A View From (Just Adjacent To) The Greenhouse; King O T’North….Issit?

Over the course of my fortnightly ramblings, my loyal reader may, (or more likely) may not have noticed a growing pile of rotting wood inside a rail fence which sits just outside the shed. It was part of a series of sheep pens, back in the day, complete with two dipping troughs. It fell first into disuse and then disrepair when Norman gave up sheep farming and, as is the way with such things, ended up as a convenient place to chuck the odd bit of scrap timber. As, again, is the way of such things, the odd bit of scrap timber grew into what turned out to be five trailer loads of rotten old rubbish wood, along with half a trailer of brambles which had grown around and through it over the years. The B&M department decided they’d had enough of adding to what had become something of an eyesore and decided a makeover was in order. What to do with the space that’s been created is the next challenge, but the difference is quite remarkable. You don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone, especially where a pile of rotting wood’s concerned, is definitely a truism!

Our recently formed council, an amalgamation of several smaller authorities in our region now has the grand title of Westmorland And Furness Unitary authority. Whatever the name, pothole repairs and road gully clearing aren’t high priorities on their agenda, but charging to take away green waste most certainly is. Until recently we’ve had “free” collections ever two weeks for most of the year and every four weeks during the “kipper” months, but now, if we want any green waste collecting, we have to have a bin with a coded sticker and we have to pay for the privilege. Following a very short discussion, which ended with a collect “F**k that for a game of soldiers”, the B&M department decided to construct a series of bins where hedge clippings, grass cuttings, weeds and the like could be given the chance to rot down and, in the fullness of time, feed the existing compost bin. As with all things undertaken by the team, no job gets done by halves. I hoe to be around long enough to put the results to some good use.

Strawberry update klaxon. As previously reported, both my own stock of strawberry plants, but more so most of the new replacements, are doing extremely well and we’ve been tucking in to the odd one or two in recent days. Maya’s a big fan, which makes me an extremely happy and proud grandad. I think I mentioned, last time out, that I was hoping to replace all the old stock with new. I’m happy to report that healthy runners are now starting to form on most of the new plants and this current spell of warm weather should really give them a boost. My inherent Yorkshire-ness could have cost me here, I’m glad I put my hand in my pocket.

I’ve harvested the garlic, not bad for a first real attempt, so I think I’ll try the same again later in the year, but with a few more cloves this time. I’ve hung them to dry a little, but I intend to put these cloves in some olive oil. We don’t use a great deal of garlic, so this little supply of home grown should last us a good couple of months, so long as the oil thing works.

Not exactly a “new” departure as such, given that I’ve given butternut squash a go in the past, albeit with very limited success. This time around (under the supervision of the B&M department, who provided the seed) we’ve put three plants in the greenhouse, under the old vine, and (hopefully) left them enough room to spread out without taking the place over. My thinking is that they might be better off outside, but currently space is at a premium and we can always  shade them, should they require us to do so. Hopefully there’ll be some success and we can have a change from tomato or leek and potato soup (roasting’s always an option, too, we aren’t Philistines).

A quick update on the “pea planted in a plastic tube” experiment. It appears to be working and given the Bank Holiday weather we are having, I’m expecting further progress when I get round there, having spent a couple of days away from t’coal face, as it were. Last count there were what looked like seven viable shoots. Only another 21 to go!

Staying with the outside area, and although the four varieties of climbing beans seem very reluctant to germinate (again this burst of warm weather may be the catalyst) the broad beans which I directly planted several weeks ago, having acquired some new seed at B&Q (of all places) have decided it’s time to spring to life. Pea and broad bean risotto in a month or two, I have no doubt. I’d found myself in the shop having looked unsuccessfully in a few other places for seed, but all were sold out. There were two packets in B&Q, one of which was ripped (not by me, honest). Any road up, I took it to the counter and said I’d happily buy it if there was a discount to be had. Long story short, I got the pack for half price and, as I’d salvaged the beans that had fallen from the tear I’ll call that a proper Yorkshire deal.

