I have an aubergine - yay!

One of the black beauty sowings has poked it's head up in the heated propagator.

Another one, viserba is about to push through along with a california wonder sweet pepper.

I'm so excited!

Succession Sowing

I am trying to get into the habit of succession sowing this year; this weekend I have sown another row each of white gem parsnips, chantenay red cored carrots and mammoth snowstar leeks in the raised beds along with a large tub of white gem parsnips.

I also added to the brassicas by sowing some more kale and purple sprouting broccoli as I'm hoping they will provide fresh veg throughout the winter and into spring when there is not a great deal around - essential if I'm going to achieve self-sufficiency.

On the subject of brassicas, I planted out another batch into the raised beds; mainly cabbages, golden acre primo, offenham flower of spring and kalibos, along with some kale and purple sprouting broccoli. 

My plug plant enterprise has had a 50% success rate so far; the beetroot has germinated very well, but not one single turnip has come up. I'll give the beetroot another week before planting out though, hopefully that should be okay; they are still a lot smaller than the plugs sold in the garden centre and I need to strike a balance between them being strong enough, but not so advanced that the roots are damaged by transplanting.

Fruit Blossom

It's always nice to see blossom in the spring; one of the cherry trees and the pear tree are doing their bit.

The gooseberry and blackcurrant bushes have also come into bud.

I have already seen quite a few bees in the garden, so hopefully they will do the pollenating to ensure some good fruit this year.

Yummy Pea Shoots

I looked at the pea shoots this morning and thought, yep they are large enough to start harvesting.

I wasn't really sure where to cut them so that they re-shoot, but did it anyway. With a few of my home grown rocket leaves, they made a lovely salad for lunch.

Absolutely delicious!

What a turnaround!

I've been going on and on... and on about my poor tomato germination rate, with good reason I think. Well, it's safe to say that those that have made it are making good progress; today I potted on 3 costoluto fiorentino, 2 gardener's delight, 1 roma, 1 sub arctic plenty, 1 urbikany and 1 red cherry.

There are also 3 garden pearl, not quite ready to be potted on but coming on nicely, and the more recently germinated have been transferred from the teeny tiny pots they sprouted in to the next size up. 

Even the okra, that I am very wary of seem to be developing.

Just need to work out what to do about my lack of peppers...

Go Go Cucurbits!

I had to pot on another batch of cucurbits today as the roots were taking over the pots they were in, so 2 yellow scallop, 3 tondo di toscana, 1 gold rush, 2 slangen longoda, 1 marketer and 4 jack o' lanterns now reside in larger vessels in the greenhouse.

The gherkin and mini whites are also looking quite good at the moment.

Won't be long before I'll need to be potting them on too.

Planting out and potting on

This morning I planted out 3 reine de glaces, 3 lollo rossa and 2 little gem lettuces into my recently acquired wicker planter.

When I checked on the seedlings in the greenhouse the roots from 2 of the yellow scallop squash and the all green bush courgette were about to take over so I potted them on into the next size up.

I also think that I made the wrong container choice when I sowed the peas shoots, so undertook a very delicate operation to extract them from a shallow seed tray and move them into a trough. I think I might have lost a couple, but most of them seem to have made it okay. 

Today's the day...

I decided that today I would check my sowed peppers and tomatoes for any further signs of germination and dispose of those that had failed, so during the last week in both the heated and non-heated propagators the following seedlings have come up:

• Tomato (San Marzano Lungo) x 2
• Tomato (Sub-Arctic Plenty) x 1
• Tomato (Red Cherry) x 1
• Tomato (Principe Borghese) x 1
• Tomato (Rio Grande) x 1
• Tomato (Urbikany) x 1
• Chilli Pepper (Chilli Shake) x 1

I am actually quite pleased with the tomatoes overall, they came slowly but along with the few earlier ones I think I will have more than enough plants this year.

Peppers on the other hand I am really disappointed by, so in a final attempt I sowed some more:

• Sweet Pepper (Corno Rosso) x 2
• Sweet Pepper (California Wonder) x 3
• Chilli Pepper (Cayenne) x 4

along with a few other seeds that failed to germinate:

• Aubergine (Viserba) x 2
• Aubergine (Black Beauty) x 2
• Cape Gooseberry (Golden Berry) x 2

all in the heated propagator. If nothing comes of them, then it wasn't meant to be this year and I'll try again in 2011.

Quick Germination Update

This morning:

• the heated propagator has germinated one tomato and there are signs that a few peppers are about to push through.
• the unheated propagator that was left in the potting shed has germinated one tomato and there a signs that a couple more are about to push through.

In the main, they were sown at the same time and I moved a selection of them into the heated propagator to see what would happen. It is noted though that none of the peppers in the unheated propagator have germinated. I'm not really sure what these results mean, but as long as they are germinating somehow I'll keep smiling.

First Harvest

The best thing about today, was that I had grown enough rocket to have some lovely fresh salad leaves with my dinner tonight... and there's plenty more waiting to be picked.

Plug Plants

I decided to begin my own plug plant enterprise so that I will always (hopefully) have something to fill the gaps that will no doubt arise in the raised beds; currently on that production line are turnips and beetroot which I normally sow direct.

Making the most of the spring sunshine

I have been making the most of the recent good weather and luckily had a few a few days away from work so have been able to spend a lot of time in the garden.

