Rest When I'm Dead

Three 10-metre beds of lettuce - I hope people want to buy it all!

Picture the scene. It's the end of a long day in the office. You have been working on three different tasks, one a report that your boss needs first thing tomorrow, the other two are longer-term but with deadlines near the end of the month. Today one of them has involved you pulling in certain experts across the company for their views which you're not sure you have captured completely accurately, but your notes on your computer are as detailed as you could get them.  You rush out to try to catch the 7:14pm home.

A bean wigwam

Overnight someone breaks in. Rather than simply taking the computers as any decent burglar might, this incognito troublemaker finds your laptop and somehow logs in. To your dismay the next morning you find certain files modified, and others apparently vanished. The notes from yesterday's meetings have been wiped. The boss' report has been heavily edited, most of it deleted. It takes you most of the morning to rewrite the documents, relying on memory, and you're not that happy with the results. The next night, the same thing happens. And the next night. The police are called and make the right noises but as nothing physical is missing you get the feeling they are not going to bust a gut to find the criminal.

Now you know how I feel about slugs. 

Buttercups prettify my polytunnel exterior

I spend hours carefully teasing out lettuces one at a time from their seed tray, pulling their roots gently away from the others, and planting them in soil which often needs a bit of extra rotted manure dug in first, then watering each one around the base making sure the leaves are not caught in the flow (they are easily damaged, and the sun could scorch wet leaves). During the night a rampage of slugs, mostly tiny ones, slide out from their daytime hiding places and gorge themselves senseless on the vulnerable plants. The next morning I might find 20% of them killed, and others with one of their two leaves missing so reducing their chances of survival. This is why I'm going out at 10pm each night with a headtorch and spending at least an hour going round everything, picking them all off - their destination, the river. The big ones I don't mind so much, at least I can easily see them and pluck them from their breakfast. It's the little critters I hate, they're so fiddly, but just as deadly when en masse.

 Some of my many many cabbages

Anyway, enough about slugs, I hear you drawl. You were banging on about them last week. The only thing worse than a bore on their pet subject is a bore whose pet subject is slugs.

So let me share with you some of my non-slug-related activities of the last seven days. I have direct-sowed four metres of "Mooli" radish, the long white Asian type, and sowed in pots twelve fennel seeds, two more melon seeds and three butternut squash (some earlier-sown ones have sprouted already). I've replaced four dead or dying sweetcorn seedlings with four fresh ones, and done the same with nine climbing french bean plants, two runner bean plants and many lettuces. I made a wigwam out of bamboo poles and planted nine french bean seedlings around the base (of the climbing type I hope!) Many other plants in pots got big enough to be planted outside in the soil - one red cabbage, three dwarf french bean plants, fourteen green cabbages, fifteen red orache (a beautiful ruby-leaved salad plant), seventeen broccoli, 24 kale, 50 "Morton's Secret Mix" lettuce, 63 beetroot, and 90 "Australian Yellowleaf" lettuce. Into the polytunnel soil went the last four tomato plants and the first four yellow courgette plants. And a grand total of 189 cabbages have been potted on (ie removed from the module where it began life and given a larger pot of its own). Yes, you read that right - I've gone cabbage-tastic this year. There are more on their way too. Lest we forget, all these young seedlings need watering each day because they're under cover, and given the recent hot weather I've been watering outside a bit too.

Somehow I've had to squeeze all that in around certain paid odd-jobs that came up this week, joining a crew at a carpenter's workshop to make up wall panels and painting moveable steps and a lectern (it's for a conference in Brick Lane apparently) and then loading the lorry with them all, weeding the grounds at the local health centre, and giving a piano lesson.

And of course while I'm busy doing all the aforementioned, those darn garden weeds will keep on growing. One day I'll have to get round to doing something about it. Now, as I was saying about those slugs...

Less Far From The Madding Crowd

The happy couple

For a weekend I was plunged into a maelstrom of people. A wedding of a friend drew me from my idyllic hidey-hole, a train shuttling me out east out of peaceful rural mid-Wales to the grime of urban mid-England where a second train picked me up and escorted me south to the over-populated capital of the United Kingdom.  

It had changed a little bit in the sixteen months I'd been away. Two new skyscrapers and a third being built. Lower Marsh, one of my local haunts in Waterloo, had more trendy cafes than you could shake a skinny latte at. The bookshop on the corner of Waterloo Road had vanished, taking the entire building with it. Waterloo Station had smartened up good and proper. There seemed to be more souped-up cars idling past than I remembered. Boris Bikes were now advertising Santander instead of Barclays. Old-style Routemaster buses were on the roads. 

