Sowing!

Had a morning out having a look round the 'posh' garden centre with mum and was treated to coffee and cake - hurrah! - then we buzzed off the the garden centre which actually has plants, and I bought my seed potatoes.

This evening, I've done my first sowing session. Every year I say I'll sow successionally, but never do - so it's this one, and the bean/pea/tender crops in about a month and that's it.

I now have pots of brassicas (cauli, cabbage, kale, broccoli) and tomatoes and peppers, and lettuce.

 I'm rather surprised that my little helpers didn't join in - they must be slipping, an 'interesting thing' generally brings them from rooms, if not floors away; even if the 'interesting thing' is being done silently or when they are flat-out asleep.

Marshall's Trial Seeds and Potting On

I now have too many tomato plants - or I will have in a couple of weeks when all these seedlings have grown up a bit.

I have room for six buckets in the courtyard garden - i.e. six tomato plants - and I already have the baker's half dozen plants that my friend kindly gave me the other day when I thought that my germination was zero.  Now my germination is rate is 17 out of 18.

Two of these varieties are from the Marshall's seed trial, and I will pay particular attention to how these do.

I've had good germination from their courgette, and two varieties of squash too; and the cabbage - however, I've only had two of the 'brokali' come up out of six modules with a couple of seeds in each module.

I had a grand potting on session last night - the courgettes need a bit more room each for a couple of weeks before planting out, and I won't have room for the brassicas for a while yet, so they all moved up a pot size for the time being.

Back to the plot at the weekend* for more bean planting out, and bed prep for the tender crops - and then Domino cat can have his bench back!

*But not on Sunday, when the streets of our town are closed off and I join 6,999 others belting round the borough and the adjoining largest urban park in Europe.  'We're fundraisers - everyone gets a finishers medal - it's not a race!' goes the official line. Not a race? Yeah, right.

Transformation of a Compost Heap

Today's forecast was for heavy rain for most of the day, so I went to the Hill yesterday with the aim of planting the potatoes.

I parked at the top of the site, and walking down past the plots with seed potatoes clutched to me in their egg boxes where they have been chitting on the windowsill for the past few weeks; and saw that I was not alone in this plan, with a number of plots sporting the tell tale ridge-and-grove of earth with (presumably) spuds tucked up underneath.

Although I see the theory of planting the spuds in the groves; filling in as the plants grow, then earthing up the growing plants, it strikes me like a lot of hard work, so my spuds get dropped into planting holes made with a handy broom handle about 8" deep, with earthing up later in the season if I can be bothered. 

First, I had to move the netting tunnel to a different bed where I will sow carrots in a week or two - and now that
I have the knack of it, the cage didn't take long to put up in a sturdy fashion in it's new situation.

The three cabbages that it had been protecting though, did make me scratch my head - they are too small to harvest, but in the way of the spuds, and now open to pigeon attack.  I managed to work around them and rig up a temporary netting and hope to be eating them before they inconvenience the potato plants. 

Then I spent some more time digging over and weeding the plot front - the lavender plants that have been there for some years are now leggy (baaaaaaaad pruning!) and since Gardener Zoe showed me last week how easy peasy it is to take cuttings, I will be growing more on and replacing the existing. 

Talking of Gardener Zoe, I offered her all the dry woody contents of my horrible out-of-control pallet composters for kindling if she wanted to have a bonfire in the week, and rather than the compost bins looking like this:

They now look like this.  

Magic!  Now all I have to do is decide what to do with the extra space this gives me. Maybe a pumpkin to ramble over, then dig and create a fruit bed at the end of the growing season, perhaps?

A New Neighbour and Final Bed Prep

The Spring equinox at the weekend means that at last the days are now longer than the nights, and with warmer weather (and the pigeons at home making eyes at each other), it definitely feels Spring is Springing.

The seeds that I sowed last month agree, with the sweet peas and leeks both putting in an appearance - just - the microscopic dot here is a leek seedling.  They have been sown in pots and in the shelter of the mini greenhouse for almost four weeks before sprouting, which just goes to show that that Mother Nature will get on with things in her own sweet time.

I dithered whether to get the spuds in the ground or not this weekend; however, they are due to go into the two beds at the front of the plot which are currently clogged up with two daleks, one cage over the kale and one newly robust netting tunnel protecting three cabbage plants - so there is a bit of a backlog of stuff in the way before the spuds can go in.

So when I arrived at the Hill on Sunday, I moving the cage, and the netting to one site, and got to work with the fork and three-pronged cultivator.  I chatted to my enthusiastic new neighbour Zoe who gardens for a living, but is not so experienced with fruit and veg.

Neat Neighbour John, Novice Neighbour Jody and then Jody's Mate Shaun have all left plot 17a in good shape, and now Gardener Zoe has custody of the front of that half plot to make of what she will.

Once I'd finished going over the beds, I hoed in some blood, fish and bone which should give the cabbages a boost, and made a start on tidying up the flower border at the front of the plot, which is prone to weeds.

Time running out - although not daylight this time - I tidied up and went to pick some kale.  It's just starting to bolt now, so snapped off the flower heads off to take home for tea - and hope that it will throw some side shoots in time for my next visit too.

Shopping, Prepping and Mending

The Hill storeshed is kept stocked with all sorts of gardening essentials all at very reasonable prices, and purchases can be made through any committee member who you can happen to catch on the plot. But from the middle of March, the storeshed is open for business on a more formal basis, on Saturday and Sunday mornings for a couple of hours.

So instead of wandering up and down the site in the hope of catching someone with a key, yesterday I could march up to the shed and talk to Cheery Brian who was playing storekeeper for the morning and buy the fertiliser that I've been after for the past few weeks.

Despite the weather being markedly colder than the past couple of weekends, the Hill was full of plotters out of hibernation and all busy with preparations for the growing year, and the site was quite a hive of activity. 

And so to the business of final bed preparation in readiness for sowing and planting out - and after a couple of solid hours with a fork and the three-pronged cultivator, sprinkling the fertiliser as I finished each bed, six of the eight beds look pretty darn good, if I say so myself.

I cleared away the bamboo canes - the long ones to bring home, shorter ones to put in the toolshed in a bucket.  Any plastic balls which I use as cane toppers which have perished I put in a rubbish bag, and other pieces of wood gathered together at the back of the toolshed. 

Of the last two beds at the front of the plot, the one has the kale plants still growing strongly, and the other has the ramshackle netting tunnel protecting - let me see - ah, yes, three cabbage plants.  

I am curious as to how it can be improved upon, though, so took it back to basics and put the hoops closer together and used bamboo canes instead of heavier wooden spars as horizontal braces and it now looks a million dollars.

Content with progress, I tidied away my tools and headed home for a nice hot cup of tea.