Spring Update

Well, I call it a spring update but it's still feeling like winter to me. What a dismal Easter break we've had?

As such, things are a little later on the plot than I would have liked. I have three long polythene cloches to protect my plants. They were over my broad beans and spinach and I've just pulled them off and put them over my first pea (Kelvedon Wonder) seed sowings. After that, I will put them over my sweetcorn which I'll sow straight into the ground.

Right hand side of the plot with broad beans in the
foreground and peas and PSB to the right

I've had a pretty poor germination rate over the winter - I can only assume it's due to the cold and the wet...or a combination of both. I have an unheated greenhouse and the water was freezing overnight in it at times this winter and early spring.  However, as always, lets focus on the positives and look at the successes. 

The weeds haven't started coming through yet and I've only cut the lawn once so far giving me plenty of time to sort, plan, re-plan, procrastinate, ponder, re-plan and finally sow seeds and plant things out.

I have three strong double rows of broad beans and  3/4 of my allium beds full of onions and garlic. The leeks (Musselburgh and Lyon) are in the coldframe and are ready to go into the final 1/4 once they're big enough.

Herbs are coming along well, except the tips of the

Bay which got a bit too cold and the Sage which

I pruned just before the first snow!

I'm following a 4 year crop rotation. I always have done. I have two sections still with a green manure on. Rather than dig it in, I let the chickens on to it while the grass is growing slowly and they can eat (wreck) it to their hearts content. It all ends up back in the soil whether I dig it in or whether they eat it and manure it for me!

Always wanting to try new things, I've forced rhubarb for the first time this year. Using my Grandmothers terracotta pot, I've had rhubarb for a month now and am just about to take my last pickings before I move on to the normal rhubarb. Ever the planner, I have 4 clumps which I will rotate my forcing through each year so as not to drain each individual plant. 

Rhubarb in its second year is doing well

Recipe idea - have you stewed rhubarb with orange? I hadn't until a couple of years ago and it's delicious. Add the juice and zest of an orange and stew away. Try it!

Another new crop I'm trying this year is Salsify. I sowed the seeds yesterday and will see how it goes. They're alongside my parsnips so I hope they will be friends.

I'm also trying a new variety of beetroot. Last year I decided to only grow the golden varieties as I loved the taste and they were excellent in salads over the summer. However, after watching Masterchef this week, I decided to buy some Beetroot Rouge Crapaudine and give them a go. I've had the email this morning to say they're on their way.

Last year was a first for me growing Edemame beans, and I've got them waiting to go in once things warm up. They were lovely roasted with a bit of chilli as a snack.

In the greenhouse I have a lot of flowers - It's important to balance the veg beds with flowers, both for the aesthetics and for the benefits they bring in attracting pollinators and other beneficial insects, as well as warding off some 'nasties' from the crops. I have French marigolds, nasturtiums, nigella, sunflowers, Californian poppy, calendula, sweet peas and geraniums for my patio pots. 

This year I'm labelling properly in the greenhouse.

Time for a confession - I snuck a few seed heads out of a local stately home last summer and so I hope to have them growing in a few weeks in my garden too! 

Also sown in the greenhouse are herbs, lettuce and salad, toms, peppers, squashes, aubergines and chillis.

In the coldframe are all my brassicas - cabbages, sprouting broccoli, kale. I'm not growing Brussels this year as I'm never really that successful with them. After many years growing them and not much to show for it, I've cut them out altogether.

Rosemary cuttings in the coldframe with leeks, sweet peas and brassica seeds

Sown directly into the ground are carrots, beetroot, parsnip, lettuce. Spinach and overwintered brassicas are standing tall.

In terms of fruit, I have three new additions this year, a patio quince and patio apricot and a damson.

 

I'm really waiting until May now to get on in the hope that it warms up eventually. French beans will be going in then with swede and sweetcorn and I will be ready like a coiled spring to start planting out more successional sowings.

So even though it's cold and wet, there's still a lot going on in the garden. I've overhauled the front garden over the winter, but that's for another post!

Keep warm.