My Goodness!

Where has the time gone? It just shows that as the spring progresses there is more and more to do on the plot!.

Our first Asparagus harvests started in May -

By the 16th May growth was really noticeable -

   

Jobs for Today
Decided to potter in the greenhouse today. I potted on my sunflowers not a very good photo sorry! I chose Firecracker  - Unwins sunflower Seeds - because I grew them last year and they did really well. You only get 12 seeds in the pack and they cost £2.99 but last year all 12 germinated. They are a small, multi headed variety and last year formed a gorgeous sunflower hedge at the plot.
However it's been a different story this year .... Only 5 of the 12 seeds actually germinated. I contacted Unwins via their website and a few days later received vouchers to buy a new pack. That's good service in my books. Thank you Unwins!

I also sowed some courgettes, some butternut squash, some lettuce and a second batch of kale because the slugs have chomped half of the first batch which were in the greenhouse. A timely reminder to be vigilant in the greenhouse when you have lots of seedling in there!

Seed Sowing

The next batch of seeds sown yesterday -

These are 

• Sweetcorn - Swift,
• Swiss Chard - Bright Lights
• Lettuce - Nobellan
• Cos Lettuce - Little Gem
• Lettuce - Lollo Rossa

And also a look at how everything is getting on in the greenhouse -

Just look at the difference!

I took cuttings of my gooseberry bushes on Thursday 18th of February and I photographed them again on March 22nd. Just look at the difference in just about a month!

The next stage ...

My broccoli seedlings were ready for pricking out and potting on. I have moved them into pots which are slightly larger than I would normally use simply because they are relatively slow growing and I prefer to have large, robust brassica plants to transfer into their allotment bed. This helps them to withstand attack by slugs! Also never make the mistake of not putting netting over them when you plant them into their final positions. Certainly on our allotment - the pigeons would decimate them overnight!

Today's sowing -

I have sown Sunflower 'Firecracker', Basil, Coriander, Red Salad Bowl lettuce and Cucumber 'Telegraph Improved'.

Good Friday

Although the date of Easter varies widely - the traditional day for planting potatoes is on Good Friday. With a lovely weather forecast my husband and I decided to go for it!

   

 
                                                                   




So that's four different varieties planted -

Rocket - First early

A very early bulking and heavy cropping first early variety producing almost round, white skinned and fleshed tubers. Potato, 'Rocket' has good all round disease resistance including golden eelworm. Easy to grow and quick to produce 'baby new potatoes'

International Kidney - Second early.

A heritage variety that has stood the test of time. If harvested as a second early, 'International Kidney' makes a perfect, very waxy, salad potato. Harvested later as an early maincrop, it produces floury, large, general purpose tubers.

Maris Piper - Early maincrop.

The best chipping variety available, and a versatile 'all rounder'. Potato 'Maris Piper' produces dry, floury tubers with creamy-white flesh of good flavour, that rarely discolours on cooking. This popular purple-flowered maincrop potato is also Golden eelworm resistant. 

Sarpo Mira - Late maincrop.

This late maincrop variety has it all - unprecedented blight resistance, good slug resistance, vigorous weed suppressing foliage, and it grows well in a wide range of soils. Potato 'Sarpo Mira' produces huge yields of tasty, floury tubers that have a long storage potential. A real all-rounder for all cooking purposes.

What are you growing this year?

On The Plot Today

Asparagus just starting to show

Purple sprouting broccoli almost ready to pick

And just look at the size of the rhubarb!

Another Grey Day.....

I decided to potter in the green house at home again yesterday.

I have cheated .... and bought some sweet peas from B&Q! I did't get round to sowing them last autumn (which is when I prefer to do it) and happened to be passing when I saw small pots of sweet peas for £!.00! They are Spencer mix which I think are good ones so fingers crossed. I gently teased them apart and was delighted to find 30 plants in the 2 pots. So 30 plants for £2.00 - not bad! I potted them on and left them to settle for a couple of days. Today I decided to pinch them all out to encourage bushy plants and more flowers! If you need more information about growing and looking after them - click here - Growing Sweet Peas

I absolutely adore the smell - they remind me of my Dad. I can picture his sweet pea patch at home when I was a little girl.

The next job was to sow some leeks. I am very much in two minds about this because a couple of years ago we got Leek Moth on our allotment site and it ruined everyone's leeks. They look great at first and then seemingly overnight they start turning brown and slimy -YUCK!

Leek Moth Damage

The only real protection is to put up a physical barrier. So after some deliberation I have decided to fleece them and also to treat them as a crop of baby leeks and start harvesting when they are still fairly small. So anyway they are sown!

Then, typically, the sun came out and I washed some more modules and half trays ready for the next batch of seeds and left them out to dry.

Well - that's it for now but this Friday is Good Friday and you know what that means .... planting spuds! Updates to follow!

Today in the Greenhouse

Today was one of those miserable grey days. The light levels have been low all day. So I decided to potter in the greenhouse. My lovely other half came home the other day with a present for me and set it up in the greenhouse all ready while I was out.

This lovely potting bench! So I got busy and potted on the sweet peas, the cabbage, the cauliflowers and the brussel sprouts. This is in addition to the peas, broad beans, broccoli. cosmos and lettuce that I have already sown.

