9 litres of rainwater collected in the last week! The pond had a lot of bindweed in it, so I made a good effort at clearing it out, including the more established bit at the back of the pond. I carefully checked the weed and found several damselfly larvae to return to the water. I later discovered a number in the shallow waters of the bird bowl too. The pond looks much better now, so maybe it’ll start to find its balance again soon.

I weeded Bed 11 at last and got all the big weeds out. There are some good-sized gourds coming and it won’t be long before the first sweetcorn can be picked. A cucumber is also on its way, but a bit small at the moment.

Mum and I cleared all the nigella and weeds out of the fern bed, so it looks better now. I cut some dead foliage off the two suffering ferns and saw signs of some new growth, so maybe they’ll fight back.

I’ve given all the tomatoes a good foliage trim to increase air flow. The Romas are much denser than the Red Alerts, which needed little work.

I magically remembered to gather the pale pink poppy seed, so that dead plant is now out of the parsnip bed. I was dead on my feet, so the whole thing just got thrown onto the compost heap as is.

I’d gathered 7 litres of rainwater in my buckets, which was wonderful! That’s gone into the butts, along with whatever came via the gutters. The chaenorhinum along the front of the pond is doing quite nicely and I’m pretty sure there’s an antirrhinum at the bird bowl end. Unless it’s all antirrhinum?!

I did two buckets of weeding from all over, but concentrating on the the front bed. That’s finished for now. I’m leaving the allium to be a splash of colour. I’m not sure where they will end up with bed renovation; maybe moved somewhere where I don’t need to disturb the soil.

The pears look good on the tree, only a few seem to have scab so far.

Happily, with cutting the right hand everlasting pea back an amount I discovered one of the bear’s breeches in flower under all the mess. That’s now been revealed and given more space.

The deadheading will have to wait for now as the weeding did me in. All the transplants from last week are still alive, so there’s a chance of continued colour. I wonder if the anise hyssop in Bed 6 and in small pots at home would be of any use in the gap on the left and in the front bed.

The runner beans have kicked off properly now. Time to carefully scan the wigwam up, down and inside each time.

I have quite a lot of gourds in Bed 11 and with all the rain one of them in particular had taken off left and was trying to climb my mini sweetcorn. I have a few cucumbers coming now and there’s also the unknown cucurbit on the compost heap, which is going great guns. All the time it’s not impeding access, I’ll let it grow to find out what it is.

There’s lots of rain coming tonight, so I didn’t bother taking any bottles to the plot when I went to do the mowing (2 then 1 because of the damp clover). I made sure all my buckets are out and also put the downpipe back together on the left butt. I don’t know why it likes to come apart like that.

The big sunflower has opened its first flower and is streaked with red. It makes me wonder if it’s actually a Hallo.

I saw the field vole again, as it jumped out from between the two big pieces of bark under the apple tree. It then ran along the bramble undergrowth. There are lots of blackberries coming – a bit early really.

Another runner bean was ready to pick and there are lots of flowers on the vines.

I managed to feed everything while it was cloudy. I gave some more to the callicarpa and some other perennials to help them out.

Having seen the rain coming in past my window panes while sheltering in the shed recently, I bought some silicon and managed to remember to do the job today. I’ve put a line across the bottom and down the middle brace. I couldn’t smooth the line behind the water butt so well, but it looks neat enough.

I’ve found a tunnel dug out from the woodland bed up onto Mr B’s path. Hedgehog maybe? The vole is tiny and has already made an enormous network of tunnels, so it can’t be that.

I pulled up lots of spent borage and cut back those that still had obvious flower buds to come. I put some cosmos and rudbeckia I’d been raising at home in the gaps. These aren’t the big cosmos; I’m saving those for when the onions come up.

I’ve put the anise hyssop into the end of Bed 6. The soil was dry and powdery and no doubt needs some more organic material in it. I probably need to get some of my leaf mould spread as mulch before covering the bed in the winter.

There was pond excitement as I was leaving: a damselfly laying her eggs in the hornwort. She stayed for ages and came back in the afternoon too. I also noticed that the poor loosestrife that dried up both have lots of new growth coming at the bottom.

The sweetcorn now has cobs on it, but the plants are so small that I knelt down to take this photo.

