Life, Faith & Vegetables

Category: Vegetables

Early April : Progress so far (10th April)

April 10, 2025 /

So, the Korean Celery came out of the fridge and is now sprouting! The garlic is doing really well, which is very pleasing. There was a great harvest of Purple Sprouting Broccoli but that has come to an end now.

It’s not just the March hare that goes mad! I think most gardeners tend to as well especially if you are trying to grow your own food. From some point in March (depending on the weather) until the end of May it is a season of sowing, potting on and planting out as the weather improves. After that things calm down a bit, but its never not busy. If spring is sunny and warm, as it is this year, it is tempting to want to hurry things along, but the night-time temperatures are still quite cool. The temperature in my cold frames has varied between 30oC plus down to 3oC. The soil is now dry so if sowing in the ground the seeds will need regular watering until they get their roots down. The soil is quite warm so if we get some rain they should do well.

Some of my calabrese and cabbage are ready to plant out and the sweet peas are not far behind. I like them to be quite large before they go out and have to face the big wide world full of pigeons, slugs etc (they will be netted).  The first lot of Alderman peas were eaten by the mice who nipped of the growing shoots, so another lot are germinating in pots at home.

My raised salad bed at home is planted up with lettuces, radish, spring onions, beetroot, parsley and garlic chives.

In terms of harvests there are still leeks, some small spring cabbage and the Nine Star Broccoli. This is a white, semi perennial that is tender, sweet and worth trying. It isn’t very cold hardy,, in my experience, so needs a bit of care in the winter. I’ve also taken the flowering sprouts off the Astrurian Tree Cabbage to stop it flowering and keep it for another year. Apparently, you can eat the flowering shoots, but I haven’t tried it yet. The leaves are lovely; pale green and soft. They make great stuffed cabbage leaves.

The last of 2024’s potatoes have been eaten but the new seasons are all in. The earlies were planted in late March, under cover, and are all up. The main crop has only just gone in.

The south facing windowsill is populated with Dahlias, Chillies, Aubergines, Peppers and the cold frame with onion seedlings, brassicas, flowers, peas, more lettuce and salad crops.

The tomatoes and cucurbits will probably go in next week. As pretty much everything has to grow outside, I don’t start them too early, and they are quite quick to grow. The carrot seed will go in at Easter as I’ll be around after that to keep an eye on the watering. There’s a lot to do, but it is a very exciting time of year for the gardener.

Below is a list of everything that’s growing and what will be sown later this month:

Potatoes: Jazzy (early), Picasso, Desiree

Carrots : Early Nantes2, Amsterdam Forcing, Romance *

Peas: Alderman, Oregon Sugar Pod

Cabbages: Primo F1 Red, Golden Acre, Kalibos, Wong Bok*

Cauliflower: Graffiti*, Snowball, Boris*

Calabrese: Marathon

Aubergine: Long Purple, Czech Early, Genie*

Chillies: Jalapenos, Havannah Gold, Beaver Dam*, Ostry*

Peppers: Lemon Dream*

Beetroot: Boltardy

Spinach: Matador, Beet Leaf*, Tree Spinach*

Chard: Peppermint, White Silver

Spring onion: Lilia

Lettuce:  a mixture of Salanovas, Navarra, Salad Bowl, Lollo Rosso, Canasta Llaguna

Radish: Bright Lights

Tomatoes: Tomande*, Ozark Sunrise, Tigerella, Crimson Crush, Principe Borghese*, SuperSauce*, Garnet, Black Opal, Honeycomb*, Orange Zlata, Paul Robeson*, Russian Black

Cucumber: Market More, Mini Munch ( not hardy, will grow in small plastic greenhouse)

Courgette: Romanesco, Zephyr

Squash: Tromboncino*, Marquee de Provence*, Sunshine*, Crown Prince, Butternut (Hunter)

* indicates varieties that are new to me this year.

Sow many seeds, So little time!!

Enjoy your gardening space, and I hope you get time to enjoy the sunshine.

Starting a new season.

March 3, 2025 /

Today is 3rd March and officially according to the MET Office Spring has come. It does feel like it during the day while it is beautifully sunny, but at night it is really cold, below freezing. So, I am resisting the temptation to put anything outside, apart from the peas and sweet peas which are in a cold frame. I chitted these in damp compost first as they were old seed, but they all came good.

