Tag: leeks

A busy but enjoyable weekend

With the lovely weather that we had last weekend (along with most of the country) there was some good progress made in the “Small Plot”. Although this obviously meant a corresponding lack of progress with the blog updates!

Lawns are overrated

The new chickens are having a bigger impact as time goes on with the most visible change being that part of the lawn has been replaced by wood chip. This will hopefully improve the overall appearance of that area and reduce the workload when cleaning up after them.

Compost bin made from old turfAs a result we had lots of unwanted turf (although much of it was moss if I’m honest) so after a bit of creative thinking the result is a new compost bin at the back of the garden!

It almost certainly needs a few air holes poked in the sides to make sure of a decent air flow but we have nothing to put in there yet so no rush. Having said that, judging by the rate the chickens are filling up the current compost bin it won’t be long before this is pressed into action.

Seedling progress

French marigold seedlings The marigolds (for companion planting) are coming along very well at the moment and seem to have suffered no ill effects as a result of the lack of attention on my part. It’s not always easy juggling time away for business every so often but it looks like I got away with it this time at least!

imageThere has also been some promising signs from the leeks (and carrots) in the cardboard toilet roll tubes. Overall it looks like I’m getting about an 85%-90% germination rate which is very gratifying but I’m not sure I can actually take any credit for that.

As a comparison I have just planted some more carrot seeds in a standard seed tray to see how that goes and so that I have some more seedlings to plant out when harvesting the first batch.

I got some left over garlic for planting from my sister recently so that also went into the garden in a couple of key spots. I even had some left to plant in a tub to leave near the chickens as I read somewhere that growing garlic helps to mask the scent from predators. I don’t put much faith in that but it doesn’t hurt to try it.

Recycle and reuse

imageSeveral years ago I bought a metal-framed cold frame – originally to help when taking cuttings – but as seems quite common the glass was too thin and easily broken. As a result it was left in a corner and underutilized but after replacing some of the glass with perspex a couple of years ago I had better luck.
This weekend I had the brain wave to bring it back into service by using some clear plastic (actually the packaging for the cloches and netting I bought recently) in place of the remaining missing bits of glass. It looks a little ramshackle but looks like it will work so I immediately filled it up!
Hopefully I haven’t overdone it now but if I have I’m sure I can find a home for the spare plants…

Weekend plans

Assuming that everything is still fine with the seeds I’ve planted and they haven’t completely dried out by the time I get home on Friday then I have a big weekend ahead of me.

Chitting time might be over

With luck I can possibly plant out the first batch of potatoes if the chitting has progressed far enough. I’ve had a cloche over the veg bed where they will get planted for the last couple of weeks so I think they’ll be okay, especially  if I put the cloche back on them after I’ve finished planting.

There isn’t a lot of room for vegetables this year so I’m only planting two small-ish rows of potatoes with the first row at the back of the bed so it doesn’t block the light from the second row when that gets going.

When I harvest this first row of potatoes (in June/July with luck) I plan to have some runner beans ready to put in their place. It makes sense to get the most out of the three small veg plots I have for this year.

More seedlings to consider

It is unlikely that my leek and carrot seedlings have progressed far enough to consider planting out even with the aid of a cloche. However I’m always the optimist so I’ll take a look and maybe risk a few so they get a head start.

The marigolds for companion planting might be a bit further ahead so there’s always the option to plant out some of those if I can’t fight the urge and absolutely must plant something this weekend!

Internet + Credit Card = another project

After an unsupervised moment on the internet earlier this week I am expecting delivery soon of a second water butt to put behind my garage. The plan is to use this  new water butt for watering the veg beds via a mechanical timer and an irrigation/watering kit which is also in the delivery.

I’ll get all the bits over time but the first task is obviously to get the new water butt in place and make the necessary changes to the guttering to collect any rainwater.

Not forgetting the chickens!

Of course there is also the rest of the garden which needs looking at sometime, perhaps a bit of lawn maintenance is also in order and not forgetting the most important part, a bit of chicken bonding. It’s been a while so I hope they remember me!

The first batch of leeks and carrots are in!

Just to prove that the toilet roll tubes worked well, here are a couple of pictures showing last weekends seed sowing. I have to confess that carrots weren’t originally on my list to grow but then I read somewhere about planting quick-growing crops in with the slower growing ones.

As a result I have batches of leeks (Apollo F1)  and carrots (Nantes Early?) planted and already on the garage windowsill. The  toilet roll tubes look like they are working well so far too which is nice!

