The up-side of a rainy June

[weedin project]

I know they are related to gunnera, but I've never had rhubarb like this year's before.  Massive stems that are full of flavour and not stringy or nasty in any way.

I knew there had to be an up-side to such a miserable rainy June. ;D

[weedin project]

[RobinOfTheHood]

Well, the bright side of my allotment-cum-swimming pool is that I've never seen so many dead slugs, drowned all of em with a bit of luck!  :)

Now if only I can get it drained before all the brassicas kop it....could turn out OK!  :D

[froglets]

true.

I've been able to move herbaceous plants around and do a bit of dividing knowing they will recover really quickly.

Know what you mean about rhubabrb, mine is usually floppicated by now, but it's been staging a revival the last week or so.  Rhubarb crumble for comfort puds in this rotten weather

[daisymay]

Bizarre.. our rhubarb seems to be having the opposite problem, is looking very sorry for itself, was thinking it was too wet for it! confused now!  ???

[cambourne7]

Daisymay i have the same problem, the leaved are all eaten and they look like they are finishing for the year. I though it might be something to do with being hidden my weeds for a month and it was not getting any water or light.

I have made a feed of water and chicken poo and given them all a light feed to see if they perk up now the weeds are cut down they should get more light and rain. My rhubarb ( grown from seed 2 years ago ) is planted into clay though weed membrane. I have been tempted to put a couple of wheelbarrows of horsepoo and compost onto the plants and cut the membrane to allow them to grow more but its perishing anyway so i know this is not limiting there growth. I do think however that it might be a little late for this in the year.

[Robert_Brenchley]

Mine's flopped as well. The roots are really deep, and it came through the drought last year with no problems at all, but all this extra water seems to be too much. It'll soon recover though.

[manicscousers]

it's worked well for our caulis and romanesco brocc. also, the parsnips and carrots in raised beds are huge, the thinnings are practically full size  ;D..

[asbean]

We give our rhubarb a good barrowload of horse poo each autumn.  The plants are very old, but keep giving us loads of fruit. We don't like it all that much, so give a lot of it away, and we're told by several friends that it's the best they've had. Must be what we put on it  ;) ;) ;) ;)

[Mrs Ava]

My bubby is ginormous also.  Going to make a couple of monster crumbles in a couple of weekends time as the old man will be 40 and we are having a huge family barbie.  The rest will be chutneyised.  ;D

[cornykev]

Good luck with the barbie weather EJ  ??? and its good to see you back on the board.  ;D ;D ;D

[Tin Shed]

My rhubarb started the year well, then went all thin and stringey in April [probably the very hot and dry weather] and then it perked up again thankfully as we all love rhubarb and so do friends and family.