Thursday 23 February 2012

Gardening Unplugged

Gardeners have lots of enemies. Slugs, birds, inclement weather, fungal diseases.... all manner of things physical, metaphysical or otherwise can thwart even the best laid plans. My personal hit-list now includes the cordless drill.
Someone, name unknown, unplugged my precious propagator full of tiny tomatoes to recharge the drill. It reminds me of the urban myth of a hospital in America that had what became known as ‘The Bed of Death’... 


Patients in one particular bed in the Intensive Care unit kept on dying. Nobody could figure out why. Eventually the managers became so perplexed that they installed CCTV.  Lo and behold, every time the cleaner came to polish the floor, which life support machine was unplugged to power up the hoover....? You’ve guessed it.
Tiny seedlings of tender things like tomatoes are especially vulnerable to sudden dips in temperature, so the cosseted environment of a heated propagator is perfect for them [if like most people you just get them going on a windowsill, make sure you tuck curtains or blinds behind them at night]. Looks like we were lucky, it was a warm night and my ‘Gardener’s Delight’ are coming up like cress...

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