So all in all, a fairly productive day!

This Year ....

I wrote this list last year on our kitchen noticeboard to remind me about the new things I wanted to grow this year. However so far I have done nothing about them!

Malabar Spinach

I saw this growing when I visited the RHS Flower Show at Tatton last year. It is actually not spinach at all. It's not even related! Well, OK, it's distantly related, but it doesn't taste much like spinach at all. When it's raw Malabar spinach has very fleshy, thick leaves that are juicy and crisp with tastes of citrus and pepper. When cooked, though, Malabar spinach does look and taste a lot more like regular spinach. It doesn't wilt as fast, though, and it holds up better in soups and stir-fries.

Chickpeas

Chickpeas are a new crop to the UK although they have been cultivated for centuries in Asia and the Mediterranean. They are small leaved annual legumes, growing about knee-high, with great drought resistance and freedom from most pests. Plants are not fully hardy although capable of withstanding light frost. With attractive grey-green foliage and the capacity to fix nitrogen, chickpeas show great promise in the warmer and drier parts of the country for a long season of production, with low demands for water or nutrients and little effort needed to grow them.
However at one pea per pod you would need the grow a lot! My other half thinks I'm daft!

Watercress

In order to thrive, watercress must be kept permanently wet. It can grow submerged in water (as it does in a stream), but will do just as well in damp soil. The simplest way to achieve this is to sit your container in a deep saucer filled with water. Periodically flush the container with fresh water to keep the pot from becoming stagnant. (In hot weather, you'll have to do this more frequently.) By early summer, apply a liquid feed such as nettle tea. The soil outside now is too cold to sow watercress seed, but by late March or April it will have warmed up enough to sow direct into a pot.

Patty Pans

I have grown lots of varieties of pumpkin and squash over the years but have never tried these. They do look rather fun though!

Sweet Potatoes

Unlike normal potatoes, sweet potatoes are grown from ‘slips’. These are the long shoots that have been removed from ‘chitted’ sweet potato tubers. ‘Slips’ don’t have roots, although sometimes there are signs of small roots beginning to appear. The roots will grow once the ‘slip’ has been planted. Having read up a bit about them they do much better in a warm summer and after last year's disappointing summer - the jury is out as to whether I am going to give them a go or not!

Started off at home

Bought 'Slips'

Well that's the list covered - let's see what actually makes it to the plot!

A little bit about me ...

As well as having the allotment I also volunteer in the Victorian Kitchen Garden at Speke Hall. This is a beautiful Tudor house owned by the National Trust.

For more information - click here - Speke Hall

I go every Wednesday with a lovely group of volunteers and we grow and look after the fruit and vegetables in the Kitchen Garden. These are harvested and go to the restaurant or to visitors who simply make a donation and help themselves from our barrow.

Here are some photos from last July - 2015 - to give you an idea -

         

Preparations continue ....

We have actually had a few dry days - not on the run I hasten to add - and that has meant that myself, husband Mal and lottie partner, Jim, have been able to get busy.

We have -

• Pruned the old apple tree
• Edged some of the grass paths
• Dug over about half of the beds
• Prepared the area where we are going to plant a damson tree
• Cleared out the greenhouse
• Cleared a bed of flowers that is going back to veg production
• Had a fire and burnt lots of old, rotten wood.
• Taken hardwood cuttings from the gooseberries

At last!

Finally we had a sunny, if cold, day yesterday and I could get down to the plot. Always a bit daunting at this time of year because the question is - where to start?

I cleaned out the greenhouse first because it was warmer in there! There was quite a lot of couch grass which I spent some time digging out.

Then I dug over the patch where we are going to plant a damson tree. The soil is still really waterlogged and we may have to add sand or grit before we plant.

Next I decided to start edging the grass path. I didn't do the whole lot though - note to self - must sharpen the edgers!

Then I dug over the first three beds. There is no real need to do this as they could just be prepared when I am ready to plant or sow into them. However I love the look of freshly dug beds - it looks so neat!

Next job was to start pruning the apple tree. There is one large bough that I want to remove but will need either a heavy duty saw or the chainsaw for that so just took out the three d's - dead, diseased and damaged for the time being.

Not a bad start to the lottie year!

New Recipe - Pumpkin Pie

For years I have been meaning to make a Pumpkin Pie but have never got round to it until yesterday. I searched the net for recipes and in the end chose this one - 

Pumpkin Pie

POTATOES, POTATOES, POTATOES!

Everyone seems to be fixated on potatoes at the moment! Facebook gardening groups are all talking potatoes. When to chit, how to chit, when to plant etc., etc., etc.!
On the allotment the traditional day to plant spuds is Good Friday. That always intrigues me as the date of Easter changes so much each year! Lots of the older guys on our site simply plant them all - whether earlies, second earlies or maincrop on the same day. A bit hard on the back though!

What a Difference!


This was taken on 13th January 2013 -

 And this one on 13th January 2016 -

There has been a lot of speculation, worry and debate about the mild, wet weather we have been having and it's affect on our plants. The first picture was taken 3 years ago today. You can see how much further on it is by comparison!