Currently still in the ground, at the allotment, are leeks, celery, chard, spring broccoli, spring cabbage, and a few sad white and savoy cabbage. Everything else is either perennial planting or green manures. The celery doesn’t look like it survived the chill we had in January, the cabbages are not looking good and the green manure is largely eaten by the deer! I still need to find a deer resistant green manure. The Purple Sprouting Broccoli is doing well, and I have had a few pickings, and the 9 Star is still to come. The leeks still look a bit thin, but they are coming on OK. I dug up the remainder of the parsnips and was surprised at how thin a lot of them were given how much rain we had last year.

The garlic finally went in, quite a bit later than I would have wanted. These are replanted cloves from this year’s harvest, bought as Solent Wight 3 years ago. They were in modules in a small plastic greenhouse at home. Storm Bert shook them all off their shelf and upside down onto the floor. Ah well, they are planted out now and they seem to have recovered and forgiven me!

The onion germination was mixed. The Red Baron were great, the Zebrun about 80% germination but the Bedfordshire Champion was about 60% successful. These were old seed, so I bought some new seed and chitted them first to make sure they were good. So now there are about 40 of each, which should be enough.

Every windowsill is covered in seedlings, there is no more space. As soon as the nights warm up a little the hardier plants will go to the cold frames to make room for the next succession of sowings. In front of me now there are chillis, aubergines, dahlias, tree spinach, tagetes, and herbs. All small seedlings. Upstairs are the onions, cabbages, caulis, calabrese, and lettuces. Still to germinate are the moment are beetroot, chard, spinach, more herbs, Agastache and calendula. In the fridge the Korean celery is still chilling!

I am thinking that this year I won’t grow parsnips but try some other root veg like oca and sweet potato. It’s always interesting to try new varieties. Well, it’s begun and will only get busier over the next few months.

If you are growing your own food however much or little I wish you all the best, and don’t be fooled by this false spring!

Reviewing the 2024 growing season.

November 26, 2024 /

It’s that time of year when we start looking back at how things went in the garden or allotment, the successes and failures and what can be learnt for next year.

Needless to say, the weather was a big factor this year (‘when isn’t it?’ I hear you say). This year will be remembered for a long cold spring, endless grey days with little bright sunshine and a sudden cold snap in September. The warmer weather plants (tomatoes, cucumbers, chillis, aubergines, Frensh beans) all had to wait longer to go out: some looked pretty sick by the time they were planted. Slugs and snails proliferated, making planting out a bit of a lottery. The cooler weather seemed to reduce the number of aphids compared to last year, and the ladybirds seemed to cope.

Successes and Failures?

The carrots, onions, squash, potatoes, garlic, cabbages, lettuces and bush beans all did pretty well. There are always a few failures but on the whole the harvest was good. The pole beans that were grown for the seeds (Greek Gigantes, Algarve) did not do very well, mostly because of the lack of pollinators. The disappointments were the tomatoes, cucumbers, courgettes, chillis and aubergines, basically the warmer weather crops. They suffered from lack of sunshine, and this also seems to have affected the taste of the tomatoes, they are fairly bland.

What am I going to change next year?

I still need to work on my succession planting and try to sow smaller amounts more often. This is tricky, you always sow more in case they fail, then when they all grow I feel obliged to plant them on. Will have to be more disciplined with myself! More flowers for the pollinators may be useful, perhaps sown in pots so I can move them to where they are needed. The art of growing cauliflowers still alludes me so will try a few other varieties and see if that makes any difference.

What’s still growing?

Currently in the ground are leeks, celery, chard, spring broccoli, spring cabbage, and a few sad white and savoy cabbage. Everything else is either perennial planting or green manure.

Still to go in are the garlic. These are replanted cloves from this year’s harvest, bought as Solent Wight 3 years ago. They are in modules in a small plastic greenhouse at home. Storm Bert shook them all off their shelf and upside down onto the floor. Ah well, I’m sure they’ll get in the ground eventually, when they’ve recovered.

It has been fashionable to spend this year moaning about the weather (some would say that’s normal), and I was no exception until towards the end of summer when I realised my small square chest freezer was already full of vegetables and I could stop complaining!

As the climate changes we may have to get a lot more flexible about when and what we plant. It will probably make some new things possible and old favourites harder to grow. More challenges for the lottie!

Happy gardening 😊

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