My preferred mode of transport, sporting new gear sprocket and chain and brake blocks

Perhaps I'd changed a bit too. I found myself noticing the trees more. Sirens made me jump - although they were deliberately starting them just as they went past me, the ambulance driver lolling out of his window and jeering "Beardy!" as he roared past. Yes, this is London.  And the people everywhere, all looking slightly younger than last time, thronging around happily in the sunshine as if there was nowhere else on Earth to be. I joined in, met a few old friends, and became for a while a Londoner again.

An old bridge in Dinas Mawddwy

In reality my day-to-day life affords me only occasional interactions with other humans. Mostly I commune with the young plants in my care which seem keen to teach me a lesson in how to make the most of what life throws at us, in their case howling gales, driving rain, acid soil, wildly varying temperatures, and slugs. Some do not make it. Others are hanging in there, the verdict undecided. Yet those that live will, in just a few short months, transform from a single seed to a mighty plant bearing edible gifts for whosoever may choose to pluck. Get your beaks off, birds!

A visiting sibling showing off his new head

 I do also occasionally commune with the beings which move under their own volition. There are a lot more of them around now, fragile flying things that fly into my face at night attracted by the headtorch, birds arriving from their winter holiday in southern Africa and noisily telling the other stay-at-home birds all about it, a frog that I found squatting amongst the asparagus stems that refused to move even after a gentle prod, beetles galore. And slugs. Slugs, slugs, slugs. #FreeFoodAtMatts is trending on whatever passes for Twitter in the slug kingdom.

Ok I don't really commune with them, unless you can stretch the definition a little to include collecting them all in a large yogurt pot and hurling them into the fast-flowing river. This I do every night at the moment, having been galled to find my lettuce, turnip, beans, asparagus, kale and cabbage all badly eaten, with lots of the young lettuce seedlings killed. It can take an hour to search the garden and polytunnel. The slithery menaces only come out when it's dark so I have to stay late on my land. It's more effective than any other slug-prevention techniques I've tried. Don't talk to me about beer traps - the only trap I pour beer into is my own mouth. And believe me, I need to after a few evenings like this.

Scroll down if you're not freaked out by the sight of slugs in a pot

Climb Every Mountain (or at least the manageable ones)

It was my fortieth birthday on Sunday. The British electorate had a whip-round and got me a Conservative government without checking first if it's something I actually wanted. In actual fact I'd much rather have had a good kicking but there we go, that's what they got me and apparently it can't be returned, they lost the receipt. It has a product lifespan of five years so I'm going to have to put up with it now until I'm 45, when I'll be really old. These Conservative governments have a reputation for breaking what they're supposed to take care of, in this case, our society. For my 45th birthday I'll be a lot clearer about what I want. 

Llyn Cau

To take my mind off it, and to mark the passing of my thirties (one of my more turbulent decades), on the eve of my 40th I gathered a small group of friends and marched to the top of the most stunning peak in south Snowdonia, namely Cader Idris. OK, 'march' doesn't quite capture the reality of it as we were scaling the tough steep southern face. 'Slowly trudged' reflects the truth somewhat better. We slowly trudged to the top, through mind-bendingly beautiful vistas of loud tumbling streams in ferny gulleys, far-off thin waterfalls glistening on the sheer black rock face, over squelchy moorland and tumbled boulders, past the bottomless lake Llyn Cau, as the temperature dropped and we approached the cloudline. The summit was completely enveloped. 

It was not all plain sailing. One of our number, Lisa*, stumbled on an awkward jutting rock and twisted her ankle, yelping but without resorting to any of the swear words that could be considered appropriate on such an occasion. Unfortunately she had to turn back due to the pain, her boyfriend helping her to hobble back down to the car park. We were down to six. Another of our group, Sophie*, was required to be at a life drawing class by 4:30pm so knew that she was unlikely to have time to do the full route. It's not like she could just skip this class – she was the model! So when we were well inside the cloud but not yet at the summit, she made the hard decision to turn round and head back down to allow herself enough time. Jeff* returned with her to help her with the route, as this was her first time up and he was a Cader veteran. 

