It was a pleasant morning down at the patch and the threatened showers failed to materialise.
I lifted the Senshyu Yellow onions that were sown as sets last Autumn and hung them in the shed to dry off. This was done because leaving them in the ground meant that there was a risk of bolting... and bolted onions have a tendency to rot.
The sets purchased from Dobies produced a fine crop of large bulbs, but those purchased from Homebase produced much smaller bulbs and far lower yields. Next time round I will try to grow most of my onions from seed sown in August and September. These will be backed-up with a January planting of ABS101 sets from Thompson & Morgan. Apparently, these will mature quicker than any sets sown in Autumn.
In the space left vacant by the onions we transplanted the leeks grown from seed in trays at home and those grown in our nursery bed. As mentioned before, we sowed two varieties of leeks : Blue Solaise and Oarsman. Both varieties were grown indoors in trays from a January sowing and both varieties were also sown outdoors in a seed bed at the allotment in March... the plan being to see which method proved the most efficient. Unfortunately, the writing on the labels in the seed trays and at the allotment washed off. We now had four sets of plants but are unable to identify the leeks according to their variety !
So here's what we did :
I lifted one set of plants from the nursery bed where the largest had the slightest hint of blue in it's foliage (Blue Solaise, obviously !) and these were transplanted into a prepared bed with a gap of 12" between each one. We were five plants short of a complete row, so I took five from the ones that had been grown in trays.
Next, I lifted the remaining set of plants (Oarsman ?) and transplanted these into a row 12" apart from the ones planted previously. We then found that we had sufficient to plant another row alongside.
So we now have 3 rows of leeks : Two complete rows which will either be Blue Solaise or Oarsman and one row which will be whatever is not in the other two rows... apart from 5 plants which could be either !!!
In addition, there were some plants left-over which we are growing on in the tray as mini-leeks.
On a more thoughtful note, the plants grown from seeds sown outdoors in the nursery bed proved to be stronger and more vigorous than those started indoors in trays.
I lifted the Senshyu Yellow onions that were sown as sets last Autumn and hung them in the shed to dry off. This was done because leaving them in the ground meant that there was a risk of bolting... and bolted onions have a tendency to rot.
The sets purchased from Dobies produced a fine crop of large bulbs, but those purchased from Homebase produced much smaller bulbs and far lower yields. Next time round I will try to grow most of my onions from seed sown in August and September. These will be backed-up with a January planting of ABS101 sets from Thompson & Morgan. Apparently, these will mature quicker than any sets sown in Autumn.
In the space left vacant by the onions we transplanted the leeks grown from seed in trays at home and those grown in our nursery bed. As mentioned before, we sowed two varieties of leeks : Blue Solaise and Oarsman. Both varieties were grown indoors in trays from a January sowing and both varieties were also sown outdoors in a seed bed at the allotment in March... the plan being to see which method proved the most efficient. Unfortunately, the writing on the labels in the seed trays and at the allotment washed off. We now had four sets of plants but are unable to identify the leeks according to their variety !
So here's what we did :
I lifted one set of plants from the nursery bed where the largest had the slightest hint of blue in it's foliage (Blue Solaise, obviously !) and these were transplanted into a prepared bed with a gap of 12" between each one. We were five plants short of a complete row, so I took five from the ones that had been grown in trays.
Next, I lifted the remaining set of plants (Oarsman ?) and transplanted these into a row 12" apart from the ones planted previously. We then found that we had sufficient to plant another row alongside.
So we now have 3 rows of leeks : Two complete rows which will either be Blue Solaise or Oarsman and one row which will be whatever is not in the other two rows... apart from 5 plants which could be either !!!
In addition, there were some plants left-over which we are growing on in the tray as mini-leeks.
On a more thoughtful note, the plants grown from seeds sown outdoors in the nursery bed proved to be stronger and more vigorous than those started indoors in trays.
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