Relaxed Farming - our farm in your classroom

We are very lucky to have our polytunnel but even so, a lot of veg is still very behind for the time of year. Last year we were already eating cucumbers by July and here we are in mid-August, only just starting to harvest the first ones. They are looking good mind you; these ones (left hand photo) are called Serena F1 Hybrid with wonderfully prickly skins and yes you do have to peel them!!
Similarly our butternut squash are now getting huge but these are not harvestable until the skin turns yellow which won't be untill the autumn! We hope we can harvest and store them but somewhere very dry and neither too warm nor too cold in order to avoid both mould (from damp and warmth) and frost.
Our potatoes are still going strong thank goodness (local fish from Looe and our own chips for supper tonight) - as well as being huge this one rather amused us with its shape. Potatoes can grow like this if the soil they are growing in becomes a little too dry. At that point they start to grow new tubers and then when the whole plant receives water again, the potato with its new growth becomes knobbly or weirdly shaped. The key to getting regularly shaped potatoes is regular watering at approximately the same time each day in order to achieve a constant level of moisture. Even when this is done though, the soil/compost itself may be different - in some places it may drain too well, in others not enough. It is very hard to get it right BUT we can report that this weirdly shaped potato tasted NO different to the slightly more regularly shaped ones so for us, the shape of our potatoes does not matter at all!!