Sheepwash Chronicle Autumn 2016 edition

Autumn Thoughts
The weather has been a fickle jade this summer, with some
absolutely scorching and humid periods and then some awful
wet times - however, we must bear up and accept whatever
comes!
Our swallows and martins seem to have left, with never a fond
farewell - one day they’re there, the next gone, only a few
stragglers left. It is amazing, I think, that the youngsters leave
after the parents but still know where to go.
We now await the arrival of the winter visitors and all that can
be heard in the garden at the moment is the winter song of the
robin, the only bird that sings all year round to protect its
territory.
If you’re lucky you could be hearing the roar of stags (red deer)
and bucks (fallow deer) at rut, though I haven’t seen a deer, except the odd Roe, for quite some time. Along
the under road towards Totleigh Barton was a good place to hear the fallow deer, and south of the road to
Hatherleigh for red deer. (There is a place called Rutleigh in that direction - could this be significant?)
Whilst on wildlife, rabbits seem to be in profusion, and devastating some people’s gardens, but luckily not
mine or my allotment. I’ll keep my fingers crossed!
Unintentionally, that leads rather nicely on to gardening. Now is the time to harvest apples, and what a
crop it seems to be! Pears will be ready a little later. Thin out and trim summer fruiting raspberries and tie
them in to their framework.
The flower garden needs attention now, with the lifting and splitting of perennials, using the outside parts
of the clumps when replanting. Collect seeds from flowering plants when they’re dry, and store in paper
bags for sowing next spring. Lift and dispose of tired and dying summer bedding, fork over the areas, and
fertilise with a low nitrogen feed, as you don’t want excessive lush green growth going into winter, as this
can encourage disease.
Plant spring bedding. Also, plant daffodil bulbs now (tulips can be left until November). If need be, Acers
can be pruned at this time of year – if they’re left until spring they will bleed when cut – but be careful not
to tear the bark as this can let in disease.
In the vegetable garden, dig over bare ground for winter, incorporating compost or manure to be ready for
planting next spring. Garlic should be planted – each clove up to about two inches deep in October/early
November – and winter onion sets can be planted now, but not as deep, just under the surface will suffice.
Now is also the time to plant spring greens, six inches apart and one foot between rows, so that every other
plant can be used as spring greens and the others left to heart up, but if you’ve got a slug and snail problem
like I have it’s probably a waste of time, as you’ll only be feeding the blighters!
Continue checking winter greens for caterpillars, slugs, and snails. We’re trying nematodes to control the
slugs, and I’ve also set out some beer traps, which have succeeded in stupefying and drowning a lot of
slugs. I wish I knew of a similar way to control snails.
While on the subject of gastropods (that’s slugs and snails to you and me) I read a very disturbing article
the other week concerning slug pellets. I know I bang on about using the safer ferric phosphate and not the
metaldehyde ones (the blue ones), but this concerned dogs (I don’t know about cats). The blue
metaldehyde pellets are mixed with the same cereal base most dog foods are made of, which makes them
highly palatable. Half a cup (or 80 gms) is enough to kill a fully-grown Labrador, states Dr Ed Blane of
Natural England. One poor man in Norfolk lost three dogs in one day.
The pellets can spill out in piles as they are being spread on crops, so be aware and be careful when walking
around fields or using them around the garden. Maybe it’s time to accept that a few holes in the Hostas are
better than a dead dog.
Jeremy Burden
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