For the second night running a rainbow developed at about 10:40 and this time developed into one of the best displays I’ve seen, lasting almost 30 minutes when the sun went down…continually changing from a weak single bow that seemed to split at the top….developing into a full bow which landed in a spruce tree in the garden…and gradually fading as the sun set :)
All posts by Stephen Barstow
Most northerly overwintered edible Gunnera?
I was surprised to see two Gunneras (both tinctoria/chilensis and manicata) outside at the Ringve Botanical Gardens in Trondheim at the weekend. Reidun Mork told me that they had used the same overwintering technique as they used at the Copenhagen Botanical Gardens, where she used to work. I knew exactly what she meant as I’d taking a picture in Copenhagen of this in early May (second picture). I’ve never seen overwintered Gunnera so far north before. Gunnera tinctoria is one of the 80 in my book and has special significance locally as the genus was named after Trondheim Bishop Gunnerus (by Linnaeus).
I must have a go at overwintering my pot grown specimen…
The bathing season is upon us!
With air temperature forecast to rise above 20C, I noticed this beauty having a bath from the cycle path…
Vollinger in Malvik raid
These 4 fun-loving specimens of Homo sapiens from Germany, the US, Denmark and Norway, on a secret mission, raided my garden of some giant vegetables this evening and here they are caught in the act! All may eventually be revealed…
Solstice skies
And a couple of views of our northern skies at the solstice itself at 12:30 am last night..it clouded over soon after, so no moon to see from here…
Strawberry clouds
No strawberry moons here yet, but at 11 pm this was the view over the fjord. Happy solstice dreams everyone….!!
Solstice sweet and sour soup greens
Somebody once said that solstice greens are the best…I’d add that solstice perennial greens are even better :) Here’s what I used in tonight’s soup: Sea kale(strandkål), Scorzonera (scorsonnerot), Allium senescens, Sweet cicely (spansk kjørvel), Giant bellflower (storklokke), Sorrel / surblad, Nettle (nesle), Dandelion (løvetann) (all are in my book)…and I almost forgot that there’s chickweed (vassarve) in there too, perennial in that it’s there every year!
Giant Taunton Deane Perennial Kale
On 13th June 2016, I visited National Trust garden Knightshayes Court near Tiverton in Devon, 5 years after I was there last:
http://www.edimentals.com/blog/?page_id=2505
Many thanks to Sam Brown for showing me around backstage and for posing for scale next to this giant Taunton Deane’s Cottagers Kale, the UK’s only documented old surviving cultivated perennial kale! This one was acccording to Christina Damerel only about 5-6 years old. I was bowled over to see the cottagers kales when I visited 5 years ago, but hadn’t realised how big they could get. The pictures in the link above show plants that weren’t actually that old… The plant in the picture below has a similar stature to the Californian Tree Collards. Sam told me that the woodpigeons graze the higher leaves (you can see this in the picture), but the lower ones are left alone and are also better tasting. The “trunk” was massive!
More pictures from this still great edible walled garden when I get a chance!
Mandy Barber’s Incredible Vegetables and The Field
Well, not only Mandy’s plot, a group of local people in Ashburton, Devon got together to buy The Field a few years ago to grow vegetables communally! It is truly an inspiration to see how productive what was sheep pasture can actually be!! We need much more of this and I’m imagining the hills around covered in Andean tuber crops in a few years from now rather than sheep!!
It was great to meet you all and a big bonus that Owen and good lady made the journey up from Cornwall to join us!!
More pictures in the album below!
See Mandy’s blog of my visit here: http://www.incrediblevegetables.co.uk/stephen-barstow-visit/
Ringve Edimentals tours : more pictures
Some additional pictures from the Ringve Edimentals tour taken by Lorna O’Lynn, many from the second of the two tours, several showing the grand tulip flower tasting :)
See also
http://www.edimentals.com/blog/?page_id=4915
http://www.edimentals.com/blog/?page_id=2124
