A bright green toad and a massive harvest

We have been to the garden for a couple of hours today and collected the most enormous harvest of vegetables and flowers. Now we are a bit worried, as we are running out of freezer space, and that`s after buying a new one this time last year, for surplus veg.  It has taken us nearly an hour to prepare it all to eat, dry or freeze. We have guests for dinner tonight so that will use up some.

There are now enough tomatoes to make tomato sauce, a recipe that needs quite a few pounds of ripe tomatoes, but the sauce is soooo good (and we know what`s in it!!) There were 6 cucumbers....all from one plant, our first aubergine which will be in a moussaka this time tomorrow, several pounds of French Beans and runner beans, six sweetcorn and many courgettes.

Unfortunately Steve found 2 pumpkins going bad and they had to be composted. Luckily the biggest is still intact. William`s plant is looking good. Next time I will take a photo of the striation.

My main job today was to cut the grass round half the pond. There`s a fair number of brambles in it as well. As I was doing this, the most striking bright green toad hopped away from my shears. Thank goodness I had decided to leave long grass round one large side. I was undecided about the long grass roots dipping in the pond but I am leaving most as the pond skaters were hiding behind them. Anyway the toad stayed long enough to get a fairly decent photo....any closer and I would have toppled in. I am VERY happy to find it in our pond as it has only been established since spring.

 After a pretty ropey start when the asparagus got blown to smithereens in the wind, it now seems to be holding its own. Maybe it is building up the resistance as mentioned in my last post.

  I planted two more trays of well-rooted sedum plantlets and fed and watered the tomatoes. It is interesting to note that my tomatoes at home are nearly finished but in Freshwinds they have just started to get going....its only half a mile away.

Here is today`s harvest waiting to be sorted. One huge sunflower came down in the wind. It was a shame because it had a lot more flowers to come.

Lots of campers came through the garden today and I met several in the barn. 

One family was off to Bodiam Castle and yesterday one family had walked through Pannel Lane to Pett Level and said the countryside was just beautiful. (And I live here all the time!! Aren`t I lucky.) There are so many great places to visit from here.

I had to laugh when one father, on seeing all our vegetables, said to his children, "Now look carefully children, this is what vegetables look like before they get to the supermarket."