Next years Muscari - Grape Hyacinths are already in groups with leaves about 4ins long. 

Yes the runner beans continue to do very well. Bess trained them up the front of the conservatory and now some of the beans are 12 feet up- that'll be fun to watch, me trying to harvest them.

Our chillies do better outside once its mild enough- insect pollination increases the fruiting. Two that overwintered in the conservatory are tough little capsicums now and producing long, green, slender fingers.

Does anybody have any magic cure for duckweed in a pond? It's beginning to multiply and I can see it covering the surface soon if I do nothing. It seems to have colonised it naturally as I certainly didn't introduce it(though I don't know how it got there as we're a long way from any other pond/water). I cannot see myself managing to remove every single leaf by hand but unless I do that, it's bound to return. So is it simply a chore which I will have to do for the foreseeable future every few weeks or is there some other remedy? Obviously, I could dump weedkiller/chemicals into the pond but I've got other plants in it and tadpoles(and presumably other little creatures) so I don't want to do that. Or should I just accept duckweed as being a natural coloniser? Does it do any harm to other plants or to tadpoles/frogs? 

Other than waiting for the cold weather to do the trick also every scrap has to be removed. Cold try a fountain in the pond to keep the water moving. Lilies also help. 

Pond algae solutions Getting Rid of Pond Duckweed without chemicals have a build it yourself gizmo like a paint brush roller with spikes which may help.  

If you don't want to use chemicals, be persistant and remove it by hand or a net on a bamboo shoot.(the kind used for catching pinkeens).
Had that problem with a small garden pond and the above worked.
Keep at it Lionel it can be removed. Lillies as Art mentioned do help but it might be a bit late in the year and they can become invasive also but are easier to control.

Good luck.

It can be done.

Thanks for the replies. I actually have lilies in the pond so perhaps they will prevent a complete takeover. I didn't realise that cold weather could kill duckweed so it might be a matter of doing all I can to keep down the weed and hoping for a freeze over the winter. Better get started....

Plucked some runner beans today. Plenty to come yet.  Planted  6 heathers at the bottom of what is left of the Hebe bush this afternoon, it was rather bare there....

Major slug explosion over the last week; it's as if all their anticipation through July was bottled up. I also note with surprise woodlice in droves in the centre of all my cucumber flowers- apparently munching on the pollen!

Glad that I watered all my pots and troughs yesterday.. It Has been raining a lot today.. Water bucket is well full.

It's proving to be a quirky gardening year. This is our third full flush of rhubarb and the walnut tree is looking its healthiest for years- very little viral symptom; but although the cherry tomatoes are producing a bumper harvest, the plums tomatoes are struggling to ripen. Have had to clear blighty leaves off all plants.

The sparrows continue to peck the flowers off the runner beans but those that have managed to set are growing so quickly they're almost seed stock before I can harvest them!

Runner beans are doing well Two pots with a dozen in each. Picking every other day. Watering  Morning and evening.  

Biggest ever harvest of walnuts, chillies and cucumbers. Tomatoes are dire.

Hazelnuts also very good - could be just because the squirrels didn't find their way across from the Park this year!

OK help me out here please folks.

Bought a tomatillo plant late spring from Waitrose. In August the flowers started setting fruit. Now, in October the fruit have swelled and nearly filled the lanterns. Never grown this plant before.

I sliced and ate one raw yesterday; I'm still here.

I (foolishly, perhaps, as retrospectively) researched the plant and discovered that unripe and not washed properly it can be highly toxic; and... it won't set fruit unless you have 2 or more plants, which I didn't, but they have. Any authentic knowledge?

OK help me out here please folks.

Bought a tomatillo plant late spring from Waitrose. In August the flowers started setting fruit. Now, in October the fruit have swelled and nearly filled the lanterns. Never grown this plant before.

I sliced and ate one raw yesterday; I'm still here.

I (foolishly, perhaps, as retrospectively) researched the plant and discovered that unripe and not washed properly it can be highly toxic; and... it won't set fruit unless you have 2 or more plants, which I didn't, but they have. Any authentic knowledge?

Perhaps we should go on to a totally carnivorous diet

http://refrigerators.reviewed.com/features/in-the-wrong-hands-these-vegetables-are-deadly

There seem to be an unexpectedly large number of web recipes for green tomatillos for something allegedly toxic. Everyone agrees on the poisonous nature of the rest of the plant so I wonder if any reports of poisoning are due to cross-contamination?

I've not grown tomatillo (Physalis philadelphica) but I have had success with the related cape gooseberry (P. peruviana) outside in warm summers. Cape gooseberry seems to be much less toxic, if at all, and is said to have a much sweeter taste. It is also self-fertile.

This fecund year has brought me record crops of walnut, chilli, redcurrant, rhubarb, full-sized corn and cucumber.

Don't know if I'll bother with tomatoes again, having grown them every year for nearly 20. Just not worth the hassle. Hundreds of fruit set this year, but I was able to harvest only a couple of dozen. Crap August and September weather brings the blight in too quickly.

The large whites got the cabbages, an unseen parasite ruined the gooseberries and the sparrows snipped off all but the earliest runners at the flowering stage.

Had about fifty ripe tomatillos- first time we've tried these- then read horror stories about toxicity.

Just keeping to the herbs now. Wee chilies have grown but no wrinklies. Like my heather in front garden. Did buy 3 small conifer trees to replace a straggly Hebe. Got 3 indoor Terrarium with succulents doing well. 

Picked the last of the runner beans today, never had them so late in the season so I'll be sowing some late again next year.

Picked the last of the runner beans today, never had them so late in the season so I'll be sowing some late again next year.

Envy

I'll plant a whole bed of corn next year.

Nothing left to harvest now except nasturtium seeds for homemade capers. Still bright with flowers though. S'pose I'll have to start emptying pots. Still a lot of leaves to come off the walnut so I'll leave that a while.