Picking Up At The Plot

 I have been indulging my newfound interest in flowering plants and particularly wildflowers recently. Despite appearances I have been keeping up with the production of edibles too.  To bring the record up to date, here is a statement of the current state of play.

I went for alliums in a bigger way this year growing autumn and spring planted garlic as well as shallots and onions from seed. These were sown indoors in February .  The garlic has emerged and shallot and onion have been planted out on site yesterday and today. 

Broad beans sown in cells and planted out a month ago are now sitting pretty at the plot. 

Peas on the other hand have refused to be cajoled into germinating early. As a last resort I have started them sprouting in a jam jar in the kitchen and only "sown" them in cells after germination and exporting them to the greenhouse and then the plot.

Still on legumes I have sown 5 varieties of Dwarf French Bean into deep cells in the hope that the improved night temperatures will help them get started.

The greenhouse has been stuffed full each night with the paraffin heater lit on any night when the threat of frost is flagged up by the weatherman.  The main beneficiaries are flowers: Cosmos, Marigold, Lobelia, but also tomato, cucumber and pepper 

Tomatoes and Cucumber

Pepper Hungarian Hot Wax

I have attempted direct sowing at the allotment but tend to hedge my bets by using up remnant seed supplies (open packets from last year or out of date ones).  This way I don't get upset when they fail - although failure is also more likely as a result!  Parsnip, carrot, Swish chard have been experimented with in this way - and have all been resown recently..

Good Friday is a traditional potato planting day.  Easter Saturday and Sunday saw me getting all but the maincrop Rooster in. 

Potatoes in waiting

The patch allocated to potatoes in my rotational plan still had "spring" cabbages at one end and leeks at the other.  Now that's what I call bad planning! The leeks are going into the cookpot.

The ground for runner beans, celery and celeriac has been thoroughly prepped with plenty of buried organic matter.  The celery and celeriac have been growing on at home

Celery and Celeriac  - Can you tell which is which?

 but the runner beans have yet to be sown.  The courgettes squashes and sweetcorn haven't been sown either yet, but I have recently prepared a bed for them too.  My method is to bag all my weeds and trimmings in old black lined compost bags and leave them for a year or two to rot down in the hope that after another year buried underground any weed seeds will not be viable.  This keeps all the nutrients recycled on the site - all except the edible part of any crops.  

Weed suppression is something I take very seriously.  The best method is to have a crop growing but failing that deployment of weed suppressant fabric in the early part of the growing season saves hours of repetitive weeding.  As the sowing season progresses so the aesthetically unpleasing fabric gets rolled back. 

Brassicas tend to be at their best late in the growing year. None more so than purple sprouting broccoli which is currently in full production mode. 

 One again my lack of planning means the row of PSB plants is right in the middle of this year's carrot patch (under the fine mesh).  The PSB needs nets to keep the pigeons off while the carrots need fine netting to keep the carrot root fly off. so it is a bit of a logistic nightmare to cater for them both simultaneously.  As the early carrot sowing show no sign of germination yet perhaps there is no imminent prospect of running out of space just yet - the main crop carrots can wait until the PSB harvesting season is over.

This years brassicas and leeks are coming on at home in readiness for planting out. It iis going to be busy for the next month or two!

Early season brassicas

Leeks

 

What To Grow in a Crisis

It is like the old joke.

Visitor:  How do I get to XXX

Local:  If I was going to XXX I wouldn't start here...

I read that the vegetable seed companies are inundated with new orders, especially since the garden centres have shut their doors. So the question arises: What to grow?

First of all consider what space you have available.  A windowsill, balcony, patio, garden or allotment?  Microgreens, herbs, cucumber, chilli, tomato all suit the first whereas artichokes and asparagus would only suit the bigger sites. Patios are no longer limiting as "crops in pots" has become fashionable in the last decade - even potatoes.

Then there is the season - the reason for the poor joke above.  Well the news is surprisingly good for the northern hemisphere. In the UK it is too late for garlic and other autumn planted crops (like rhubarb and raspberries) but still very early in the growing season for just about everything else!  Broad beans spring to mind because they can be sown in autumn but also in early spring. It's not too late.  In fact April is about the busiest month for sowing in the vegetable gardening calendar. As a rule, what you can't sow in April you can sow in May!

