Finally catching up...

Well this blog post is certainly long over due. In fact, everything I will mention took place about two weeks ago when I took a couple of days annual leave to catch up at the allotment. So when you come back to read tomorrow's post, pretend it's been a whole two weeks since this post and not 12 or so hours...

Anyway....

The Potatoes and Onions are finally in the ground!!

We might have slightly overdone it with our potatoes. We have 4 rows (5.5m long each!) of Desiree and 3 long rows of Charlotte and we still have some seed potatoes to spare. If I get some big pots I might just put them in there and see what happens. It's not like we are going to be short of them anyway... Well, I hope not after the back breaking amounts of work I put in to planting them..

Next along from the potatoes are two rows of Onions (Stuttgarter Giant) and then a row of Beetroot (Boltardy)!

After the onions there is currently a large gap which come the middle of May will be planted up with Cabbage, Kale, Pumpkins, Courgettes and Squash. After this currently empty space, closest to the patio area is the beans. 6 rows of broad beans and there is space for a further 2 rows of dwarf French beans. I have also dug out the trench and emptied one of the compost bin’s contents in to it and then filled it on top with some used compost from last year’s raised beds, the support frame has been erected for the runners, and finally the allotment looks like an allotment again and not just a wasteland!

Here's a full on shot of the once again allotment like allotment!

The next couple of jobs are to actually sow the runner beans, courgettes and pumpkins and also prepare the ground for the cucurbits by digging in some well rotted horse manure!! There is also the unappetizing job of weeding the strawberry bed at the top of the allotment. It will be done, but when... I am not sure!

More soon!!

Martin J

Bare root bargains...

On the way to work each day I have to drive past an Aldi supermarket. Although I don't go in there very often I always glance over towards the store entrance because I know in the past that they have sold good value garden equipment and this year I was on the look out for a couple of fruit trees. Well, just as luck would have it, I was going past yesterday and I saw a big box of fruit trees being unloaded from the delivery and I made a mental note to return later.

All day I was wondering which trees I would liek for the allotment. I know that last year they stocked peach, apricot and greengage trees aswell as apple and pear.

I have a perfect spot for the trees which last year was a bit of an overgrown couch grass infested mess. So come 5pm I was straight in to have a look what they have got.

There was so much choice and I almost fainted at the price tag. All bare ruit fruit trees were £3.99 each and they had fruit bushes at 3 for £2.50. So I made my selections and headed for the till point.

My final chocies were:

1 x Conference Pear
1 x Cox Apple
1 x Cherry
6 x Red Gooseberry

I was particularly pleased with the gooseberry bushes. I had been wanting to plant some at the perimiter of the patio to prevent access to the patio from the path for vandals and the like. I had been looking the garden centres last week and they were priced anyway from £6-18 each depending on size. These will do me just nicely..

Like I said earlier, I have a spot marked out for the pear and apple tree. The cherry tree was a bit of an impulse buy and I'm still not sure where that is going to go. I am hoping to turn that weedy patch in to a nice mini orchard come summer. Using a few ideas I have seen in gardening books etc. I am going to dig out as many of the couch grass roots as possible. Plant the trees 1.5 apart and then cover the whole area with compost/well rotted manure and then water well. Following that I will cover the area with non-inked cardboard and then on top of that I will water the cardboard and then add a top dressing of manure. I believe this method is called lasagne gardening and the idea is that it keeps weeds down but improves soil fertility at the same time. We'll wait and see but on paper it does sound like it should work.

The first allotment I had when I was just 14 years old had a massive apple tree in the middle of it and obviously the roots were a slight problem to work around. I don't want to have roots growing all the way through the allotment and I believe these are dwarf root stock anyway. So in order to restrict the roots a bit I am going to copy the idea of a 'fig pit' and put 4 paving slabs in the ground to create a restricted space for the roots to grow in to. The fig pit will stop the roots from spreading underneath the surface close to the ground but will instead force the roots to move downwards before spreading down in a deeper area. Fingers crossed this idea also works, thats what I love about my gardening. Just experimenting to see what works well and what doesn't. It means that your gardening methods are changing all of the time and that of course means it can be very fun!

If you are interested in getting some of these fruit trees then get down there soon because I remember they sold out of the more exciting varieties last time and all that was left was Royal Gala apples.

