Nature is your enemy: that’s the verdict of one BBC journalist berating the current trend of allotment ownership.

The strawberries have been our big success story this summer. Surprising, really, as they have been a dead loss in years gone by.

Poor old Barbara clearly wants to be a mum. She’s not coming down from the nest in the morning, and after three hours (or more) of sitting on not only her eggs, but also Gerry and Margot’s efforts I’m having to physically lift her out of the Eglu and down into the run.

I don’t think the chickens like oyster shell. It’s supposed to be good for them, as it replaces the calcium in their bodies that they lose through laying eggs, but whenever we put it in their layers’ pellets they just kick it out of the feeder.

May saw a slight fall in the number of eggs laid by our three hens. That was unexpected, but there are some possible explanations.

A flapjack in essence, this is very quick and easy to bake and uses store cupboard ingredients, so you can keep stocked up on everything you need and make a new batch whenever you want some.

2009 is turning out to be a very hard year on the plot. We have planted three runs of carrots on three different occasions and in two different locations, and none of them has taken.

The sunny weather has pushed up the temperature in the greenhouse to the mid-50s Celsius (127F), and the plants are struggling to cope.

The apricot tree is looking distinctly sorry for itself and now, with a gust of wind, it’s lost two of its only four fruits.

We had a very good demonstration of why it’s worth growing your own this week, even when vegetables are so cheap in the shops at the moment. Here it is.