February 2024
Sowing, Planting & Preparation
01 - 28 February
2024-02-15 First sowings of the year
19/02/24
Seed potatoes set out to chit
All our bought seed potatoes were moved out of the garage into the greenhouse. It’s unlikely that any potatoes will be planted in the allotment before the beginning of April. All the potatoes were covered with several layers of fleece to act as frost protection.
23/02/24
Trying a few early lettuce seeds
I’ve got a packet of Red Salad Bowl lettuce seeds which will be out of date by May this year. As I’ve got some space under our indoor growlight I thought I’d see if they’d germinate. If they do I’ll grow them on in the greenhouse to see if I can get an early crop from them.
25/02/24
Working on the allotment
All the rain this month means the ground is too wet to do any work on it. The grass paths could do with a strim to tidy them up but other jobs need doing more urgently. I decided to do some more work emptying the compost heap. The second heap contained only composted weeds but had broken down very well. It was a little bit on the wet side but workable.
The compost was spread over several beds. In all 12 barrowfulls were dug out.
Sue cut back the raspberry canes on plot 41. A few stray canes were dug up and heeled in as a temporary measure. The plan is for them to fill in the gaps in the canes on plot 30.
27 February 2024
More work emptying the compost heap and rejuvenating our raspberries
Much of the allotment is still too wet to work on but it was possible to empty more of the compost heap.
Some of the compost was placed around a clump of early rhubarb which I think is Timperley Early.
Only one bay of compost remains to be emptied
Whilst I was moving compost around the plot Sue began work on rejuvenating our row of raspberry canes which had been taken over by weeds.