Cabbages pulled out

Half a dozen of the cabbages - which are still barely more than seedlings - were pulled out overnight. I replanted them as best I could, but they may have been too damaged to survive. The culprits are almost certainly pigeons - they like brassicas, and there are now very few berries for them to eat. I will have to protect the cabbages with netting or they'll be eaten.

Wood pile

Shelter for firewood

I found that some of the logs stored in the tool shed were going mouldy rather than drying out, so I built this open-sided shelter for them out of scraps lying around the garden. The floor is made of tiles laid on some thin branches (for air circulation), and the roof is an old door with a bin bag tacked onto it.

First frost

The temperature was down to 1 °C last night, and in sheltered parts of the garden there was a light frost, the first I've seen this year. The average first frost date in these parts is mid-October, that's six weeks ago.

The frost had melted away by 10:30, before I thought of taking a photo.

According to wikipedia, "In the United Kingdom, the growing season is defined as starting when the temperature on five consecutive days exceeds 5 °C, and ends after five consecutive days of temperatures below 5 °C." I don't think we've had temperatures that consistently low yet - most days in the last few weeks the maximum daily temperature has been between 6 °C and 9 °C.