I may have mentioned in the past that there’s a young woman in the village who works at an independent garden centre, for several years now she’s had a little stall outside her front gate, complete with honesty box, from which she sells both flowers and vegetable seedlings. I have bought from her in the past, but as my seed collections have grown I’ve tried, parsimony getting the better of me, to manage without doing so, even given that the prices are more than fair. I’ve got some leeks in that I “incubated” in small pots and I’ve also put some seed directly in the ground. In the past a small tray of leeks (maybe 8), which I have purchased, was a couple of quid, but, like everything else, the prices have gone up, so I’d decided not to bother. I was passing on my way home from the pub and I stopped on a whim to inspect the wares. One tray of leeks had seventeen plants (a record, I think). I knew I could find room for them somewhere (and I did) at 20p each, another bargain too good to miss!

I took a small gamble and took the best twenty of tomato plants out of the cold frame and set them to hardening off. To be fair, they all had root poking through the pot drain holes, so they needed planting out, which I’ve duly done, along with a dozen or so mixed chili and pepper plants, mostly supplied by a friend following another crop that had failed to germinate successfully. Ironically enough, I can’t move for embryonic chili plants and I can see the old “Plants Free To Good Homes” sign coming out, although given that the young lady with the plant stall is likely to be leaving the village this autumn, maybe there’s a gap in the market to fill?

The same pal who brought me the capsicum plants has also, following discussions about over-watering, recommended something to me called Bio-Char. I’d never heard of it, but in essence it’s ground charcoal and is supposed to do wonders for plant health. I balked a little when I saw the price of it and fancifully had the germ of an idea to create my own. That obviously would have taken a long time, but I needn’t have worried, as a box of it was provided, along with said recommendation. I could have used a spoon to apply a top dressing to the already planted seedlings, or I could fashion a delivery method using yet more alkathene, cut at a rakish angle, with a perfectly sized polystyrene bung fitted to ensure minimal spillage. It actually works and I’ve got a year to think about how I acquire (or make) a similar product for next time around.

I don’t suppose you could really call it a comeback, Mr. Burnham never really went away, but his impending rise to the top of the political greasy pole is something to behold. Even though he’s never done a proper days work in his life, he’s become, in a very short space of time, Labours “Great White Hope” as the party seeks to divest itself of the Starmer millstone and plot a future for itself, this time with a real “working class hero” at the helm, rather than a common or garden, salt of the earth, knows what it’s like to be skint, toolmakers son. Burnham has form in party leadership battles.  In 2010 he came fourth of five, losing out to Ed & the EdStone (a truly ringing endorsement) and in 2015 he upped his game a bit, finishing second to Jeremy Corbyn (put that on your CV and smoke it). I’m guessing he knew it was only a matter of time before he’d make the greatest comeback since Lazarus.

During his time as a minister he owned a mortgaged flat (maybe he still does, because it might soon come in handy) a ten minute walk or so from Parliament. He conveniently put it onto the rental market once the perk of mortgage payments for second homes was stopped, before renting another apartment at taxpayers expense. All within the rules of course, and he was far from the only one at it, but it isn’t really the type of thing you expect from a t-shirt wearing, morning jogging “man of the people”, is it? Maybe this is where his sobriquet “Flip-Flop” comes from, but it’s more likely to do with his inability to stick to his somewhat moveable principles during his time as a minister. I don’t live in Makerfield, but if I did, and even if I considered myself to be an ardent and committed Labour supporter, I couldn’t bring myself to vote for this fellow, even though the citizens of Manchester seem to think he’s a top bloke. Maybe they’ve all got short memories, or are just too young to remember his initial refusal to call an independent public enquiry into the Mid-Staffs hospital trust scandal, or his involvement in what was euphemistically called “The Liverpool Pathway”. Hopefully, the good people of Makerfield are fully aware of Mr. Burnhams track record and will use their vote accordingly.
 

© Colin Cross 2026