We are in Paris next week from Monday to Friday so there will be no time for planting these just yet but judging by the care label as long as the roots are kept frost free then the trees can be planted a little later in the season. So I will have something to look forward to when we are back. The shed also needs painting too. The growing season is coming that is for sure...

Thanks for reading as always,

Martin



Just an hour..

Not long after I made yesterday's blog post I felt very tempted to go and do a bit of work at plot 114. I knew that I had to go up at some point to water all of the seedlings in the mini greenhouse. I decided to do an hour and a bit of solid revision for my exam on Saturday morning, and then I took myself up to the plot to do something nice.

My Grandparents had given me a bag of red onion sets on Tuesday so I thought that I would spend just an hour or so planting out my onions sets. I already had some sets myself for brown onions and the red onion sets I had previously bought had a low count of quality sets, so it was good that I had the new stock to replenish them.

I wasn't going to grow shallots either, but one of the other allotment holders who was there on Monday gave me a bag of shallots that he had left over after planting his. I now had plenty of sets so it was time to get them in the ground..

The onion bed is right next to the patioed area. I am trying a slightly different way of growing them that I thought of myself after reading various methods of growing onions. I planted the onion sets in drills that I simply made from standing on the ground either side of the set. I then sprinkled some growmore in the foot imprinted areas and watered to dissolve the granules. I am then going to top up the foot imprinted areas either side of the drill with multipurpose compost which hopefully will be a good feed for the onions and should make hoeing really, really easy. Only inhereting the allotment in late February we haven't been able to feed the soil as much as we have liked so we are definately playing catch up in that regard,

I have planted the garlic cloves in a drill right at the end of the bed nearest to the compost bin in the hope that there won't be too much of a garlicy scent near to the patio area.

It was nice being there for just an hour and actually being able to get something in the ground. I have spent many whole days (8+hours) on Plot 114 clearing weeds and preparing beds and then thinking I still have so much more work to do which can be a tiny bit de-motivating. So this was a short and sweet change to that pattern. I also managed to get another freebie from another allotment holder, this time in the form of a gooseberry bush! One of my favourite fruits!! I already have 2 other small bushes looking for a spot on the allotment, so I look forward to getting those in the ground at the weekend.

Anyway, seeing as I said there wasn't going to be an allotment update until Sunday night, I didn't do too well did I? Oh well. I had fun and I still found time to revise.

I definately won't be making a blog post now until Sunday. Amy and I are watching 'Oliver' at the Birmingham Hippodrome on Thursday night and then 'Disney on Ice' at the NIA on Friday. Then on Saturday I have the dreaded exam.

Have a good weekend and Happy Birthday Mum!

Martin 

Unbelievable

I put some chilli pepper seeds in four small pots about two months ago. They were cheap seeds, and unsurprisingly they didn't germinate. However, I transfered them over to the greenhouse when I got it and still nothing emerged.

To my utter amazement, they germinated a couple of days ago!

 I can't believe it. I had wrote them off, but for some reason I hadn't thrown the soil back on the compost heap. We are already growing 'Cayenne' and 'Fillius Blue' so we won't be short of chillies, but we are now going to be growing these too. The thing is, I can't even remember what variety they are so I will have to post pictures if they eventually grow and bear fruits. They were an ornamental type with a mix of orange, yellow and red chillies.

I think that by the time they are ready to develop fruits it will be too cold to have them outside, so they may go on the window ledge, but the mini greenhouse might still be warm enough. We shall have to see. Well, I'll have to buy a digital themometer..

Have a great day,

Martin

The Jubilance of July

July. Probably the best month for being a veg gardener. All of your hard work during the previous months have lead up to this point. Over there the tomatoes are doing well, over there the potatoes are almost ready, over there the courgettes continue to come, over there the lettuces get bigger, over there the pak choi has bolted. Everything seems to be doing well (there is always one exception, stupid pak choi!!), and there is little maintenance to carry out.

In fact, it is very nice to pour a glass of homemade lemonade, sit back and look at what we have done. We have turned an old fenced off chicken run into a small producing plot, with plans to make it even better next year! (Hopefully)

We have enjoyed a few completly home grown meals. We used the saveable pak choi leaves in a stir fry last night, with some courgette, spinach, mange tout and some very hot chilli peppers. It was delicious. We've had a nice salad, and a vegetable fritatta, with some courgettes and mange tout in an omelette. It's been great.