Yesterday I planted out a row each of peas and mange tout into the raised bed. My cunning trick to stop the slugs and snails was to scatter vermiculite around them. I'm sure they won't like crawling over that to get the goodies and it seems to have worked last night anyway.

I was also pleased to see that 6 of the minipop seeds have germinated in the greenhouse.

First thing this morning I continued with planting out...

... brassicas; evesham special, raab and all year round are now located in the raised bed, protected by cabbage collars for the root fly and a net for the butterfly... the last thing I want is them laying their eggs all over the plants.

... and onions; kamal and sweet spanish have now been planted in the bed with the shallots and leeks (that have yet to make an appearance). Talking of onions, the pickling kind; barletta and purplette have germinated in their separate bulb crate.

 I also did a fair bit of sowing today, undercover:

• Brussels Sprout (Red Delicious) x 5
• Brussels Sprout (Evesham Special) x 2
• Broccoli (Green Heading Calabrese) x 3
• Broccoli (Early Purple Sprouting) x 1
• Cauliflower (Autumn Giant) x 2
• Cabbage (Savoy) x 2
• French Beans (Cherokee Trail of Tears) x 8
• French Beans (Cherokee Trail of Tears) x 8 that I saved myself a couple of years ago
• Peas (Golden Sweet Yellow Mangetout) x 8

Outdoors I sowed:

• Chard (White Silver 2) x 1 row in the raised bed
• Lambs Lettuce in a trough
• Spring Onion (Ishikura) x 1 row in a bulb crate
• Spring Onion (White Lisbon) x 1 row in a bulb crate

and planted the first batch of main crop potatoes (Rooster) into potato bags.

Elsewhere, the pea shoots are coming along nicely:

... so I decided to sow another batch of those in the greenhouse, but the herbs could be doing better, so I direct sowed the following in various containers outdoors; rosemary, chives, sage, mint, thyme, parsley, basil, dill, chervil and coriander.

Heading lettuces are also growing well:

I was tempted to plant them out too because quite a few of the roots are already showing through the bottom of the pots. I managed to stop myself, but did sow 3 Romana Bougival seeds, which is a new variety for me.

I think I managed to cover all the vegetable groups so all in all a very productive couple of days.

Heated Propagator

I've done it... in an attempt to improve my germination rate I have got myself a heated propagator. It is set up, well just plugged in and switched on really on the kitchen worktop and I have put a selection of sweet peppers, chilli peppers and tomatoes in there.

By all accounts, they germinate in a couple of days in these conditions so fingers crossed.

And they're in...

... early potatoes that is.

This afternoon I planted 15 Charlotte seed potatoes into 5 potato bags, each about a third full of compost. I think you are supposed to put 5 seeds in each bag, but last year I found that I had loads of tiny potatoes so I'm hoping that if I allow them more room to grow they might get a bit bigger.

Something else that I am trying for the first time is potato food pellets... I just sprinkled them throughout the compost before putting the seed potatoes in. I'm not sure if they are supposed to increase the yield of the harvest or the size of the potatoes. I'll let you know in twelve to sixteen weeks.

Exotic Sowings

Recently, someone very kindly gave me some seeds as a thank you, and what an exotic collection of seeds they are, most I've never heard of:

• Courgette (Tondo Di Toscana)
• Courgette (Gold Rush)
• Cucumber (Marketer)
• Cucumber (Slangen Longoda China)
• Sweet Pepper (Corno Rosso)
• Aubergine (Viserba)
• Tomato (San Marzano Lungo)
• Tomato (Principe Borghese)
• Tomato (Rio Grande)

Phew! I was in the potting shed first thing this morning sowing a selection of the above into individual modules - I can't wait to see how they all turn out. There were also spring onion (Barletta) and lettuce (Romana Bougival) seeds in the package, but I'll sow them another time.

Continuing with the trying something new theme, I also sowed some pumpkin seeds (Jack O' Lantern) and will be extremely impressed if I am the proud owner of at least one pumpkin on Halloween.

April Showers

While the rain has been taking a break from falling from the sky I've been doing a little bit of tinkering outside and moving things around this morning.

The slugs were back in the greenhouse last night and had a real go at the cucurbits...

...to the point where I decided to sow some more gherkin and marketmore just to be on the safe side. The yellow scallop squash seems to have stood firm and only have slight nibble marks. The all green bush courgette had only recently appeared through the compost and were still under a propagator lid, so managed to escape attack.

While I was at it though I also sowed another courgette as one of the earlier ones failed to germinate.

On a more positive note, things are looking up with my tomatoes, I have 3 newly germinated costoluto fiorentino and 3 newly germinated garden pearl... it's still very early days and a couple of them are very weak, but considering I have around 40 modules on another shelf failing to germinate at all, I'm happy with what I can get.

The surprise tomato seedling from last week was also standing to attention and waiting to be potted on. I think it is sub-arctic plenty, but I'll just wait and see if it makes it through to maturity.

The mange tout are looking quite perky in the guttering...

... still a bit small to be planted out yet, plus a couple of years ago when I planted them out the first week in April it snowed the next day! They survived and went on to produce a magnificent crop, but it was still scary at the time.

In the raised bed I could just about see the shallots starting to send up shoots... about time, they seem to have just been sitting doing nothing for weeks.

Anyway, it does look like the sun is trying to come out now, so maybe I'll venture back outside in a bit