Not quite mellow fruitfulness

We certainly returned to gardens which had enjoyed their freedom and flourished into the bargain. The photographs show one through the archway into the flower garden the other three are of the veggie patch.
There are 2 beds with green manure which will dig in nicely in the spring.
The brassicas under the net aren't doing too badly, the others are good too, but I'd like some frost to kill off the caterpillars, because I took off the nets much earlier than usual with being away and the rascals noticed!
There are plenty of roots, from swede and turnip, to carrot, parsnips and beetroot. I still have the main crop potatoes to dig, but they are under a good layer of soil, so I am hoping they will be OK.
There are 2 lots of leeks, surviving rather than thriving. Having said that, Mrs Soggy dug a few yesterday and they were fine - and that was of the less happy looking ones.
Courgettes have had it, there are a couple of marrows to be used up, and the cucumbers have gone too, which is a shame - they were a great variety, I had hoped they'd stretch on into late autumn. Good news though is that the tomatoes in the greenhouse are still going along, not cropping heavily, but ticking over with a few small ones.

GMO in the wild

One of the fears of those of us who grow organically is that GMO crops will escape into the wild and cross-pollinate with native species and garden plants and produce. Fortunately, for those of us in Europe, the EU has been fairly robust (though not always as vigorous as might be hoped) in resisting some of the advances of GMO.

Had I not been on a trip to Canada, I may never have seen this, but here it comes:

"Genetically modified canola has escaped from the farm and is thriving in the wild across North Dakota, according to a study that indicates there are plenty of novel man-made genes crossing the Canada-U.S. border.

GM canola was found growing everywhere from ditches to parking lots, the scientists report, with some of the highest densities along a trucking route into Canada."

Read the full story in the Vancouver Sun (if you can get hold of the printed version there is a picture worth a thousand words). Genetically modified canola goes wild

Hilary's beds

Productive veggie beds at our niece's place on Vancouver island. Plentiful herbs in the foreground, with potatoes to the right and behind them kale which survived a deer attack. The grass area to the right is earmarked for more beds, the eventual plan being to expand production enough to feed all four of them the basic staples from the garden, so lots more potatoes, onions, leeks, brassicas and roots to come.