We are just waiting on a few other things to mature and then there will be plenty more meals like that to come.

I said there was no maintenance on the plot. Well that is a lie. There are jobs to do, but there is nothing major really. If you afford yourself fifteen minutes a day then it is easy to keep on top of things. Although everything is going well, we need to be vigilant. At any moment, we could see blight overtake the tomatoes and potatoes, cabbage fly wip out the cabbages etc. If we keep a good look out for these things then we will definately be in a good place. Picking the odd weed from between the rows of veg is not particularly stenuous on our small plot.

Yesterday I spent a little while doing some of the simple jobs.

I've given the sunflowers and sweetcorn some support. The sweetcorn are planted in a triangle to aid pollination, but they were all leaning in to the centre and it looked a bit of a mess. So some bamboo canes have been added and I've loosely tied the sweetcorn to them.

 The sunflowers are not in the sunniest spot in the garden, so they have decided to start leaning towards the sun, although they would benefit from a bit more sun, they are not in the world's worst position so these were staked back too. My Grandma and Grandad gave me the seeds for the sunflowers so I gave them three plants in return and these are now planted too..

Since the pak choi plan went bottom side up, there is a bit more space at the end of the plot furthest away from the shed. We have had our cabbage growing in pots in the greenhouse ready for transportation when some more space becomes available. I planted out three of the cabbage plants we planted a few months ago. They are in a good spot by the damson tree.

There is still time to sow some more salad leaves and lettuce so I did that to give us some late summer salad greens. We will definately appreciate them come late August and early September.

We are really looking forward to the sweet peppers we are growing in the mini greenhouse. I placed them more centrally in the greenhouse as they seem to be growing well. The middle of the top shelf in the greenhouse is the highest point.

 I have always had fantastic luck with chilli peppers but not so much with sweet peppers. We have 4 sweet pepper plants and 5 chilli pepper plants this year, so hopefully there will be plenty of peppers of different shapes, colours and sizes over the next couple of months.

The flowers are going wild in those hanging baskets too..

I had to pick out a few dead heads, but nothing major. I am really pleased with these!

We are both really enjoying reading everybody's blogs and seeing what you are picking from your own gardens, allotments, window containers, greenhouses, polytunnels, smallholdings and farms. It is amazing that all of us bloggers have different sized growing area.  From Rachel with her small city balcony to  Mo and Steve and of course Sue with her much larger site. It is superb to see how we all grow things, both similarly and differently.

Have a great day, don't forget to check out some of the other blogs on the right hand side toolbar, and see what everybody else is doing this wonderful summer's day.

Martin

Raddish

I've never really had much luck with raddish. It always looks promising, but the root never seems to swell to a decent size. This year we are growing raddish in a plastic trough. We divided it into three sections and sprinkled some seed in each section at two week intervals. So we should have 6 weeks worth of raddishes.

The first lot of seeds are now a congregation of bushy leaves with the smallest pin head roots, seeing as this variety is supposed to mature in 21 days, it is almost 6 weeks now and nothing. Do I have a raddish curse? The third sowing are only 2 weeks old so are at the most basic stage of forming. However, the second sowing seem to be as far ahead if not further head than the first sowing, they have caught up nicely and really are beginning to overtake.

When inspecting them earlier today I spotted this thing..

A RADDISH!!

I couldn't believe it. I remember that even when I had the allotment I had little luck with raddishes, so to have one worth eating is a real bonus.

Amy loves raddish so this went down a treat.!! She could quite easily eat a whole bag full if they were in front of her, I always thought it was very strange because(..cough!) I don't really like raddish. But then again the feelings are reversed regards Beetroot!

We had a few more smaller raddishes, some salad leaves we have grown in a tub, some mange tout which we gently boiled, a few more small courgettes and some young spinach. With a freshly laid boiled egg, we had a nice homegrown salad yesterday night.

Delicious!
Enjoy the rest of your day!

Martin

P.S Don't forget that the first ever Our-Good-Life prize giveaway started yesterday. Work out the clues on the blog as they appear and you could win a gardening hamper worth over £20. You have to be in it to win it.

