Up the garden path !

Now that the edging boards are in place we  have started to establish a grass path down to the compost bin and a grass area around the bin and the cold frame.

Hoopla !

We are establishing the nursery bed where leeks and brassicas are being grown.
.
We have sown Bleau de Solaise and Autumn Giant Leeks,  two varieties of Purple Sprouting Broccoli, Brussels Sprouts Trafalgar F1, Kale Tosco di Nero, Red Cabbage Rodima, Savoy Cabbage Tarvoy and Capriccio, Cauliflower Candid Charm and Calabrese Belstar F1.
.
An 'enviromesh' cover will be placed over the hoops to prevent attack by birds and insects. In June, we will remove the plants from the nursery bed.  The brassicas will be replanted in another area.  The leeks will be replanted back under the cover where they should develop free from attack by Onion Fly and be ready for the table from November onwards.
.

Onions !

I thought that we ought to have some more onions to see us through the Autumn months and bought a pack of 50 'Hercules' sets from Secretts Garden Centres.

 

This afternoon, I planted these at 6" spacing in the 22' bed and only then realised that one pack would not be sufficient for two rows... so it's back down to Secretts tomorrow for another pack of 50 !

.
Update Friday, March 4th : Another pack of 50 bought and planted this afternoon !

First Earlies

Our first-early potatoes were planted today.

We have put in two rows of the very-early variety 'Swift' which could be providing us with some nice salad potatoes in 10 weeks time.

The Patch in February

We took advantage of the few days of dry weather to get down to the patch for some tidying-up.

The crops sown/planted in the Autumn have survived the Winter really well, considering how low the temperatures fell.
.
The peas at the far-ends of the two cloches were badly affected by frost and we have sown additional seeds which should compensate for the losses. The remainder look healthy and are likely to produce a good crop in May.
.
Our broad beans have been very successful with the young plants now reaching the top of the cloche. We will have to remove the cloche and cover the plants with fleece to prevent them being frost damaged between now and May.
.
The picture above shows the garlic and two varieties of onions that we planted in September. There have been some losses, but there will be enough to provide some onions for the kitchen and the showbench in June.

Raspberries

We received twelve bare-root raspberry canes from D.T. Browns yesterday. The variety is 'Tulameen', which fruits in late-Summer.

Nine of the canes were planted in the bed which had been prepared a few months back with a trench full of compost and each cane was planted 18" apart in a hole in which a few handfuls of Growmore had been added.

The remaining three canes were heeled-in alongside as back-up's should any of the others fail.

Sunny November

It was a beautiful day down at the patch. We arrived around 09:30 and worked through to 16:40... so we put in a full day-shift !

To start off, I made a bonfire of all the old wood stakes and, once it was red hot, added the cut down cosmos, the roots from the raspberries we cleared and all the dried weeds as we could gather.

I transferred barrow-loads of horse manure to the plot where we will be growing brassicas next year and spread a thick layer across it.  We will cover this with cardboard to keep the weeds down and encourage the worms to take it down into the soil below.

Heather had finished painting the outside of the cold frame and I then added some brackets which will keep the lids tied-down.

The last job of the day was to fit the gravel boards along one side of the central path, and this was accomplished successfully.  I will fit the boards on the opposite side over the weekend.

We were accompanied most of the afternoon by the young vixen. Apparently the fox sleeps with the pigs in their wooden huts, none of them bothered by the others presence.  She even made a few attempts to get into our shed until I shooed her away,  but she simply trotted off a few paces and stared back at me in defiance! During the rest of the afternoon she was watching us while we were working, often  just a few feet away.