The First of the Seeds

These little seedlings are jalapeno peppers that I planted on 14th Feb. The other peppers sown at the same time have also begun to come through, but as yet they don't need to be planted on. The onions are coming through slowly, but the leeks are doing very well and I've planted about 2o of those seedlings into pots too.

On 21st Feb I sowed some strawberries, mint and some more friggitello and jalapeno peppers. There's no sign of the peppers so far, but I've got a grand total of 1 strawberry seedling and 2 mint! I'm expecting the peppers through any day now, and I'm starting to wonder if I've done something wrong.

Yesterday was a really busy and enjoyable day spent indoors, while the finishing touches were being made to the raised beds and the greenhouse outside. While the man was occupied with heavy lifting, I took the opportunity to sow over 20 varieties of seed; mint, 7 types of chilli pepper, cucumber, sage, 5 types of tomato, onions, carrots, broccoli, sweetcorn and leeks. There's now a huge number of pots covered with sandwich bags all crowded round the radiator in the office, waiting for the weather to warm up. I had wanted to start a few off directly outside too, but the nights are still below freezing, so unusually for me I've displayed some restraint and am holding off until the frosts have well and truly passed.

The biggest lesson I learnt last year was about avoiding gluts, and ensuring a long cropping season. Whilst Cabbagetopia was immensely successful, giving us convenient frozen cabbage right through till a couple of weeks ago, I'd like to avoid having the smell of cooked cabbage permeating throughout the house this year! Therefore, I've become almost obsessive about successional sowing.

I'm aiming to sow a new batch of seeds every fortnight, following a "little and often" approach. In order to ensure the longest possible cropping season, I've worked out the maximum amount of times I'll be able to sow. For example, if my seed pack says to sow from March to May, I'll be able to have 6 batches. Whenever I've tried successional sowing in the past, I've always ended up using them all up to soon, or having some left over when it's too late to plant them. In thinking it through like this, I'll hopefully have a long cropping season, with a manageable amount of fruit and veg, and no left over seeds. Here's hoping!

The Veg Patch Wakes Up

Well, after the coldest Winter that I can ever remember, it's been fantastic to get outside and start preparing for Spring. We constructed three raised beds and I've been busy sowing seeds ready for when (if!) the frosts finally stop. On 14th Feb I used my new propagator to sow leeks, onions, golden bell peppers, Romanian peppers, Hungarian hot wax peppers, jalapeno peppers, red cherry peppers and frigitello peppers.

Since my job involves being away for days at a time, my main focus this year is on keeping my plants watered. I've got a self watering propagator, which has capillary matting to keep my seeds from drying out while I'm away. Hopefully I'll have some success with this propagator, as I'm planning to sow a lot more seeds over the coming weeks, including tomatoes, sweetcorn, lettuce, courgettes and cucumbers.

The veg patch is saved - for now...

As part of the garden redesign, I spent Saturday helping (oh, alright - watching) my Dad put up a rather large screen. The new design is intended to break the garden up into sections, starting with a patio and large planting area, then a square lawn, then a veg patch at the end. This is going to consist of 4 raised beds, making the veg patch 4 times bigger than it currently is. Unfortunately, one of the two screens that will divide these areas is going to be situated right in the middle of where my veg patch is right now.

So, when Dad asked if he'd like all four posts put up together, or one whole screen put up that day, I immediately opted to concentrate all efforts on the first screen, far away from my precious sweetcorn, which are getting ripe at last. I shared one with my sister on Saturday night and it was delicious - much sweeter than those you normally get in the supermarket.

This weekend I'm looking forward to harvesting the remaining plants and making a large batch of chicken and sweetcorn soup. Unfortunately I don't think the leeks are going to be big enough to be harvested before the second screen has to go up. I'm going to try to save them by transplanting them to an area of the garden that won't get touched for a few months. While the future of the garden is looking good, I think I have to face facts that the days of my little raised bed are numbered...

Sweetcorn: How can you tell they're ripe?

As mentioned in my previous post, I took a fairly heavy handed approach to checking my sweetcorn and just pulled one of the cobs off the stalk. Having researched this further, I found a useful article at examiner.com. This article gives some useful tips on when your sweetcorn should be ripe. Apparently, the silk coming out the top should be brown. A few days after this happens, the sweetcorn should be ripe. Other indicators are plump kernels that give out a translucent milky fluid when pressed. If it's thick and white, it's overripe.

