Fading light

Although it has been a busy weekend, I have just enough time to show you what is going on at the plot - which to be fair isn't an awful lot...!

The days are getting appreciably colder now - the warmth and stillness of the summer mornings seems to have gone... the grim reality is that in this fading light there is not much time left for the plants to thrive.

There's a chance that these little french beans will just about grow enough to make a decent portion or two - as you can see from the shot below, the plants haven't really grown up the canes...more meandered around horizontally - I've done my best to tether them up now, but I'm not sure it will help.

The cabbages have not been eaten - which is a good start! They also appear to have straightened up and grown a few more leaves each, which is encouraging too (excuse the bricks - subtle as!):

As long as they continue to avoid being eaten, they should hopefully bloom and at the very least produce some tasty leaves. I would be surprised if they develop hearts, but you just never know...

The beetroot are still doing well - I'm really willing them on now to beef up underneath; a few appear to be showing signs of root growth. I've never liked beetroot out of jars - hopefully these will make a convert of me.

And finally, in what I will dub the 'rogues gallery', I have two solitary veg plants that have grown with little care or attention - and from seed, where all others failed - a lonely carrot, and another radish: 

Last (and only) carrot standing

The real problem of course with all veg that grows sub terra is that you can never quite be sure when the right time is to pull them up... I think the carrot will wait a little longer, but perhaps this radish is not far off (not that I really care, the last one was pretty foul!):

The radish 

I decided not to show you the fennel seedlings - the picture was pretty unclear... you'd probably also make out more than was actually going on! Sadly, at least one has fallen prey to a gastropod, and to be honest I don't think the others will survive much longer. Perhaps a poly-tunnel will be a worthwhile investment next year.