Part ll -

Some herby views here, to start with. The healthy bits...
As to slugs, Lindsay has only read about using sawdust to keep the critters off but she has been out today putting mounds of very coarse shavings round the tenderest of the plants. The shavings are sold as horse bedding and we usually use them for the hens if we don't have any straw for their houses and nest boxes. This year, though, the slugs that are doing the damage are titchy teeny wee things which are difficult to spot. So we'll just have to see whether the sawdust idea works or whether they are so wee they just squirm underneath or through the soil. Coffee grounds worked for a while last year but you have to drink a mountain of coffee and also every time you water the plants you wash some more grounds away.

An admission about fennel tea - Lindsay loves its light aniseedy taste but it comes in a paper sachet that you drop straight in the cup! So this was (is?) to be the year when she grows her own and gathers the seeds, dries them and uses them to make her own tea. No research has been done by her ladyship - typical, really - and she's out of Dr Stuart's Wild Fennel Teabags at the moment so she cannot even dissect a teabag to examine the contents. However, this will be remedied and you'll get the full saga before long!