Monday 29 June 2009

Polytunnel toad

I do like a toad. Even when they come hopping into the house to watch the ten o'clock news, as they do. These summer evenings the doors are left open and as the toads emerge from behind the damp greenness left lazily and deliberately unweeded from round the doorway, they hop into the boot room or venture more daringly across the kitchen, drawn by the BBC news headlines.
The polytunnel is home to another batch of toads. They hunt beneath the crush of courgettes, the thicket of tomatoes, the panoply of peas, relishing the damp soil, the flies, slugs and other edibles.
This is a photo of the polytunnel-toad; not as large as the news-at-ten-toad, but a charmer, all the same.



The polytunnel is looking very green, apart from the sweet peas, that produce a big bunch of pink, lilac, purple and red for the table every evening. But I want it to look even more colourful, full of flowers, and that's just starting to happen. The courgette blooms are there but you have to dig deep under the huge raspy leaves to see them; the tomato flowers are also shy, and their fruits are completely green for now. The spherical yellow courgettes are only just starting to fruit and bulge.
There is one baby aubergine, already purple, and the mass of peas are, to be fair, dotted with white flowers. The french beans are thinking about flowering. Another week and I'll be rewarded.

8 comments:

Yorkshire Pudding said...

Mmmm...What shall we have for lunch darling? "Toad in the hole would be nice." Righto, I'll just nip out to the polytunnel, back in a jiffy.

James Higham said...

Ugggh!

Scriptor Senex said...

Love it. I dug our garden pond especially deep in the hope of attracting a toad but despite having frogs and newts we haven't had Mr Toad yet. Perhaps one day.

Mopsa said...

I'll eat almost anything YP, but my toads are not on the menu!

James - why ugggh? They are wonderful creatures.

SS - although we have lots of toads I've yet to see toad spawn.

mountainear said...

There are no reasons that toads are not here but we never see them.

Huge vegetable envy - ours seem so slow this year. Perhaps a polytunnel would be the answer.

Welshcakes Limoncello said...

Goodness, I think he's cute but I'd scream if they came in ! Better than a spider, I grant you...

Mopsa said...

M'ear - I have six large raised beds outside and they are WAY behind what's in the polytunnel...and slug ridden. I can't recommend one highly enough.

Welshcakes - they eat spiders!

Whispering Walls said...

Is he always grey or is that polytunnel camouflage?