Gardening in May

 I had a really good look at the trays holding the hazel seedlings and found one tiny slug hiding--is it responsible for the lack of hazel sprouts?  After dispatching said slug I also moved the pots to a different location.  Hope some of them can manage to emerge now.  And one batch of French beans really were moldy--they just went soft;  the other batch got planted out at the allotment at the weekend, and I put some very prickly gorse trimmings on top of the rows in an effort to deter mice digging them up again.  I hope to get the runner beans in within the week too:  I've cut up another pile of gorse trimmings.

I've been trying to hand weed the beets and other root veg I sowed in the kitchen garden.  I really should have put down a string between two sticks to mark the rows, so I could hoe them!  As it is, I'm pulling by hand very carefully and I can only identify beets and turnips (or possibly kohlrabi).  The weeds are mainly self sown mizuna, chard and poppies and they come up pretty easily.  I have a little more unsown space left, which I have hoed a few times, trying to clear away enough so that not quite as many unwanted seedlings pop up later.  Maybe I'll mark these rows clearly.

My summer veg seedlings on the kitchen windowsill are all up, and a few trays have gone outside for acclimatization:  two kinds of climbing beans and some sweetcorn.  All the rest are still a little small and the temps are still a little cool (around 15C during the day).  

I think the main gardening effort has now been made;  it's time to mop up those last little jobs (transplanting mainly), and then move on to maintenance until harvest time.