Click here for more details

Green is the old... Green?

When growing your own fruit and vegetables you can end up with a period on your plot where there is a lot of green, green and more green. The only things ripening fast enough are courgettes and they are well.. green this year. We did buy some yellow courgette seeds for next year though. Then there's the lettuce which is.. green. Tomato plants are.. green, although the yellow flowers are dwarfed by mountainous amounts of.. green.

Following our visit to Gardener's World on Wednesday, I was inspired by some of the show gardens where there is less.. green... and more... purple, yellow, orange, red and blue. I'll remind you of a couple of the 'Grow your own' style show gardens. Look at them closely..

and..

I've learnt my lesson this year. When you are in a small garden you need a bit more colour. We did buy some seeds for yellow courgettes, purple runner beans and purple sprouting.There is the Fillius Blue pepper plant too with the georgeous purple flowers. But what can I do immediately to brighten the place up a bit?

No... flowers?!?!

I am no flower expert. I won't pretend to be one either. Ask me about fruit and veg and I have had the input from my grandparents, I've read all the books, and I've read your blogs, and I've been experimenting with varying degrees of success and failure all my life. So I may be able to answer your questions. However, look at those photos again if you need to. What can you see? Yes, flowers. Look at the bizzy lizzies planted in the children's wellington boots in the second picture. Look at the rows of marigolds inbetween the tomato plants. Sunflowers too!

Amy was keen to get flowers but I consistently said to her 'they waste valuable growing space' which I suppose is still true. But she has twisted my arm, with the help of the endless amounts of green fly sat on our tomato plants.

We took a visit to that garden centre in our town that Amy didn't know existed two or three months ago (she is a regular now). They have a great choice of flowers. We didn't want too many, just a few.

So we bought 84 marigolds, two trays of labelia and two trays of something which I  can't remember the name of (and two cheeky pepper plants of course!!). The marigolds are an ideal companion plants for tomatoes as they deter the ever persistent green fly. On sunny evenings at the moment, Amy only needs to go over to the vegetable patch to get swarmed with them, and then have to pick them out of her hair afterwards. I'm sure they get in my hair too, but Amy's hair is a really light blonde so they show up easily.

Well, you know that blue tubtrug we bought on Wednesday. Well we decided we would use it to store our tools. Until today....

We filled it 3/4way with compost. Before placing a tomato plant in the middle. Then we placed 16 marigolds around the edge. This tomato plant won't be touched by green fly that is for sure. We've now put the planted tubtrug next to the tomatoes in the grow bags so hopefully this will work out well in fending off the invasion.

The one blot on our veg plot was the ghastly old hanging wall baskets that had been untouched for well over a year. So using some more of the marigolds and the labelia. The veg plot has had a bit of a much needed face lift.

We had a few left over marigolds so I have planted these strategically in the garden. I've just sown some wild flower seeds and we have 3 sunflowers that are ready to go in to their final positions.
The raised squash bed which I have mentioned before. Is now a seprated area of the garden. Last month I made a post called 'Windy' where I said that the old water feature had fell over thanks to the rapid winds and the top of it had smashed in to bits. Although there were many small bits that were not useable, I saved the large bits because I knew they would come in useful at some point. Well, they have and they are now the edging around the raised area which is the squash bed. I planted some more marigolds next to the edging to give it even more colour. There is also the giant yellow tubtrug and the Rhubarb in the blue pot.

Look at the sweetcorn in the yellow tubtrug. Because it is in the tubtrug it doesn't compete for root space with the squash and (soon to be planted) pumkin. Therefore because the squash plants should swallow the majority of the area and need the root system to support it, we are ensuring that the squashes, pumpkin and sweetcorn get their fair share of needed nutrients.

The green has definately been brushed over with the flower power and the introduction of the new brightly coloured tubtrugs and the yellow plant labels. Here is the new and refreshed view..

I'm hoping for a bit more colour soon when all of those fruit and veg start to ripen up nicely, ready for harvesting.

We are making the homemade beeswax candles tonight, so that's something to look forward to.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Martin



Winter

It's strange to think that on a lovely, sunny June day the topic on my mind is the hard months of winter.

