It is fecking hot and we haven't had rain for what seems like ages. Too hot to work in the sun or in the tunnel by 11:15am until late afternoon. No rain at all during June so far and precious little in May. Bringing up 6-8 buckets a day from the stream (thank goodness that is still flowing) for the tunnel and the young plants. The 'no watering' principle does not seem like such a sensible idea in these conditions - they need something, although there is still some slight dampness about 4 inches down. No sign of a change forecast for the next week.

Done some desultory mowing this morning and harvested another couple of potato plants (Nicolas). About 1.5 to 2lb per plant and really delicious.

Blackbirds are eating the redcurrants before they ripen, so have improvised a net cage over the best bush (RC1 this year) and have got just over 2lb so far with more coming. This winter I need to construct some moveable frames for nets to place over bushes as they ripen. There seemed to be plenty of Honeyberries coming but they all disappeared before I thought they were ripe - birds!