Seasons End

.I found this post in my 'draft' box.  Forgotten.  So here is an autumn post in mid winter

The clover in the garden is a  verdent green, the nasturtiums are rampaging.  The lettuces have been rained on a few times and are growing like mad as is the rocket (arugula) .  I love this time of the year.  The clover will soon be trying to throttle the lettuces if I'm not out there a few times a week weeding but it's still controllable at the moment.  This year I'm trying to outwit the clover (oxalis/sorrel, whatever it is) by planting rocket and some of the lettuces in pots which can be kept away from that green strangler.  It's not oxalis because it doesn't have those litte pink bulbs.  This stuff has very long tap roots and has to be dug out completely.  I cover one of the beds with newspapers but it still appears around the edges and encroaches inch by inch.  No problem.  Lettuces and cabbages are very cheap.  My garden is not a serious project.  I'm more into knitting and jam making.

Our neighbour's pomegranites are red and ripe and have started falling.  They are away now but will back soon for the olive harvest and hopefully they'll give me a bag or two.  I still have the quinces they gave me a month ago.  I look at them and sigh.  If they weren't so hard to peel and core I would have made quince paste and I suppose I will if they don't rot first.  Just hope there are no more quinces given to us along with the pomegranites.  Pomegranites are hard to 'clean' too but it's worth the effort.  We eat them in salads, by the spoonful or juice the seeds.

Grapes have been made into wine and is maturing in the barrels.  We are waiting for Vaso's son to drain off a few litres but it probably won't be till Christmas.  We have been given a bottle of this year's raki.  Powerful alcohol made from the skins and seeds of the grape harvest.


We have run out of lemons and have been begging from friends and neighbours.  Our two trees have lemons on them but they are still small and green and don't have much juice.  It has been a bad year for citrus fruit, except the grapefruit which no-one wants to eat.  The orange trees don't seem to have much fruit and neither does the bitter orange which is not good for anything but marmelade.


                                       

Wild cyclamen are carpeting the sides of the road

These strange plants  are growing alongside the cyclemen.

Apparently they are called squill.  They have a huge bulb at the base