We're going to have a go at growing a range of brasicas including cabbage, brocolli and purple sprouting to name a few of the seed varieties we bought at Gardener's World.
We also need to get a move on with some of the root crops including parsnips and turnips, otherwise we really will have missed them for this year...

Don't worry, we're not only confined to the doom and gloom of the 'hunger months' but we are still preparing and sowing for summer and early through to mid autumn.

I transfered the lettuce seedlings in to the ground directly next to the leeks and then  planted a row of beetroot too. The beetroot looks great, it's been sat in a pot up until now and they have come on great in the short time we've had the greenhouse. Amy doens't like beetroot, so it's only done a small row for myself. We can plant a row of lettuce each week now for a few weeks time so that we have a continuous crop in to the autumn.

The broad beans look really good, seeing as we only bought 12 plug plants that were a bit battered and starved and thus reduced at a local garden centre, we are both amazed how well they have come on. They are all flowering and we watched the bees hard at work on them. I noticed the first mange tout flowers today aswell which is fantastic. Here are a couple of pictures of the bees doing their business..

There are plenty of tomato flowers on the tomato plants, and the first sign on peppers on the pepper plants. It was great to have Amy back in the garden now she has finally finished her own exams. She helped me move the sunflowers on to larger pots, and they will be moved over to my Grandma and Grandad's house next week or just after. We are keeping a few for our own garden and I plan to save the seeds. She also got her infamous pink watering can out and gave all the plants a little sprinkle this evening. Everything seems to be thriving, even the scorched runner beans are coming along really well...

Have a good day!

Martin

Starting them young..

I found it very amusing the other day when Amy's younger brother, Jordan told us that he wanted to grow his own cucumbers because he didn't want to get E-Coli. He said that he would never eat a Spanish cucumber again in his life.

So off we went to the garden centre and we brought him a grow bag. He decided that he wanted to grow a different thing in each of the holes. So we bought him a female cucumber plant, a tomato plant and a strawberry plant. You wouldn't normally grow strawberries in a grow bag but he insisted, and we can take them out at the end of the season an re-pot them then! It's hard to find a strawberry plant that doesn't have fruits on at the moment so we bought one with flowers emerging so he could observe the whole process.

Under our supervision, he undertook the whole activity. Cutting the grow bag, planting and watering. Amy was obviously very proud...

Here is the final product and one very pleased 11 year old!

You might be able to see the 1p coins around the base of all three plants. Well, I know that slugs love cucumber plants in particular, but they don't like copper. I thought it might work, and 4 days later the plants are still untouched. Fingers crossed if continues to work..
It is really enjoyable for me to pass on my knowledge of growing just like my grandparents did for me when I was younger. I remember my Grandad Ian would grow delicious tomatoes in his greenhouse, and he had the most gigantic compost heap. My Grandad Fred was an inspiration on the allotment and helped me greatly in getting in to all of this. Hopefully Jordan will take some inspiaration from his brief encounter with 'growing his own'

Have a superb day.

Martin

P.S I've been quite busy during the last couple of days so will be reading all the blogs that I follow tomorrow, and no doubt I will be leaving comments too!

P.P.S Thanks again for visiting, and finally a welcome to the blog to my Grandma and Grandad who are now reading!

(Hi!)

Extending the veg patch!

We got the greenhouse on Wednesday which increased our floor and growing space. But now we have increased the plot considerably. We have sold the rabbit eglu that was at the top end of the patch and...

We have all the fenced off area to sort out!

Very exciting, lots of seeds to be sown and plants to be planted.

Can't wait!

Martin

Moody Monday

I can't believe the weather at the moment. When will it make it's mind up?

The picture doesn't illustrate just how much rainfall we've had today..

Not much chance of getting on the sunbeds today!

I don't mind the rain, but the battering winds that are accompanying it are a real nightmare. Some plants have been destroyed by them!

The melon plant is going on the compost heap tomorrow, I gave it a chance to revive itself but it's really had it now.

The apple tree is making an ok comeback, some of the remaining apples are really getting big now.

I've just been out and covered up the potatoes with some more compost. The potatoes seem to be really enjoying this weather. I have no more space to dedicate any more bags (well I will find some somewhere) so there may be a gap in the 'continous harvest' method. But we shall see.

