I finally feel as if I have caught up with everything; all of the fruit and veg I had planned to grow this year is now underway... some of it a fair bit later than previous years, but who says those dates are rigid anyway?
Today, I finally sowed carrots (nantes 5 & autumn king) and parsnips (albion). I also came across an unopened packet of butternut squash which had a sow by date of 2016; there were only 5 seeds so I thought I may as well sow them all.
To mark this momentous day, a couple of cucumber seedlings decided to make an appearance.
I am making some configuration changes this year, moving a few beds around and still haven't decided where everything is going to go, but as a result the poor raspberry canes have just been sat in the original packaging I brought them home in for over a month. So, I made the executive decision for this year to grow them in sacks alongside the potatoes. I have no idea how this will work out, but the roots looked quite healthy so fingers crossed.
Whilst I'm mentioning potatoes, they have put on some good growth since I planted them at Easter. The ones in buckets are doing just as well as the ones in the sacks.
Might start sowing flowers this weekend.
The weather today was glorious, so I took pictures of the various blossom as it looked particularly pretty...
Pear
Cherry
Blueberry
I did actually do some fruit based gardening today as well. The strawberry planters were looking really sorry for themselves; full of leaves and last year's woody runners weren't helping, so I removed all of the debris, leaving just the healthy plants, topped them up with fresh compost and then planted out some new plants amongst them to fill in the gaps.
Just waiting for the apple and plum blossom to show up, but I am already really looking forward to the fruit harvest this year.
The strawberries have come on leaps and bounds in the last week or so... all of a sudden the plants have shot up; this was a couple of weeks ago...
... and this is today
Strawberries everywhere!! I also spotted a tiny cucumber or two making an appearance; these ones are passandra
I've got a good feeling about this season.
It's been ages... not posted since January; so far this year it's been a slow process but hopefully things are looking up with the weather and it shouldn't take too long to catch up.
So, what's doing well?
I have a fine selection (if a bit slug & snail munched!) of courgette, pumpkin & squash in the greenhouse; some of the larger ones should be ready for planting out soon.
Cucumbers and a couple of watermelon plants are also coming along nicely.
Tomotoes are coming into their own after a very slow start.
There is a very fine tray of various lettuce needing to be planted out...
... a few peppers and a couple of cape gooseberries coming up behind everything else.
The potatoes (for Easter) clearly didn't arrive in time, but they are looking quite healthy; I doubt they will be ready yet, but I might have a bit of a rummage in the sacks to see what's there.
And finally, there are loads of flowers on the strawberries so hopefully that means there will be lots of fruit.
There is still a lot to be done though; haven't sown any peas or beans yet, only have a few brassicas, sweetcorn germination was very poor so need to resow, not sown any leeks, parsnips or turnips either as it's been too cold... I am going to be very busy for the next few weeks!
So, here it is... my end of year review. First things first, lets get the disappointments out of the way:
Beetroot - what on earth happened there? I had new varieties, burpees golden and chioggia to try but they came to nothing more or less; partly because next door's cat thought that the freshly sown bed was put there for his benefit, but even subsequent sowings were poor. Old faithful boltardy did better, but I still didn't get as many as I should have done.
Brassicas - the less said about these the better; I'm not even going to detail them separately as absolutely nothing grew.
Broad beans - my first proper attempt was devastated by blackfly.
Courgettes - not a single fruit formed on any plants... actually, that's not strictly true; there were a couple but they just shrivelled up, and I have never failed to grow courgettes before.
Cucumbers - after the first couple the plants just seemed to give up so I also gave in and pulled them up.
Herbs - failed to germinate... end of story.
That's enough of that, now onto the good stuff.
I had more berries than previous years; a constant supply throughout the summer, from strawberries
to raspberries
and blackberries
Onions were spectacular
and tomatoes were consistent; they kept cropping until November
This year I also kept a tally of how much it would have cost to buy all of the fruit and veg that I produced; excluding the few things that never made it to the kitchen scales the grand total was.....
... drumroll
... £115.85 and I have to say I was pleasantly surprised. I'm under no illusions that I'm near self-sufficient (especially not this year), or have broken-even but still, it means I didn't spend it on produce.
The highlights were:
Potatoes £29.00
Tomatoes £15.31
Parsnips £10.55
Raspberries £8.62
Onions £8.54
Peppers £8.48
Strawberries £8.29
So, onwards and upwards to 2013 and next season!
