Orto di Casa Cecconi

My first allotment, and then one thing leading to another…

L’orto di Casa Cecconi Plants Recipes Me & Kew One Year at Wisley

Tag: fruit

  • When pear shoots go black

    After coming out green and fresh, full of life, pear shoots can suddenly turn black and droopy. The sight is quite dramatic but can really signify anything from harmless to “quick, remove that and burn it!”. Below are two of the most frequent reasons, starting with the harmless one. Pear shoot sawfly (Janus compressus) Not…

  • Peach leaf curl (Taphrina deformans)

    Another plant species that is commonly known to suffer from red, curled up leaves in the spring is peach. The curling up is caused by a fungus, Taphrina deformans. The fungus, which favours cool and wet weather, causes leaves to pucker; the blisters are often red and rather showy, just before the fungus starts producing…

  • Pruning

    As a kid, I remember coming home from school and some plant or other in the garden that was lookin great in the morning would have been hacked horribly, its dignity lost, possibly at risk of never coming back. That would see me fuming with my father, the perpetrator. I knew nothing about plants back…

  • PD&D: pests, diseases and disorders

    As part of my coursework for the certificate, I had to write a Pest and Disease project. I researched 15 of the most common pests (vertebrates and invertebrates that feed, inhabit or otherwise live off plants, damaging or killing them) and diseases (caused by microorganisms such as fungi, viruses and bacteria), choosing ones that I…

  • Three Counties Orchard Conference

    As my dissertation for this year’s traineeship will be on orchards, my colleagues suggested I attend the Three Counties Orchard Conference with them, and a very interesting day it was as a range of stakeholders in top fruit production, from conservation to commercial, presented to us. An introduction to the UK orchard scene by John…

  • 10 apples or so a day: keeps the doctor away?

    After all the picking, and the rehearsal in London earlier in the month, the last six days have been full-on on apples at the Wisley Taste of Autumn Festival and one can get enough of apples, I tell you! Produce display for Wisley Taste of Autumn After a day of set up that involved me checking stored crates of…

  • Young apple trees, old apple trees

    The London Orchard Project gave me the opportunity to spend another two lovely days pruning. Yesterday, we were in Fryent Park, taking care of a young orchard that had never been pruned before and whose trees required formative pruning. It was a lovely sunny day, and a rather big team was set loose on a…

About Me

M.Paola M.Paola, that’s me

I got my first allotment in the UK in 2007 and started gI got my first allotment in the UK in 2007 and started growing my own food. Learning as I went along was not enough, so I studied horticulture. Faced with the horticultural warfare, I became a conscientious objector: I use no chemicals and support organic principles and regulations.

Brexit gave me a new life in the Netherlands, three new plots by a nature reserve and an MSc in sustainable food systems.

I write in my personal capacity and, as a language perfectionist and a non native speaker, I keep reviewing my entries’ text for clarity.

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