The tomatoes and the rest of the grow bag crew (except the melon) are also thriving which is great news. We might have found a nice new area to grow some more tomatoes. I will update you on that shortly. The first flowers are now appearing on the majority of the tomato plants.

I could do with some sun tomorrow so that I can get out there and make some more progress. I dashed out to plant the marrow out today whilst the ground is moist.

Enjoy the rest of your bank holiday and half term!!!!

Martin

Sack of potatoes

Good Morning!! Just planted another bag of potatoes. Having such a restricted space for growing in, it is very convenient to grow potatoes in a bag. We have 6 bags and 1 pot of potatoes on the go at the moment. I have always criticised garden centres who sell a 'potato in a pot' that has almost reached harvest. The plant is flowering so the potatoes must be almost ready. I saw one garden centre sell this sort of thing at.. wait for it.... £7. Ok, granted you got a terracotta plant pot but then again they are the most expensive potatoes you have ever had, but realistically how many potatoes will you get in a small pot. 3 or 4? That works out at over £1.50 a potato.

I was intrigued to see a particular blog post the other day. They grew 7 perfect new potatoes in a plastic plant pot. I hope they doesn't mind but we've nicked their idea!! (I can't remember who's blog it was, so if you're reading, remind me and I will put the link in) Seeing as the whole sack of seed potatoes cost us 50p (for about 30 seed potatoes) and the pot is just one that was lying around it's a bit of a saving on £7. We are just open to seeing what works well when growing in a small space. Remember - Kaizen is Japanese for 'continuous improvement'.

I documented in a previous post about how that when growing potatoes in old compost bags like we do it is important to make sure that the bags are effectively covered so that no UV light can reach the potatoes and give any potatoes touching the surface a green tinge. However I've now manouvered a few things and the potato bags are now being sufficiently covered by other growing things. The courgette plants and tubtrug are covering two of the bags, the courgette leaves are really offering a lot of protection. Also the wigwammed mange tout, combined with the runner bean plants, the rhubarb, the fence and the eglu are offering more protection.
Here is the picture from wednesday's blog post..

It is quite hard to notice, but the potato bags are at the back of the courgette's foliage and are on the edge of the eglu run. (Please note, this eglu is empty.)

Things are looking really, really, really good for a continous supply because all of the bags are at different stages, so fingers crossed.

It has come to that point where all the summer crops are blooming and I know it's only May, but it's time to think about Winter..

..well maybe tomorrow!

Have a superb day!

Martin

From this.. to this.. to this

Well, it was only on the 15th April that we bought these teeny-weeny courgette plants, and we planted them in a tubtrug full of multi-purpose compost!

They then turned into these bushes...

Now they are overflowing the tubtrug and there are courgettes growing left, right and centre...

The whole centre of the above picture is made up of the large courgette plant leaves. In just over 4 weeks, we have gone from two tiny plugs, to two vegetable bearing bushes.

It is great to reflect on a plant's growth by revisiting blog posts. When you water and tend to them everyday it is hard to realise how much they actually have grown.

Courgettes are a must for any vegetable plot!

Martin 

Windy..

Well we've had the downpour we needed and the sun has now come back too. But the one thing we can't seem to shift is this wind! It is so windy here, it is untrue. You can hear it whistling through the air. We've had a bit of wind damage too. The water feature we were going to turn in to the wildlife pond by adding some aquatic plants has been swept off its feet and the top half has smashed in to oblivion. Secondly, I have just seen the apple tree topple over too. Thankfully it is payday today so I am going to buy a huge pot to put it in because it is still currently in the little black pot it came in.

In the veg garden we have the first bloomed courgette flower of the season. It is a beautiful bright yellow and the courgette itself has doubled in size from what I can remember the last time I saw it. There are about 6 mini courgettes now on the tubtrug residing courgettes.

The runner bean plants have really come in to life. Lots of rain and lots of sun has seen these really kick on and they now have been transferred in to their own pots. One of them is now so big that I have put it into it's final growing pot. Remember, these aren't traditional runners but they are supposed to turn out like a small bush. It will be interesting to see what happens to them.

The second sowing of mange tout are now about an inch a piece, so I have just sown a new seed tray full so hopefully we will have a continuous crop of fresh mange tout. I find that spacing out the sowings instead of sowing them all at once avoids a large glut that needs to be preserved, and instead you get a much more steady and continuous flow of fresh produce.

