The fruit patch started to produce in July. Here’s a selection of some of the goodies. We had good crops of gooseberries, blackcurrants and raspberries. The freezer will be busy for the rest of the year! Unfortunately we did not do very well with our vegetables this year. It was quite cold back in April when we planted seeds and many failed to germinate. We should have crops of the basics such as potatoes, onions and leeks though.

We also started to develop some more decorative beds in the middle section of the garden. It’s a bit more sheltered down there so we hope to be able to raise some plants that would not survive up at the top, windswept area of the garden. Here’s the first bed that we have dug out. The sycamore stumps that were in this area have mostly rotted away now so we should be able to get on with some planting soon. This area is heavily infested with persistent weeds such as couch grass, nettles and ground elder so it will require a lot of weeding until we have got them under control.