One of my favourite books is written by two local authors, Robert Penn and Antony Woodward. The Wrong Kind of Snow chronicles the most amazing weather history in diary form and I find myself referring to it often to see how ‘mad’ the weather was years ago, not just now.

The summer of 1956 was deemed one of the worst since weather records began with continuous rainfall and gales in southern England taking lives of people and established trees. August Bank Holiday of that year also recorded 4 feet (1.2 metres) of hail fall in Tunbridge Wells. So maybe this summer isn’t so bad after all – though let’s see what the Bank Holiday delivers!

The Anglo-Saxons called August ‘Weod Monath’ meaning Weed Month, as it is the month where weeds grow the quickest. I’m not sure I entirely agree, I think they have exceeded the ‘weed limit’ for most of the spring and summer. But it is probably the month that they’re all going to seed the quickest so it’s well trying to pull them up before they explode and create next year’s chores. As the saying goes, ‘one year’s seed equals 7 years weed’.

Similarly, lots of herbaceous plants will be setting seed now and if you don’t want them to take over, then simply deadhead before they drop their seed, or gather the seed heads to dry and simply sow where you want them to grow as opposed to letting them self seed in paths and patios. Spending time removing seed-heads now will save you a lot more time weeding next year. 

Little envelopes of hand-gathered seeds also make lovely little gifts, and you can seed-swap with friends and neighbours.

‘Saving seeds’ seems to have gone out of fashion. As a child I remember watching an elderly neighbour saving the ‘pips’ out of her tomato salad. 

She would carefully remove the gelatinous coating before putting the ‘naked’ seeds to dry on paper and saving them to sow the following year. 

It’s a fantastic memory to have.

The gel that coats the tomato seeds contains a germination inhibitor to ensure the seeds don’t sprout prematurely. A fruit that has fallen to the ground will naturally ferment and dissolve that gel organically. How clever is that?

Another fabulous memory I was reminded of whilst picking my sweet peas last week, was the young lad who had grown his own scented flowers for a competition I was judging. Getting a little frustrated when he couldn’t recall the name of the flowers, he blurted out, ‘I know – sweet beans’. I have referred to them as that ever since. And don’t forget to keep picking your ‘sweet beans’ to ensure continued flowering. If you let them go to seed, they will think their work is done and stop flowering.