The key consideration for sowing/planting outdoors is the last night of frost. Here in Edinburgh mid May is the usual reference point, but further south you can expect an earlier date. That is not to promise that nature won't come up with a nasty surprise (Edinburgh has exceptionally had frost in June!).  Generally plants are 'hardy',  'half hardy' or  'tender' to frost.  Peas are half hardy whereas courgettes are tender.  That's why you can sow peas outside before the last frost date but you need to protect courgettes and only plant them out after the danger is gone.  For tender crops it is worth keeping an ear/eye out for the weather forecast in the days/weeks after planting out sensitive seedlings. Frost warnings feature larger as the year goes as even some weather forecasters are gardeners too.

So you have identified your growing space and are ready to sow.  What's best to try?  Something fast, something tasty?

'Fast' in gardening terms is relative.  You cannot expect to beat 7 days for mustard and cress or other microgreens indoors.  Proper salad leaves boast that they are ready in as little as 25 or 30 days. By contrast parsnips are notoriously 'in the ground' for 12 months. Although ready to be dug up in the autumn, there is a reason why they are associated with Christmas.  Chillies and tomatoes take all summer to get cropping in Scotland, but then the challenge of getting a return at all is half the fun! In between these extremes most vegetable crops deliver in 40 to 90 days.

Tasty:  Tastes differ but one rule is that schoolchildren don't like radishes (a shame as they are one of the fastest crops).  Peas and beans, carrots and cabbages are all popular, but each has its own growing challenge. Some unfamiliar crops can turn out to be favourites. When the school garden produced a bumper crop of purple sprouting broccoli some children wouldn't even try it, but others did and enjoyed the novelty. Swiss chard is not common in the shops but really popular in  many 'grow your own' households. Bulb fennel is not difficult to grow but divides opinion depending on where you sit on the aniseed tolerance scale. The brassica family (cabbage, kale, Brussel sprouts) is a must for most adults but a no no for many youngsters.

So, time to come off the fence. My top 5 starter vegetable recommendations are:

Mustard and Cress - Quick old fashioned reliable 'microgreens'

Carrots -  6 inches of soil needed for the homegrown taste money won't buy.

Peas - Straight from the pod - unforgettable - or 'peashoots' if you are in a hurry.

Swiss Chard - All the benefits of spinach but easier and with the bonus of buttery ribs.

Beetroot - Red or Gold, so sweet. Worth the wait.

Growing veg isn't as easy as it appears to be on telly, but it is remarkably rewarding in the first year and devilishly addictive once you have taken on the challenge of improving on last year.


Now here is a tune that seemed laughable not so long ago:

Standing to Attention Part II

There's not much happening now that the weather has put the freeze on the growing season. Parsnips, cabbages, kale, brussel sprouts,  jerusalem artichoke and next spring's leeks are shrugging off the the icy weather on their own.    

I've taken the opportunity to put into action my "great soft fruit cage plan" for 2013. This was going to be the great soft fruit cage plan for 2012 but was put on ice until the preparation time became available. The wood was collected from a skip when a building renovation was under way and they were being thrown away. I am happy to give them a second use. They've waited in a pile standing on bricks until now. 

I've already posted a picture of wooden poles soaking in a bucket of preservative.  Well these have now been fully painted with preservative and moved to their new location to dry out.

The next step has been to install the uprights:

I know my joinery limitations, so  every joint is made using an simple L shaped bracket and 4 screws.


The suspended beams will be next to be screwed into position.  Then all I need is the netting.  And some sort of access point.  I've got all winter to finish off so I am pretty pleased with progress so far.  There will be no point in netting the roof until after any danger of snow has passed.

Of course devoting 1/5th of the plot to soft fruit has upset my 5 year rotation plan which has had to be adapted to a 4 year rotation.   The Alliums and Other Roots will now share a block. Planning is actually a large part of the fun of allotment gardening - plans working is the payoff.

Happy winter days.