July Review

It's July and the patch is really showing some growth.

Here's a brief summary of the crops we are growing and how they are performing :

• Potatoes : We are growing Cara, Desiree, International Kidney and Anya. We are currently lifting some of the International Kidney and Anya for the table and the plants have produced good yields of tasty potatoes. A few Desiree were lifted and shown to have good yields, but a few of the tubers were found to have 'hollow heart' and we will have to watch the crop carefully. The Cara have produced good top foliage and I expect them to produce some very good yields when lifted in late Summer.

• Three Sisters : This bed is coming along nicely with the beans growing up the corn and the squash starting to cover the bare earth.

• Brassicas : The cabbage, red cabbage, cauliflower, kale, savoy and purple sprouting broccoli plants are growing strongly in the pigeon and butterfly proof cage. The calabrese produced good quality heads a lot earlier than expected. These have been harvested and frozen and the plants are now producing a secondary growth. We have had to bring on some more calabrese plants and these are now ready to be transplanted into the bed inside the cage.

• Leeks : The seedlings of the two varieties were transplanted to their final positions and are looking strong and healthy.

• Peas and Broad Beans : The October sown plants were removed and this area will be used to grow Spring cabbage and Choi Sum. We have sown another row this month that we hope will take us through to the first frosts.

• Celery : We have some strong healthy looking plants, although the sticks are rather thin.

• Onions, Shallots and Garlic : All bulbs from Autumn planted sets have been harvested and the area used to sow late peas and broad beans. The bulbs from Spring sown sets and seeds are developing nicely, although the changeable weather is likely to induce bolting.

• Asparagus : All ten crowns have produced a number of healthy spears which are now showing ferns which we will leave until the foliage browns and starts to die back.

• Fennel : We are currently harvesting bulbs from the spring sown crops and have also made another sowing of a late developing variety.

• Carrots : Both varieties (Autumn King & Purple Haze) are showing signs of attack from Carrot Root Fly despite all of the preventative measures we have taken. We will now lift all of them and see what we can salvage for freezing. Another row of Autumn King has been sown and we will try to protect this crop as best we can.

• Parsnip, Celeriac & Swede: We have strong plants that should produce some good yields.

• Beetroot : We have already lifted (and pickled) two successive rows and have seedlings growing in a third sown row.

In addition to these main crops, we have catch-crops like radish, spring onion, spinach and also some plantings in odd corners... lettuce, borlotti beans, outdoor cucumber, and tomatoes.