Peat, weeds and (real) Easter eggs
This week an update on peat, why my geese love goosegrass, a recipe for a cake and a garden visit
A ban on peat …. is it really coming?
April is looming, and for me, that means campaigning under the banner of PeatFreeApril, a month-long campaign to educate people via social media on why peat should stay in the ground. I had written about why we need a ban on the use of peat in horticulture, but this all changed when I heard that Theresa Villiers had introduced a 10-minute motion to bring in a bill to prohibit the sale in England of horticultural peat by the end of 2024 and to provide for certain exemptions from that prohibition and for connected purposes. The bill will be heard on 16 April. There is government commitment and cross party support, so I really, really hope that I will be reporting good news.
Meanwhile if you are visiting a garden centre over Easter and looking to buy some potting compost, check the bag – all the peat free composts have it written boldly across the front. Don’t be fooled by the reduced peat ones.
This year our campaign is focused on making compost so gardeners are more self sufficient and don’t have to buy in potting compost. Kim very generously allowed us to write 3 articles on compost making in Amateur Gardening Mag. The first article, published this week, was written by Alex Valk (@rantsaboutplants) and she outlined the basics of making compost. The next one, 9 April, is written by Gill Hickman of the Pennington Community Allotment and she discusses the ins and outs of using hotbins and bokashi and the third one is written by Beth Otway (@pumpkinbeth) and that’s on growing plants like comfrey that you can use for composting. Beth has a great blog on composting here.
Weeds
I have been looking at ‘weeds’ this week – not the weeds you want to remove, but those that are really useful in the garden. There are plenty in flower this week – shepherd’s purse, bittercress, red and white dead nettles, dandelions, celandine, speedwell, stitchwort, and ivy-leaved toadflax.
The toadflax (Cymbalaria muralis) caught my eye as it’s covering some of my old walls and its small flowers have had a constant stream of insect visitors, including solitary bees and flies. Its not actually a native, but was introduced from southern Europe around 500 years ago, whereupon it naturalised and spread. Now we find it everywhere growing from cracks and crevices in walls. I was reading up on this plant and discovered this fact. Initially the shoots grow towards the light i.e. they positively phototrophic, but once the flowers are fertilised, they grow towards darker places, such as crevices, so the seeds can fall in places where they can germinate. So clever.
Another weed that I positively seek out at this time of year is goosegrass, stickywilly or cleavers (Galium aparine). This is a creeping annual with long stem and whorls of leaves that are covered in tiny hooked hairs so they cling to vegetation. Its edible, but that the not the reason why I let it grow in the garden. My poultry absolutely love it, indeed they fight over it, so It’s not surprising that its called goosegrass. And the reason is probably because it has medicinal properties,specifically as a natural wormer. In fact the well known natural livestock wormer, Verm-X, has the following ingredients – cinnamon, garlic, thyme, peppermint, fennel, cleavers, nettles, slippery elm, quassia and elecampane. I grow many of these in the garden so the chickens get a fresh supply in the summer.
You can see in this video how the chickens just love it (and you can hear the geese talking to me from the neighbouring pen).
And continuing the poultry theme
An Easter recipe
At this time of year all my birds are in lay – the geese, ducks and hens, and I have a lovely selection of eggs, which are brilliant for making cakes.
To make my all-in-one lemon sandwich cake you need 1 goose egg (or 2 duck eggs or 3 hens eggs) and 2 homegrown lemons (bit of a brag here as my lemon trees covered with fruits!!)
Weigh the goose egg, crack and add to a bowl and then add the same weight of soft butter, castor sugar, self raising flour, the zest and juice of one lemon.
Simply stir together so the fat is incorporated and tip into two greased sandwich tins.
Cook in oven at 180C fan for 20 minutes. Turn out, and when cool, sandwich together with some lemon buttercream made with lemon juice, butter and icing sugar).
Easy peasy ….
A garden visit
Last week I did a mini book tour to celebrate the launch of my book, The Resilient Garden and Allotment Handbook, speaking at several garden clubs including the U3A garden group at Malmesbury.
The next day I attended the specialist plant fair at Sarah Rivett-Carnac’s garden at Charlton Farm near Malmesbury. There were some great stall holders present which meant more Muscari purchases …. But the garden was delightful too so here is a gallery to show you some highlights.
There is another fair next month if you fancy visiting the garden. Well worth a visit.
Happy Easter
I know we are all desperate to be in the garden over Easter so let’s hope the winds and rain subside and we get a few sunny hours to catch up on all the stuff we haven’t done yet. In my case, its planting early potatoes and my potato onions, potting on the first tomatoes, cutting the willow, finishing off a woven willow structure to contain my leaf litter, mulching beds and possibly sowing the first parsnips but it may be too cold and wet … still ..
Happy gardening
Sally
Talks and Workshops
Workshop 5 April Growing polytunnel and undercover edibles over winter with Kim from her garden in West Wales
Talk 15 April Sally is speaking at Fagus at Nailsea, Somerset
Workshop 19 April Get climate change savvy GYO course with Kim from her garden in West Wales
Talk 11 May Sally is speaking at the FarmED Literary Festival - the venue is brilliant and the speakers awesome