Rough Winds DO Shake the Darling Buds of May

but which buds would Shakespear have been referring to?

I have a feeling these wouldn't have been around in his day:

Redcurrant (unripe)

But maybe these would?



Elderflower in bud

 At any rate we've had wind bad for a week in Edinburgh and I'm fed up with it. Whereas I expected a break from zipping up the two plastic greenhouses as the weather got warmer instead I'm leaving them zipped up all day as well as night to protect the plants from the wind!  My beans (all 130+)  have outgrown their pots and need to be planted out, so what to do?  Here's my solution:


Like shipes in the night

 As you can see the whole plot is beginning to look like a badly run laundry. In the distance there's a tunnel of dwarf beans and the other white mounds are thrip nets over carrots.


Runner beans all aboard


Even hardy old rhubarb is protesting about chill winds:

Rhubarb in shock

The only protection my peas are getting though is from the birds.  The picture doesn't really show the wide gauge pea netting strung between the posts (although the nearest, earliest, row has a more robust chicken wire tunnel). That's six rows now, three presprouted in toilet rolls and three sown direct today - Mangetout, Petit Pois and "ordinary" Kelvdon Wonder.




A proliferation of peas

The only protection for spuds  is mounding. After the frost two weeks ago more have emerged. 

Mounded potatoes

 And to end my weekend roundup on a cheery note, our local pair of swans have a new brood:




New arrivals (1 day old)