Look how well the first sowing is doing too! They have all now attatched themselves to either the sticks or each other... (typical!!)

We need a new grow bag, so I will add that to my shopping list for later. We have 2 large tomato plants that need to go in as soon as possible, and we also have 6 that have freshly germinated. Again continuous flow as opposed to glut.

The first potato bag has now had it's final covering of soil. We are already looking forward to fresh potatoes in a few weeks and I will start another bag off by the end of the week. We currently have 3 on the go, but simlarly to the runner beans we want a continuous flow rather than a glut.

The mixed salad we sown that were out of a free pack of seeds are almost ready for picking. I think I am going to make burgers again tomorrow so the salad leaves will be lovely with the burger in some homemade bread...

Finally, the strawberry bed/wheelbarrow is doing well out the front. So far we have counted 44 flowers or mini strawberries. The bed is looking quite established already and there are plenty of runners...

I can't wait for my exams to conclude on the 27th because a) we are then going camping on the Monday and b) we can do some more planting and self-sufficient like things like beekeeping, jam making, strawberry picking etc etc.

Have a great Tuesday!

Martin

P.S Over the next few days you might see some 'archive' posts taken from my old blogs to fill the gap whilst I am studying. I will pick out some relevant and interesting ones for you and hopefully you will enjoy them. I will also do some 'photo archive' posts from different topics such as bees, chickens, jam making etc.

P.P.S Don't worry, I will still be compiling blog posts but I like to post every day so the archive posts will fill in where it is not possible for me to compile a new entry!

Check back soon!

Extending the 'orchard'

An orchard is an intentional planting of fruit or nut trees and shrubs that is maintained for food production.

Well that rather loose definition could apply to anybody who ever planted a fruit tree in their garden. In my garden there is a damson tree that has been well established for quite a few years now, it was here well before we moved and it is still thriving today. We get a tremendous harvest from it each and every year.

I absolutely love it when it is full of blossom.............

At Amy's house there is a majestic Bramley Apple tree that produces hundreds of apples throughout the year, far too many for a family of 40 never mind a family of 4 or 5.

Bramley apples are fantasic favourites for cooking with, the crumbles and pies they attribute to our delightful. But we don't just want cooking apples, which can appear quite bitter if eaten raw rather than cooked. So today we visited a garden centre/farm shop in Dunnington Heath. It is one of the most popular farm shops that I know of and it is always very busy, and today was no exception.

They have a display garden there which is delightful and it is adjacent to the plant centre. Whilst we were there we pondered which things to buy and then we spotted the soft fruit and fruit tree section. I had really wanted a pear tree but they did not have any, so we decided on an apple tree which was well budded and we were told that it could be kept in a small garden in a large pot. Seemed like the ideal variety for us. Apparently it produces, very sweet and juicy dessert apples, so that is very exciting.

Here is a close up of the budding apples..

So now we have two fruit trees in our small garden, and we can definately class it as an orchard because there are now TWO trees which have been intentionally planted for food consumption...

Talking of food consumption. It makes me laught that some people prejudge farm shops etc. to be too expenisve. We managed to pick up all of our dinner for tonight for just over £3. We got 2 brocolli, 2 MASSIVE leeks and 4 potatoes. All of that veg for only £1. Then we bought some sausages made from the pigs on the Ragley Estate which is just over 2 miles from our house. They are not just plain pork sausages, but they even include locally produced Hogan's cider which is absolutely delicious!

...and just to finish, we saw some delightful lambs at the farm shop, they allowed us to get very close to them and enjoyed me scratching behind their ear..

I am going to pick up a very exciting piece of news this evening, so be sure to check back here this evening or tomorrow!

Martin

The lightest of spit spat sploshings..

Well, the clouds covered the sky, a chill was in the air and then that long awaited moment... RAIN!!

Oh how I have missed you rain, the waterbutt is dry, the ground is desert like, the resevoirs are emptying, the vegetables need a good guzzling. No don't do that! Too late, you've stopped. In the twenty four seconds it has taken me to write all this so far the rain has started and then stopped. I saved this post as a draft originally in case the rain came back, but the clouds have parted and the sun is out. How bizzare!

We are definately getting rain this weekend according to the met office, but how much of it we shall see...

