Fruit, Veg, Flowers and Slugs

 At the start of the growing season 2025 there are many things to do on the vegetable patch and in the garden. For personal reasons I have been unable to update the Blog recently but I have been busy 'behind the scenes' and much has been going on.  For the last few weeks there has been little spare space on windowsills around my house with various seeds germinating here there and everywhere. Greyhound cabbages and Lancaster F1 leeks have been residing on the windowsill of the spare bedroom, four different tomato variaties were on the front room windowsill and the Scarlet Empire runner beans were threatening to take over the conservatory. Lavender cuttings and Agapanthus seedlings (seeds saved from one of my established plants) were also to be found in the conservatory. The Salvia cuttings I took last year from an established plant had been moved to the logstore at the bottom of the garden along with the Geranium cuttings in March ‘hardening off’ along with some Nasturtium seed...

I wrote back on the 23rd August how I planned to sow  White Ishikura Spring Onions  and  Carrot Amsterdam Forcing 3  carrots to grow undercover in the greenhouse through autumn and into winter in the hope of having some crops for the long dark months of winter and perhaps even few carrots for the Christmas Dinner fresh from the garden. I also sowed a line of Carrot Amsterdam Forcing 3 seeds in the veg patch outside to compare with those in the Greenhouse.  Firstly the outside sown Carrots failed, no great surprise as they are not a 'winter hardy' variety and were sown very late. As for the crops in the Greenhouse I didn't manage to have home grown carrots with Christmas Dinner sadly but will be having some this evening, I am very happy to report 😃 Both the  White Ishikura Spring Onions  and  Carrot Amsterdam Forcing 3  are now ready for harvesting; okay a little later than hoped but it's fresh veg off the plot in March that isn't Winter Lett...

The vegetable patch is beginning to look a little sorry for itself now in November. The Green Manure mix sowed a few weeks ago has really shot up, I possibly sowed a little to thickly, but it will do no harm and does at least add some foliage to the plot at this time year and is of course doing a very important job. I mentioned in a previous post how Green manures stop weeds spreading and prevent nutrients leaching from the soil over winter. With the amount of rainfall we have had at times in October I am very pleased I sowed the mix! The plants will be cut down and lightly dug into the soil come spring.  The Runner Bean plants are pretty much done for with the last having been picked at the weekend. They have been brilliant this year, I have bags and bags of them frozen to get me through the winter. I will leave the plants for a week or two as they die down to let the leaves fall off; makes it much easier unravelling them from their supports. All the remains will naturally be comp...

 We have seedlings!  I wrote back on the 23rd August how I planned to sow White Ishikura Spring Onions and Carrot Amsterdam Forcing 3 carrots to grow undercover in the greenhouse through autumn and into winter in the hope of having some crops or the long dark months ahead and a few carrots for the Christmas Dinner fresh from the garden. I have also sowed a line of Carrot Amsterdam Forcing 3 seeds in the veg patch outside to compare with those in the Greenhouse.  Those in the greenhouse appear to be going well and I have a very high germination rate as you can see from below. Excuse my terrible sowing skills some thinning out will clearly be required - my big old sausage fingers are not built for sowing carrot seeds thinly 🤣 The carrots in the veg patch haven't germinated as well thus far but a few seedlings are popping their heads above ground and with warm weather forecast for the next few days I am hopeful a few more may get going yet.   It really has been ...