Today has been a good day... the sun was shining and I harvested a mighty fine haul from the garden.
Emptied the first sack of very pretty bonnie potatoes; this is the first time I have grown this variety and am very pleased with the results
A lovely selection of beetroot had reached picking size, so they came up
Tomatoes are ripening quite frequently now, so this is what gets picked on almost a daily basis
I have never been known for patience and my lack of it got the better of me today; I've been admiring the foliage on the parsnips and wondering what was happening under the ground so pulled one up
I should also be harvesting cucumbers and courgettes right now but it just isn't happening; so far I have only had 3 cucs and the plants aren't producing anything else so I made the decision to put them out of their misery and pull them up. On the courgette front I have not had a single one... I'll probably end up pulling them up as well, but saw a ray of hope on one of the plants this afternoon so will give them another week or so.
But, I don't want to finish on a negative so here are first blackberries of the year
It may only be a grand total of 3 at the moment, but there are loads more just about to turn so watch this space...
Well, not quite; although we have had a couple of punnets worth of strawberries so far this year. This batch was picked today
It is a constant battle to beat the slugs and there are so many more that they get to first... they don't even eat the whole fruit, but damage them just enough to make them unfit for human consumption! Then the woodlice get in there and have a go at the decomposing ones.
Partly my fault as I have let the soft fruit bed run wild this year; I didn't cut down the raspberry canes, or remove the straw that I put down last year, or weed it, so I have created a haven for creepy crawlies to thrive in.
So much so, that picking anything that doesn't naturally rise above the mayhem is like a bush-tucker trial. These gooseberries had the added complexity of thorns hampering their collection (the redcurrants got pulled off during the process and are not quite ripe yet)
So, learning point for next year... keep on top of the general garden maintenance!
Very successful germination of cucurbits has taken place in the greenhouse; 3 black beauty
2 tondo di toscana and 2 zucchini
I'm still waiting for the all green bush and gold rush to show. In cucumber news, 4 mini-whites have germinated
Even the outdoor wonder melons have come through; although I've managed to get them to the flower stage before but never got them to fruit... this year we shall see
... and I'm off! Sowing for the 2012 season has finally begun; a little bit later than originally planned, now that I think (hope) there won't be any more harsh frost.
Everything is in the potting shed with the tender stuff in unheated propagators, so fingers crossed it all germinates. I have sown:
- 40 tomatoes; 8 varieties (moneymaker, roma, gardener's delight, cherry, principe borghese, sub arctic plenty, rio grande, san marzano lungo)
- 40 chillies; 6 varieties (hungarian hot wax, rokita, orange wonder, aji crystal, cayenne, unknown from a mexican restaurant)
- 40 sweet peppers; 5 varieties (california wonder, corno rosso, bellboy, diablo, ozarowska)
- 6 aubergines; 2 varieties (viserba, black beauty)
- 6 cape gooseberries
- rocket
- mixed salad
and finally, the charlotte seed potatoes have been put out to chit.
Bring on Spring!!
... just the regular kind though, pears and plums to be precise. Both trees have now been stripped of fruit.
I read somewhere that you are supposed to pick pears when they are slightly under ripe, which is how I prefer to eat them anyway. So these have been picked at the perfect time.
The plums on the other hand are probably a bit over ripe. I'll know for next time to give them a squeeze rather than look at the colour of them. I can't remember what variety they are but for some reason I thought they wouldn't be ready until they are red. A few of them should still be okay to eat now, but most of them will go into a preserve of some kind.
I made a small batch of jam with some of them a week or so ago, so maybe I'll try a chutney recipe with these ones.
When growing something for the first time I'm always a little bit cautious about when to harvest, so with regards to my cape gooseberries I thought I'd go with how they look on top of desserts in fancy restaurants.
I know that the outside is supposed to be light brown, a bit see-through and feel like paper, so this one looked about right.
You can also see that the fruit inside is orange and when I gave it a squeeze it was firm with a little bit of give. There is also a very sweet smell coming off the plant. So I picked it and was not disappointed.
The taste was amazing!
There are a few more that are ready to be picked now, but also lots of green ones
and even some new flowers appearing
I have no idea how long it is supposed to produce fruit for but hopefully for a while yet.
I did a quick run round the garden yesterday evening and this was the veggie haul
It included the first picking of baby sweetcorn, although I think I left them a bit late so they are slightly bigger than they should be
I also picked a handful or so of blackberries; these have been ripening for the past couple of weeks
