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Friday 15 February 2013
Brambling
For a while on Friday it felt that spring might just be on the way. Out of the breeze
and in the sunshine there was a little bit of warmth in the sun. We couldn’t let
the opportunity of such a nice day slip by so we paid a visit to one of our favourite
RSPB reserves at Old Moor.
Like they usually do on our arrival the star attractions decided to go into hiding
but I did manage to get a photograph of a brambling, the first I’ve ever seen. It’s
name suggests to me it ought to be growing on the allotment but in reality it’s a
rather pretty little bird. This is a male.
It was rather a long way off so not the best of pictures. The challenge is now to
get a much better picture. Unfortunately the weather spoilt itself a little in the
afternoon as it clouded over and the light faded quickly making photography a little
more tricky.
Of course most of the regulars put in an appearance and we had plenty of pictures
to sort through once we got back home. Certainly there were lots of greenfinches
making the most of the plentiful supply of food available.
Saturday 16 February 2013
Early Carrots
Saturday produced another nice February day and as we hadn’t been down to the plot
for over a month due to the weather and problems having our gas main replaced we
decided on a visit.
I’m not going to dwell on the fact that our over wintering brassicas have been totally
decimated by wood pigeons. The only decision to be made is wether or not to net them
now and see if they recover and produce some sort of crop. I had my doubts about
our remaining carrots left in the ground to over winter.
All they’ve had for frost protection is some loose straw around the roots. With all
the frost, rain and snow of the last few weeks I wouldn’t have been surprised if
the carrots underneath had turned to mush.
As you can see we’re not too good at thinning out carrots. Once sown they’re left
to get on with it. I suppose thinning out might produce better looking carrots but
we only want them for the pot not the show bench.
One thing I discovered digging up these roots was that the soil is far too wet to
work as it glued itself to my fork as I dug around the carrots. The carrots looked
a bit of a mess when first dug having lots of muddy gooey soil sticking to the roots.
Once washed they didn’t look too bad. They have some slug and carrot root fly damage
so there is some wastage on the carrots but these are Early Nantes sown last spring
as an early crop which have managed to over winter reasonable well without too much
effort from me. They still tasted good when cooked which is one of the reasons for
growing your own.
It helped make up a little bit for the disappointment of those devastated brassicas
but not completely.
Sunday 17 February 2013
Chitting Potatoes
Sunday was another sunny day, that’s two in a row, we will be getting spoilt.
As the sun lifted the greenhouse temperature to around the 20°C I decided to move
our seed potatoes out of the garage and set them to chit in the greenhouse. The potatoes
have survived a month in the garage without any problems and it possible to just
see the first signs of tiny shoots on some of the earlier varieties.
The tubers were set out in seed trays with the sprouting end uppermost.
I’m hoping that all my labelling stays in place because there is nothing worse than
finding labels have gone missing at planting time. It’s the first time we’ve had
seed potatoes from JBA Potatoes and these look to be of really good quality.
Once all the varieties were set out the trays were placed on the greenhouse shelving
for the chits to form. All the trays were covered with a couple of layers of fleece
to give some protection from frost.
Hopefully the tubers shouldn’t need any more attention until they’re planted out
in the first few weeks of April.
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Vegetables
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Variety
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Seed Company
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Comments
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Potatoes
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Charlotte
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JBA Potatoes
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Tried & Tested over many years
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Potatoes
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Harmony
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DT Brown
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A trial this year - recommended as a good baker
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Potatoes
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Marfona
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JBA Potatoes
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A trial this year - recommended as a good baker
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Potatoes
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Nadine
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JBA Potatoes
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Tried & Tested over many years
|
|
Potatoes
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Nicola
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JBA Potatoes
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Tried & Tested over many years
|
|
Potatoes
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Swift
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JBA Potatoes
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Tested last year - thought it worth another go this year
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|
Potatoes
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Vales Emerald
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DT Brown
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Tested last year - thought it worth another go this year
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Potatoes
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Winston
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JBA Potatoes
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Tried & Tested over many years
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This is our full list of potato varieties for this year which consists mostly of
tried and tested varieties along a few new types to us just to see if we can find
better tasting and higher yielding varieties than the ones that have earned their
place on our tried and tested list.
Monday & Tuesday 18/19 February 2013
Spring For A Couple of Days
The last few days have been really superb lulling us into a false sense that spring
has arrived. We’ve had plenty of sunshine and very little breeze so although the
temperature hasn’t managed double figures it’s felt mild especially in the sun. Apparently
all is going to change from Wednesday onwards as we get cold dull weather back again.
This robin certainly thinks spring in here as it’s been singing its heart out from
the top of our crab apple tree for the last couple of days. Even when we’ve been
out in the garden he hasn’t been deterred keeping up his song to attract a mate.
Making the most of the weather I managed to clear some space in the greenhouse whilst
Sue planted some onion and shallot sets into modules to get them started. It may
be several weeks before conditions improve enough on the plot to get the ground prepared
and left to their own devices in net bags the sets will start to shoot in any case.
It goes to reason then that they might as well gets some roots down into a little
bit of compost and be planted out when conditions are more favourable.
At the moment Sue has planted up one tray each of onions Sturon, Red Karmen, Rumba
and Stuttgart together with 2 trays each of shallots Golden Gourmet and Red Sun.
Once some more space is cleared in the greenhouse some more onions may given an early
start.
It was around this date last year when we sowed our celery Victoria F1 and celeriac
Giant Prague seeds. All seemed to go pretty well until the seedling eventually got
transplanted into the plot. Once there they seemed to grow very slowly and neither
produced any worthwhile crop. To be honest they didn’t produce any crop at all. We’ve
had a good few attempts to grow these two crops and never had any success. Not to
be deterred we’re having yet another go this year. We will try to grow them a little
differently to last year but at the moment our technique for this year has yet to
be decided.
At the same time our free onion seeds Bedfordshire Champion have been sown to see
how these compare with those grown from sets. Celery, celeriac and onion seeds have
all been placed under our indoor growlight to give them the best possible start to
life. Just a small stick of celery and a celeriac bigger than a walnut would be something
of an improvement for us. We can but try.