I’m calling it: peak pea has passed. The snap peas and snow peas were particularly prolific – and popular – but now they’re in decline. Although we’d envisaged a seamless pea-to-bean transition the two beds that suffered from bad compost set us back and we don’t yet have enough to sell (though there’s a silver lining for our dinners). After I gave an inadequate answer for why we can’t plant more peas (from the seed packet) Alex is experimenting with a late summer pea planting. Let’s see.

There’s a chance that the first beans will end up producing well. After the combination of good compost, blood and bone, gypsum, lots of rain and some hot weather they’re finally a deep green. (Determining the key to success will be tricky!) Some of the other problem beds that we sprinkled with lots of gypsum and water are finally retaining moisture and becoming soil, which is a huge comfort as we head towards winter. Not that Alex needed more encouragement to continue on with his compost (daily temperature readings are back).

We’ve had some stellar weather, culminating in three days around 30 degrees this week. The garden seemed to cope better than in earlier (mini) heatwaves. I’m crediting the homemade compost that Alex put on most of the vegetable beds with vegetables so that they retained some moisture (unlike the purchased compost) and daily watering. Thanks to the heat, summer plants that we planted a little too late had another growing spurt. It looks like we might have lots of pumpkins, corn and zucchini after all. But the late field tomatoes may have been overly optimistic, especially since everyone’s outdoor tomatoes have struggled this year.

We’re still preserving some of the harvest for ourselves over winter. Peas that were too big to sell are in the freezer. Coriander seeds and chamomile flowers are drying in our spare room – and more are coming. I already have 3.5L of dried chamomile so I’m quietly confident and pleased that I’ll meet my personal goal of chamomile self-sufficiency! We’ve almost finished podding the (now dry) broad beans. There’s a shed full of garlic to sort and store properly. The apple tree is laden with fruit that are starting to ripen. And half of the sunflowers are in full bloom though I’m just enjoying them because I’m not sure what to do with them yet. I have a feeling March was a busy month last year!