radish

Salad days

I planted a whole load of salad things into the new bed at the side of the greenhouse:
  • spring onion
  • radish
  • chard
  • rocket
  • spinach

The bed itself is divided into squares (roughly 12"), so hopefully will look pretty.

Spring is coming

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I planted some peas (a nice long row in the bed behind the garage), more carrots and, as I forgot them last week, some radishes. I'll do more work tomorrow, but I've been thinking about how to grow cabbages etc without them being eaten. The picture is of the winter cabbages. Those protected by netting survived, everything else (the cauliflower) has been eaten by birds (I suspect the pheasants).

I think that I need a frame!


frosts on the way

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The row of spinach that I planted on the 2nd March was a bit thin (about 4 plants poked their way out of the ground), so I’ve sown some more to bridge the gaps. I sowed a row of carrots (Paris Market) in the plot to the side of the garage. The books disagreed on when to sow, so no idea what results I’ll get. Finally, I put the last of the potatoes (Anya) into the same plot as the carrots and sowed the last few in plant pots in the greenhouse so that I get an early crop. The others that I sowed like that have started to sprout and I’m filling up the pot with earth.

Meanwhile, the cold frame is turning into a real investment (and a good present). I had my first salad leaves and a tiny radish today from there and the cabbages waiting to go into the ground are doing really well. It’s forecasting frosts this week, so I’ll wait.

We ate some of the cabbage (which is bolting) and the spinach with Sunday lunch.
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catching up in the garden

I took a day off in lieu of my last Saturday last weekend and I spent a good part of it in the garden. Outside, I planted potatoes (Swift and Anya), beetroot (including transplants), leek, radish (French Breakfast), lettuce (Tin Tin) and parsnip. I also planted out the carrots that I grown in half toilet rolls into the ground inside the cold frame.

sowing after snowing

The snow has almost gone now and the weather is warming up. This year I want to grow as much from seed as I can so I want to treat the propagator as a bit of a conveyer belt, getting stuff out of it and new seed in as fast as I can. Somewhere I read that when 75% of your seeds have germinated, take the containers out.

Tomatoes
I’ve taken most of the tomatoes out of the propagator. Both types, Alicante and Gardener’s Delight have sprouted. I sowed a batch of the ‘Garden Pearl’ (which I got from a magazine) into pots (three to a pot) and put those into the propagator. You can grow these in pots or in hanging baskets.

Carrots
I’ve taken the ‘Nante’s 2’ from the propagator as pretty much all of them have come up. I planted these in toilet rolls and, when the weather is warm enough, I plan to put them into the ground as is. I need to sow some more, but the propagator is now full.

Leeks and Beetroot
These have gone into the propagator.

Radish
I’ve sown ‘French Breakfast’ in the cold frame (where mixed salad leaves are starting to sprout. No sign of the carrots in the cold frame yet, but there has been a lot of snow and freezing temperatures.

Cabbage and Cauliflower
Despite last year’s doing really badly (the cauliflowers came late and rotted, caterpillars decimated the cabbage, only Savoy cabbages are left) I bought some more seeds and sowed them today. Cabbages were ‘Primo’ which are apparently ideal for small gardens and the cauliflowers are ‘All Year Round’ (Britain’s most popular). I want summer ones, these grow quickly and you can eat them in June / July. These will be grown under netting!


Tomato ‘Garden Pearl’
An outdoor tomato with big crops of very tasty sweet cherry tomatoes with pink-red fruit. It s (determinate) bush habit makes it ideal for pots tubs window boxes or borders.

Radish ‘French Breakfast’
Elongated, rosy scarlet with a white tip. The crunchy flesh has a pleasant flavour.

salad days

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We picked (and ate) the first of the radishes and then, later we had a nice starter of baked goat's cheese on a bed of salad, also from the salad bed

Salad and herb bed

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This is all coming along nicely. The spring onions were an impulse buy - none of mine have seeded. The twigs are to keep the cats off.

raddish

I planted some raddish (Alan Titchmarsh's organic Saxa 2) in the new herb and salad bed.

Raddish Saxa 2

An early variety, producing flavoursome round, red roots.