The teasel is now flowering. It does so in rings, so won’t ever be a full head of pink flowers.

The apple tree will get a bigger haircut in the winter. I had to unscramble a couple of branches that were weighing each other down to the ground.

An evening visit, still hot though! The pond is a bit busy with blanket weed at the moment, especially as it’s warm. Hopefully it’ll settle in a while. I’ve not seen my diving beetles for a little while, so I hope they’re safe.

The Merlin app caught a new bird: a swallow.

I did lots of deadheading and made a start on cutting down the borage. I’ll need to glove up properly to pull them up. I gathered the first seeds from Bed 1: cornflower and corn marigold. The candytuft has gone over now, so I’ll leave most of that to collect seed. The calendula is still going, but I’ll save that seed too.

I’d been missing the shield bugs, but there are plenty around now, so maybe I was just looking too early.

I pulled all the nigella out of the fern bed. I’d forgotten that I have heucheras in that bed too, so it’s good to give them some space. I’m aiming for foxgloves next year, not nigella and corn cockles. The foliage has disappeared from the bluebell pots, so I might just need to take them out of the pots and plant them and hope for the best.

One of my bags of leaves was falling apart, so I emptied it across the two bins. The top was very dry, but underneath was quite wet. The dry ones in the bin are really crunchy and I feel like I need to put a food mixer in there or something to crumble them up.

Today’s harvest had the first runner beans and carrots. I also picked some small flowers for home, plus one of the Soleil sunflowers.

After all the rain on Sunday, I thought I’d better go and combine all the bucket water to make sure it wasn’t evaporating again. I’d gathered 4.5l, which I’ve put in the shed for a feed in the next few days. The pond was looking a good bit higher. Around the edges, flying ants were emerging in a couple of places, and ordinary ants were running along the wood and up and down a piece on the far bank.

The borage has definitely gone over, which is about a month early. So I need to take that out. There might be room for the less good cosmos from home to fill holes, but it’ll also be a case of revealing log piles, which is ok.

A cucurbit of some kind is emerging from the compost heap. I think for amusement I’m going to let it do its thing until it’s a nuisance. I picked another big beetroot for Suzy. There are still a couple of big ones to pick, but we’ve still got one in the fridge.

Looking at the panorama at full size I’ve just noticed a tall sunflower in Bed 6 – maybe a Hallo? It’s reached the shed roof and looks like it hasn’t finished yet.

There’s a beautiful poppy plant by the parsnips, which I’m doing my best to remember, so I can gather seed from it.

The first gourds are appearing now – some round pale ones and some green striped ones.

It looks like it might be a good pear year too. A few look a bit scabby, but most look good and healthy like this.

A lot of the flowers had gone over (rather early this year as it’s been so dry) so after doing all the deadheading, I made a start on clearing the front bed. The dead corn cockles are hiding the alliums and perennials and I don’t want them to seed down this year. I thought I’d be able to pull them out, but the ground was rock hard, so I cut them off. Rain is coming overnight and tomorrow, so hopefully the ground will soften a little with most of the rubbish gone.

There’s more work to be done – clearing and then digging out the roots. I need to feed the callicarpa again as it doesn’t look very happy. I have some good perennials in the bed, but I need more robust plants in there, having got rid of all the weeds that cover the ground. Adding a bunch of compost and leaves would be a good idea too.

I harvested a massive beetroot for Suzy. There are more big ones to come. I know I’ve watered that bed an amount, but it’s been so dry that the beetroot success is still a bit of a mystery to me.

I didn’t want the edges to get too long, so I did the strimming after work. It turned out that I didn’t need to do it all though, as the recent heat has stopped the grass growing too fast.

I noticed some movement on the bug hotel and saw a field vole on top, sitting in the evening sun. He stayed long enough for me to retrieve my phone from the other side of the plot (where it was recording birdsong on Merlin) and when he noticed me, he darted down a hole and then ran across the front inside. There are holes all over the plot, but maybe that’s his base.

The sunflowers are opening, as are the sweet peas. The Red Alert tomatoes are flowering well, but the Romas haven’t started yet.

I harvested some more radishes. It’s really old seed, but seems to be happy to grow. I need to sow some more.