Friday 30 March 2012

Its all go go go..

  A fine week weather wise! Lots of sunshine and of course longer days. Cool nights but not much in the way of frost. That means everything continues to grow. Many more seeds have germinated in the poly tunnel and the peach, pear and cherry blossom has flowered at last. The apple blossom is not fair behind. Last of the parsnips have been pulled and turned into spicy parsnip soup. There are now a few bedraggled leeks left in the garden and some curly kale. For some reason no one likes curly kale! Radishes, chives and parsly are being  harvested.
 I have started to overhaul my compost heaps. This is a major earth moving exercise and will take some time. I have also started to clear the nettles from another border and that too is a large project that will take some time to complete.
 I am fated never to grow peas. Despite my precautions the chickens have managed to nip off the tops of the peas. Roast chicken is currently on my menu! They have also made dust baths amongst the shallots and they continue to reduce my borders to flat beds. Funnily enough though there is not much damage to the plants. One good thing is that when they see me they run!
  The rhubarb is looking very good and the shallots and onion sets are starting to grow.
  Lots of potatoes planted this week. It seemed to took forever to plant them. 10kgs of Rosebelle, 5kgs of Blue Auvergne, 5 kgs of Desiree.
  I have dug a melon bed. The bed is a trench filled with manure, covered  with soil and black plastic sheeting on top.You leave that for a few weeks to allow the manure to start to rot so producing heat. You then plant the melon plants on top of the bed. Melons it would seem like to have warm roots and lots of food!
  I have planted some lettuce in the tomb. The tomb is what we have nick named the construction that used to be used to cover a french grave. It is a solid construction of metal and glass and serves as a glass house of sorts. The small beds in there tend to dry out so require regular watering.
   In the poly tunnel the transplanted tomatoes are establishing themselves well. Many seeds have now germinated and are growing away - sweet peppers, gourds, various flower seeds to mention a few. I have sown 98 sweet corn seeds (supposed to be 100 but the packets contained 45 and 53 seeds respectively!) in pots to get them off to a good start. My over winter cauliflowers are small but least I have cauliflowers! The asparagus has sprouted and will more than likely be left alone this year. Outside it has yet to show. Brassicas are growing well. I have pulled the first radishes of the year and the second sowing has been made. Chives have been trimmed and put in salads! Red Salad bowl lettuce is growing fast along with Latitude and Batavia Reine Glace lettuce. No sign of the spring onions yet! As a boy I used to grow spring onions and used to get very good results. Not any more but I persist. Had some rogue ones grow outside over the winter where I had sown them with some carrots and forgot they were there. Maybe that is the way to proceed. The row of carrots is showing signs of germinating.
  Here in La Creuse we do get some good weather in March. I have made a note to try to get some lettuce started in the poly tunnel in January next year so that we have some salad in March.
 All in all the season is well underway.


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