, flowers and fruit , very fountain like in fact !