All well and good, but surely that means pulling off the cob? Apparently not. What you can do is just pull some of the husk away and carry out your tests. If you find the corn is not yet ripe, you can simply put everything back where it was and secure it with a rubber band.

As you may be able to tell by the lack of photos in these recent posts, I'm on the road with limited internet access, so I haven't been near my veg patch all week (sob!). However, I'll be back tomorrow morning - wellies on, fork in hand, so I will report back with my findings as soon as I get back to my glorious mud.

The first signs of Autumn

For the past couple of weeks I have noticed the trees changing colour whilst I've been out and about. But I can now officially announce the arrival of Autumn, because I've made an apple pie with fruit from the garden! Ever since I was little, I've associated Autumn with apple pies and crumbles made by my Grandma. This year has been extra special for me as it's the first time I've made a pie myself. I did attempt pastry once, but it was such a disaster that I've been too scared to attempt it, until I felt I had to give it one more go, for the sake of my apples.

The recipe I used was from The Ultimate Recipe Book by Angela Nielsen. The pastry recipe was strange to me as I always remember watching my Grandma rubbing in lard, butter and flour and it all getting a bit too messy (mainly due to my over-enthusastic "helping"). This recipe is more like a cake in that there's no rubbing in. Instead, you cream butter and sugar, add a whole egg and an egg yolk, then mix in flour until you get a dough.

This strange process actually worked a treat, and the pie was delicious. The recipe called for Bramley apples and unfortunately I have no idea what mine are as the tree was there when I moved in. Still, they tasted lovely and I'm looking forward to making another one next weekend.

In veg patch news, my sweetcorn plants are looking truly majestic and I've got about 15 cobs in total. Unfortunately, I have no idea what they look like when they're ripe. I pulled one off the plant and opened it up a couple of weeks ago, but it was nowhere near ready. Rather than try this ham-fisted technique again, I'm going to look online to see if I can get some advice. As soon as they're ripe, I'll report back, hopefully with a bowl of chicken and sweetcorn soup...

Minimum Preparation - Maximum Results

In keeping with my mantra of "very little effort, money or skill", I can honestly say I've done nothing to prepare my soil. I know the books tell you to get your soil pH levels tested, mix certain ratios of poop to mud to get the best soil, and rotate your crops so all the nutrients aren't sucked out.

While I'm sure that all of these things make for a far better crop than mine, I'm only feeding 2 people and I want to spend as much time relaxing in my garden as I can. And faffing about with test tubes isn't my idea of a good time.

So I decided to take the lazy route. My theory is that if it's meant to be, it will be. If I plant a seed and it does well, then great. If it doesn't, then it's not suited to my garden for whatever reason and I should try something else. That way, I won't be wasting a load of time, effort or money on improving my soil for the sake of some cucumbers.

Using this theory I've grown 15 different types of veg in 3 years, and learnt a new lesson at each step of the way:

Potatoes - do too well, they need to be kept in a pot
Tomatoes - do better in the mud than in the growbag and much less watering required
Spring Onions - always seem to come back to life no matter how much they dry out
Radishes - grow from seeds sown straight into the ground but slugs love them
Cabbages - they get a lot bigger than you'd think, plant them far apart
Beetroot - so easy to grow, they survived under my cabbages with virtually no sunlight
Sweetcorn - take up a lot less space than you'd imagine
Squash - really fast growing
Lollo Rosso Lettuce - much hardier than I expected
Spinach - needs picking regularly, you'd only need one plant to feed two people all summer
Leeks - another vegetable that seems to need no water
Celery - just plant them through some black fabric and leave them to it
Carrots - sow the seeds in a pot, not directly in the ground

The only true failures I've had so far are peas and purple sprouting broccoli. I tried the peas twice with bad results both times. I'm going to give them one last chance, by growing them in a big pot. If I don't get any luck there, then I'll admit defeat. The broccoli was a heartbreaking disaster. Having just two plants survive my premature planting out was bad enough, but returning from holiday to find them utterly decimated by caterpillars was too much. Next year not only will I be more gentle with the planting out, I'll also be sure to keep them under a net.