France in Focus

Be interesting how fellow gardeners are coping with this very hot weather.
I have been slowly pulling beetroot to use in the salads which we live on every summer but this year even with watering every night, they are going hard and splitting, can only bottle so many jars as toh doesn't eat vinegar preserves and having tried to store them in the past I found it not successful. Onion and shallot crop is the best ever, they dry store well. Only veg in the potager now is young cabbage, courgettes, and roma tomatoes which are coming to an end.
Although its hard work having heavy clay soil its a blessing with the rose beds, they are coping wonderfully along with the espalier fruit trees.

Mulching, saving shower and washing up water so I can still water stuff without falling foul of the water restrictions.

Frantically harvesting tobacco leaves before they over ripen.

The rest of the veg seem to be coping well - my herbaceous beds aren't doing quite as well, but I'm not too concerned because I can't eat or smoke them.

We save every drop of spare water we can for the same reasons as you Charlotte. I've put literally tons of wood chippings on the flowerbeds and round trees. Our soil is mostly sandy with one area of clayey stuff. Most things have done pretty well so far but then we haven't had the horrendous temperatures of down south. The constant breezes can be drying though.

We've only grown a few spuds this year - we haven't the time to work on a veg patch with all our other activities. Plus this area is brilliant for farms and people selling directly - bio and non-bio - and the prices are a fraction of what we'd pay elsewhere.

Similar for us no fruit, its either the wasps, or birds that get them or the weather watering is not too bad I have 600lts underground for the smallish veg plot, the main problem is with the Bloody Flea Beatle, cant shift them

The rain from the last couple of days has been a blessing both for the garden and for refilling the water butts.

WE are much behind many of you and our tomatoes are just coming into ripened fruit. First courgettes also in the last week. The new potatoes are now half cropped and the space planted with broad beans for harvest in the autumn. (So that rain has been a real help in giving them a chance to germinate.)

Spectrum wrote: ↑Sun Jul 28, 2019 2:24 pm Similar for us no fruit, its either the wasps, or birds that get them or the weather watering is not too bad I have 600lts underground for the smallish veg plot, the main problem is with the Bloody Flea Beatle, cant shift them

Flea beatle? That's a new one on me! What's a flea beatle/beetle please?

Bayleaf wrote: ↑Sun Jul 28, 2019 3:01 pm

Spectrum wrote: ↑Sun Jul 28, 2019 2:24 pm Similar for us no fruit, its either the wasps, or birds that get them or the weather watering is not too bad I have 600lts underground for the smallish veg plot, the main problem is with the Bloody Flea Beatle, cant shift them

Flea beatle? That's a new one on me! What's a flea beatle/beetle please?

Here you go Bayleaf,

https://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profile?pid=510

Pretty much the same here as with exile - toms just ripening, courgettes just coming into their own. One physalis has loads of fruit, the other none. Plenty of redcurrants from a new bush, but the blackcurrant has suffered hugely from the heat and the birds had a feast.
Lots of experimentation this year as it's the first full year of the new (tiny) garden, formerly all grass. I bought 36 bales of straw last summer and marked out beds, then plonked in cuttings and lots of perennials in autumn/spring. It's been interesting to see what has thrived (and where) and what needs moving - I'm going to assume that spring/summers will be hotter than in the past and give more shade than I'd planned.
Loads of bees, hardly any wasps and lots of flies in the last week.

Char wrote: ↑Sun Jul 28, 2019 3:15 pm

Bayleaf wrote: ↑Sun Jul 28, 2019 3:01 pm

Spectrum wrote: ↑Sun Jul 28, 2019 2:24 pm Similar for us no fruit, its either the wasps, or birds that get them or the weather watering is not too bad I have 600lts underground for the smallish veg plot, the main problem is with the Bloody Flea Beatle, cant shift them

Flea beatle? That's a new one on me! What's a flea beatle/beetle please?

Here you go Bayleaf,

https://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profile?pid=510

Thank you Charlotte!