Seeds in toilet roll tubes and biscuit tin

 

In total I have about 80 toilet roll tubes which I filled using  a 20 litre bag of John Innes No 1 and that is about evenly split with 40 of leeks and 40 of carrots.

A range of seeds planted and labelled

 

 

The weekend beckons and the garden is calling…

I have big plans for activity on the vegetable growing this weekend so there should be much progress to report next week. For the moment I have posted a page of advice on growing potatoes which contains most of the knowledge I have gathered from various websites, blogs and vegetable growing books.

This  will be updated with any additional potato advice that I find and also with further details of my own experiences with growing Charlotte potatoes in a new vegetable bed I’ve started using.

With luck I should be able to plant a lot of my leek seeds in my home-made seed trays using cardboard tubes from toilet rolls. I may even experiment a little bit by filling them with different types of compost.

I also hope to fix my wheelbarrow which has had a flat tyre for ages and my initial attempts at repairs last year using a new inner tube were less than successful. I may end up cutting my losses though and just buy a new one – I can always place  the old barrow at the end of the garden and use it as a new raised bed

 

Planting the leek seeds

These are not mine obviously!

The leek seeds (Apollo) arrived from Marshalls Seeds as part of the initial delivery in January along with the seed potatoes and some Growmore so I’ve been impatient to get them planted ever since.

Unfortunately as I don’t have a proper greenhouse and the weather up here in the North East of England can be slow to warm up, I plan to use the garage windowsills  so I don’t want to start too early. Luckily this is also delayed by the fact that work keeps me busy and away from the garden so I can’t get to these until next weekend I think.

Staggered Planting

Another favourite subject of mine this year is staggering the planting time so I’ll be doing the leek seeds in two batches spaced at least 3-4 weeks apart. It may not make much difference with  leeks in the long run as they  stay in the ground for quite some time but at least it spreads out the enjoyment of planting the seeds!

Seeds in a roll

I’m not sure where I got the original idea from but after deciding to expand the veg beds late last year, I thought  it would be a good idea to save the cardboard tubes from the middle of the toilet rolls for use in the garden.

I’m amazed how many I managed to save between December and February but there are absolutely loads even though as far as I can recall we didn’t have an outbreak of dysentery in the period.

How will it work?

My theory was two-fold and goes something like this:

  1. I can fill the cardboard tubes with seed compost and stack them all together in an old chocolate tin left over from Christmas with drainage holes. They can start off indoors like this and just  plant them out in the tubes  at the right time to minimise root disturbance – the  tube will eventually rot away.
  2. I can also use the cardboard tubes as an aid when “blanching the leeks as they develop. I thought, why not just slip another roll (or half roll) over each growing plant so that I can  build up the earth around the plant with less risk of getting soil in amongst the leaves.

However after reading about an experience of  mould appearing on cardboard/paper based seed starters I’m starting to have small doubts. Presumably this can be prevented with good drainage and proper ventilation but I’ll be keeping my eyes out for this in the future.

Four simple questions

What?

With so much to choose from it seemed almost impossible to narrow down the options of what vegetables to grow. After a little careful thought I soon realised that my first task was easily identified though – just go through a few reliable gardening books and note down which plants were labelled as “easy to grow” or “good for beginners”.

Predictably there were too many  final choices and they were most of the usual suspects that many gardeners tackle when starting out. However that list was easily  cut down to size  by the simple guiding principle that says “don’t bother growing something you won’t eat”.

As we only have 3 small-ish veg plots, the final list ended up as Potatoes, Leeks (from seed) and Onions (from sets).

Where?

This is easily solved because I am only working with 3 fairly small veg beds this year – not much I know but that is 2 more than I’ve ever had before so I’m happy! Two of these beds are wooden sided raised beds from a kit which have been set up on top an unwanted section at the bottom of the garden. These have been carefully prepared over the last few months, filled with nice new compost and left to settle although I did pop in some cabbages last autumn (don’t ask, they’re not doing much) and I also had a failed attempt with spinach when all I got was some more greener for the compost heap.

When?

I suspect that this might be the tricky part because we live on the north east coast of England which is not known for the tropical climate. The growing season is noticeably shorter up here and plants are definitely slower to get going. My main concern will be fighting off the impatience so I don’t start sowing or planting out too soon.

Why?

Arguably the hardest of the 4 questions… I’ve grown some veg in the past but never more than one crop per year and certainly not every year so why is this year different? Can it all be down to a mid-life crisis? Have I really not got anything better to do with my time? The most likely explanation is that it seemed like a good idea at the time and now I’ve set myself the challenge I don’t want to admit defeat without giving it a go!