When you are digging potatoes and cutting cabbages it qualifies as a harvest!
I have been resisting the urge to start digging spuds until now. Today I set to with a fork and was relieved to find good sized Epicure potatoes. A couple of Greyhound cabbages were ready too. So it is going to be homegrown veg from here on. Woopee!
On checking my records, these (the first row of potatoes) were planted on 17 March several weeks before the other earlies and over a month before the final maincrop which was in by 19 April, See Diggin
At the allotment this morning and not all is well. Half a row of raspberries has veined leaves like this:
Raspberry Leaves showing classic symptoms of iron deficiency.
and early cabbage Greyhound is also a bit blotchy.
Cabbage with blotches - Manganese deficiency?
Returning home with pictures and consulting the books both seem to be mineral deficiencies. Given recent climatic conditions it could simply be waterlogging showing up in different ways. All the same I will be looking for a suitable tonic for each. The iron deficiency might benefit from a sprinkling of ericaceous fertilizer as this states "Extra Iron For Richer Green Leaves". Manganese sulphate might be harder to come by. The advice seems to be not to over lime susceptible soils. This seems harsh for a brassica patch! If there is an organic trace element cocktail in the shops/garden centre I will probably get it as an insurance.
Now on a more cheerful note, I also picked the first strawberries of the season today. Now when is Wimbledon?
Here's the current state of play: Looking from East to West, there are beans in the foreground, brassicas beyond.
The East End (reverse view)
In the corner the globe artichokes are showing a bit of muscle.
The blueberries are responding to winter pruning in their pen.
Here is a closer look at the brassica, each plantlet at its station 18 inches from its neighbour planted through the weed suppressant fabric. At the rear are the early planted cabbages and cauliflowers already well away.
A closer look at the early brassicas,
Moving along further West there are peas, cucurbits and sweetcorn (also through weed suppressant fabric) carrots (under nets) and alliums.
Cucurbits: Squashes and Pumpkins:
Sweetcorn with two courgettes beyond.
In the next corner the old rhubarb is looking robust
and alongside at the West End there are first signs of another robust cropper: Jerusalem artichoke.
The alliums are looking very happy.
Heading back from West to East the fruit cage now has a net over it.
and the early potatoes are flowering.
View of the potatoes and fruit East to West.
These pictures were taken yesterday 7/6/17 a dryish day between two very wet ones!