Besides, in the vegetable garden...

Well yesterday we went for a trip to the only garden centre in our town. It is one of those places that is very good, but is a bit out of the way so you rarely go. There always seems to be a more convenient place to stop off at when we visit the major towns such as Stratford, Evesham and Redditch. To say it is well hidden is an under statement, Amy has lived in the town for just under 7 years and she didn't even know it existed!
However, we did managed to get some bargains though....

I bought an onion set on special offer, which will hopefully lead to a speed up in the making of a raised bed. We also got a few plants that we wanted to grow but only wanted one of etc. So we bought an aubergeine/egg plant, another strawberry plant, a chilli pepper plant, a cucumber plant, some leeks and a grow bag. The leeks were a real bargain, 6p each and they were very healthy too! I had successfully grown leeks on the allotment when I had it and really didn't think I had time/space to grow them here but hey presto...

This is our leek bed. It is at the end of what is now our seggregated vegetable garden. The soil here is full of stones and is far from perfect, but I thought it was worth a go. They say that leeks need lots of sun but a bit a bit of shelter too. The sun shines on to this spot for most of the day despite it being underneath a damson tree. I grew the leeks on the allotment under a Bramley apple tree so I can see no reason why there would be a problem, fingers crossed. So I dibbed out the holes about 20cm deep, popped the leeks in and watered them twice. The water drains away from the surface really quickly. I have planted 8 as that is all there was room for, but I did buy a block of 9 so I now have a spare leek plant.. where shall I put it?

After my exams (27th May onwards) we are going to be making a herb garden round at Amy's mums house which is very exciting. It is a really nice courtyard garden with a lot of potential, so it will make a delightful herb garden.Whilst clearing some stuff out of her garden to make way, I took this rather nice pot to plant the youngest courgette plant in to. We swapped her a juvenile chill plant so there was some degree of giving and waste not want not as opposed to just receiving.

The vegetable garden is looking quite good now, with lots of different bags, buckets and pots with signs of life emerging from them. The ground in this segregated part of the garden is probably one of the downsides to keeping chickens. The chickens have not been in residence for just under a year and despite trying to turf over it nothing but weeds seems to be able to establish itself. (Fingers crossed for the leeks of course!!)

I like this picture because on the up-side how fantastic are some of the plants looking. The first lot of potatoes have been covered up for what might be the final time as the soil I added today almost reaches the top of the bag. Fresh home-grown potatoes in a few weeks then! I also like this picture because of the brick wall. This brick wall used to be part of the public toilets that served the town before there was development rehaul a few decades ago.

Finally here is our scarecrow, I mean scare rooster! He is looking after the plants for us when we have our backs turned!

Rumour has it that Amy might actually be on here later...

If not, have a very good evening anyway!

Martin

P.S I started this post at 4pm and despite the twenty four seconds of rain, there is still no rain at 7.10pm, the skys are clear and the sun is still out. Looks like I'm going to have to water the plants now!

hi ho hi ho.... Into the grow bags they go..

Wow! We are now on tomato plant overload! So much so that we've taken a few spares over to my grandad and grandma so they can do their own grownbag.

We popped in to Stratford after the Talton Mill dissapointment earlier and we picked up some makeshift grow bags and bits and bobs. We were surprised when we tried B&Q for some equipment. Put it this way.... We worked out that they expect you to pay £17  to grow 3 tomato plants (including the 3 plants and grow bag). The grow bags and all their veg plants were so expensive there that it was untrue.

Anyhow, mini rant over. We have been out visiting Family this afternoon so this evening we made up the two grow bags and planted 3 x orange cherry tomato plants, 1 variety of black tomato, 1 x moneymaker and 1 x Gardener's Delight.

Elsewhere in the vegetable garden..

The courgette plants are showing really mini courgettes and flower buds.


The potting table/old rabbit hutch is still full of fresh greenery... mainly provided by the courgette plant that is getting re-potted tomorrow.

The runner beans have developed well in their pots and they can now go in to a bed soon..

I can also tell you some really great news!! The first cabbage seed has germinated and oui voila...

So that was our potting and planting for the day. Some of the things are coming on very quickly now so we are going to be keeping on top of the situation every day and potting and planting as and when.

Thanks for joining us!

Martin