Tal-y-Llyn on the left, Llyn Cau on the right

So it was only four of us who actually reached the stone at the top, 893m above sea level. Apart from the crowds of other tourists of course, all snapping windswept photos of each other, the presumably panaromic views completely obscured by the white blankness. After stopping just long enough to eat a sandwich and get bitterly cold, we set off on the alternative route down. Although it was my first time up Cader, two of the others had been up many times before and so I was slightly surprised several minutes later when they declared we were lost. We were wandering across the plateau in the thick fog searching for the path down. There was talk of a fence that we should meet that we would then follow downwards, but the fence had not materialised. We soldiered gamely on, wondering if we'd end up on the wrong side of the mountain, but the relief was palpable when out of the gloom emerged the fabled Fence Posts of Hope. 

We carefully negotiated our way back down, pausing as we left the cloud behind to gaze gob-smacked at the view that finally became ours – both the mountain-top lake and the larger lake at the foot of the mountain became visible simultaneously. Poor Lisa was still in the car park, unable to drive her car home as her foot hurt too much, she was waiting for one of us to drive her. We found out later that she'd fractured her foot and is now on crutches. Lisa, get well soon!

On top of the world

* Names changed as per usual

Election Fever

The results of the first two hours of using a tractor-mounted log splitter

On the eve of the most tightly-fought General Election in the history of the world, as the media whips us all into a frenzy of elevated political discourse (is it Shiny-Face or Boggle-Eyes?), and as we all prepare to step up to the polling booth tomorrow to cast our vote to decide the fate of our nation, many of you have surely come straight to this blog for some last minute guidance. It's so hard to choose between them. Do we vote tactically, or honestly, or not at all? Why has there been so little in the run up to this election to inspire us?

The sweetcorn have just been planted out

Baby sweetcorn plants are a greater inspiration than all our political leaders. They'll certainly produce tastier fruit.

Tomorrow I won't be going to the polling station. Before you start to harangue me about those who died to get the right to vote, the reason I'm not voting tomorrow is because I already have. That's right, I jumped right ahead and did the deed a couple of weeks ago. I'm on the electoral roll down in West Dorset but since I knew I'd be in Wales in May I got myself a postal vote organised. So it's too late now for me if any fresh announcements are made that might change my mind (the Tories re-nationalising the railways and offering free travel, Labour giving huge windfall subsidies to small local food producers). My vote is cast. The Greens got it. That's assuming it didn't get lost in the post.

Baby French Beans (the climbing variety, each provided with its very own pole to climb)

Natalie Bennett came to the 40th anniversary celebrations of the Centre for Alternative Technology last year, I saw her there give a great speech about what the Green Party stood for. She didn't have a brain freeze. She spoke with optimism and clarity about the systemic changes that must be made to place our society on a better footing. She urged us to vote for who we believe in, not tactically just to stop a worse bunch from getting in. And I think on the whole that's the best thing to do even when you know it's not going to get them into power. (My vote is in Oliver Letwin's constituency, one of the safest Tory strongholds). It may not this time, or next time, but small parties can only grow if people vote for them. 

Baby cabbages buffeted by the howling winds with only a couple of old cloches to protect them

So if you are in a bit of a dither over who should get your precious vote tomorrow, pour yourself a small glass of chilled Chablis, have a seat by the fireplace and, if you haven't already done so, spend a few minutes glancing over the Green Party manifesto. It's worth a read even if you don't vote for them. It certainly isn't just about how we can stop destroying our planet, although that does feature (thankfully).

I'll end on a bit of slightly good news. My planning officer came to visit me last Wednesday on my land and we spent nearly an hour talking about my various planning woes. Those of you who've been following this blog will know that (a) I'm no longer allowed to live in my caravan on the land, and (b) I was forced to put a planning application in to keep my polytunnel and greenhouse, which the Highways Agency has subsequently objected to. With regard to (a) she remained adamant that it would be a breach of planning control to live on my land, and I can't be classed as a seasonal agricultural worker. So no joy there.

However, on (b) she is taking my side against the Highways Agency. That's not to say she won't follow their direction and refuse it (they're playing the “We're the Welsh Government” trump card) although she's pushing back on them to explain their reasons more precisely. But if she does refuse it she says she will consider it inexpedient to enforce it. Which boils down to me being able to keep them without any more hassle. I also have the option of appealing a refusal decision which could end up with it being overturned – in which case the two structures would finally get the legitimacy of official blessing from on high! I tell you they don't make it easy for veg growers around here.