Ok I HAVE STARTED!

     The weather continues to be a dampener on activity in the garden and my reluctance to go outside in the cold! Still, some work done this week. More forking and weeding and I must now have more than two thirds of the beds cleared. Picked some sprouts. Still a few left and I have made the first planting. Champ (meaning that they are not bought ones but grown and harvested at Watermeadows) Red Sun shallots and Champ banana shallots sown. Maybe a week or two early but the sets were there so nothing venture nothing gained. I need a trip out to buy seed potatoes, shallots and onion sets along with some garden lime and fertilizer. I am resisting sowing seeds, even in my propagator. Still a week or so too early methiks. Plenty to do in the garden beside sowing seeds! Umm, maybe some carrots? Have to think about that. Lol!

    Chickens are being chickens as usual and an average of 6.6 eggs per day this last week. Best week so far this year. I am sure another hen has come into lay. Still, what another five or six yet to start! There is a possibility of twelve eggs in one day. Oh my!

BEER IS BEST!

 

      There has been some thirsty work done this week! Repairs made to various beds after the ravages of my feathered chicken friends. Currently I do not mind as they are clearing the soil of things and of course they poop while doing it! One bed completely forked and weeded another finished off. Most beds that I will need to plant in the next few weeks are ready. Just need to keep an eye out for the odd weed or two! Despite the frosts it is very noticeable that the grass is starting to grow. Thoughts of the first cut are in mind and if I get a string of dry days I may start. Continue to lift carrots and there still are more to do. It will soon be a race between digging them up before they start to grow again. Plenty of thinking going into what to plant where and when. The propagator is out and the ex mushroom trays are stacked and waiting for the seed potatoes.

   Chickens are being chickens and causing a little mayhem in the newly forked and neatly edge vegetable beds. Hey ho! Plenty of eggs though. Average this week is 5.4 repeating last weeks efforts. 

Forking and weeding a bed (this one has been completed)

No DIG

WEEK ENDING 05/02/22

   Ooops. I forgot to publish this blog on the 29th Jan so this a two week blog. Mind you the second week has been very quiet. Lots of personal stuff to do and the weather has been damp, drizzly, on the cold side and the ground was really too wet to work on.  So, some leeks dug up and a chicken coop cleaned out. This last week the hens have laid an average of 5.1 eggs per day, an continuing improvement week on week. 

  WEEKING ENDING 28/01/22

   This week any time spent on the vegetable garden has been in the continuing construction of my second "no dig" bed. The first was my strawberry bed and very successful it has been too. Fingers crossed this year will be as good! The second bed is almost done. Another couple of barrows of soil should see the end of it although the chickens will not doubt attempt to flatten it. The "no dig" bed is a layer of cardboard, in attempt to stop weeds coming through, and then in my case chicken manure, raked up leaves, chopped up cabbage leaves topped off with soil. The soil was from my enormous pile of weeds that have rotted down over the last couple of years and were forming a dyke!! With a bit of luck I will use the bed to plant lettuce and what else I am not sure of at this point in time.

Day 1

Day 1

Day 1 with helpers

Day 2 second half

Day 2 second half

Day 2 all but done! With helper!

  The start of the week saw very cold days with some very hard frosts. Lots of hoar frost! 

 Probably the last of the sprouts have been picked. Considering they did not look good they have been ok. Not brilliant but least I got some! Still pulling Touchon carrots and there are a few to go yet. It was a very good year for carrots in my garden. The remains of the cabbages have been removed along with the disappointing cauliflowers. Leaves chopped up and added to the "no dig" bed. More forking and weeding done and the first attempt at sorting out the self seeded parsnip seedlings done. 

   Chickens are being chickens and being a menace on my new "no dig" bed. Coops cleaned out and contents spread in the new "no dig" bed. Average of 4.4 eggs per day this week, an improvement on last week. 

TRANSPLANT OR LEAVE?

    Another week passes and unfortunately little done in the garden! That east wind is blooming cold! Still, some work done. Another bed forked and weeded. That bed will be turned into a "no dig" bed. One more bed started only to find lots of self seeded parsnip seedlings. I will more than likely just thin them out and let them be. Parsnips are a difficult seed to germinate and when they do so without any encouragement, well, one has to go with flow!  I am now thinking more about where to sow stuff and as the end of January creeps up it will be time to buy seed potatoes! The propagator will need dusting down.

Self seeded parsnip seedlings

   Chickens are being chickens and the main flock has really got the hang of the treadle feeders. No more feeding the rats! Not that there are any at the moment. My campaign to eliminate them has worked!  Slight drop in average daily egg production - 3.7 per day, however, despite giving thirty six eggs away I still have fifty five in trays!

Bed 2 (without the chicken) ready to make into a no dig bed

 

TAD ON THE COLD SIDE

     Reality has struck! Real winter weather has arrived of the last week with frost and very cold over night temperatures. The ground has gone from wet to workable to frozen! 

     At the start of the week I was able to clear two beds, fork and weed them along with putting mulch back onto the Hugelkultur beds that the chickens has scratched off! Since then the ground has frozen to a point of being unworkable. Chicken coops moved and the two groups of chickens that lived close to the garden have been merged so now there is one cockerel with four hens! He is happy! The other larger group are doing just fine. Average of 4.4 eggs this last week down on the week before. Good job! I have eighty four eggs to eat! LOL!

    New varieties of seeds have arrived. Giant Japanese cabbage, giant pumpkins, giant Russian and Mongolian sunflowers (for the grand kids, of course!).  Also a new variety for me of long outdoor cucumber called Suyo long (Chines, 10 to 18 inches!). Should be a year for the giants!

Large Hugelkulter bed and cleared/forked beds

ANOTHER YEAR BEGINS

    Happy New Year! Surely it has to be better than last although from a gardening perspective as far as I am concerned it was a very good year. Anyway, onward and upward!

    Another quiet week but when the weather allows I will be out and about doing stuff in preparation for sowing come the middle/end of February. This last week there has been frost and snow showers! A white cabbage cut (they have been very good) and a good size too. Some tidying up done, which to be honest, should have been done a while back! Netting and supports removed from the strawberry bed and weeding/forking started. I have now finished forking and weeding the bed and also have mulched and replaced the netting but really that sentence should have been in next weeks blog!

   Chickens are still laying well with an average of 5.6 eggs a day

White winter cabbage

REVIEW OF THE YEAR

      Another year draws to its close. Overall the year has been good. Yes some crops did not do well, tomatoes, for example, but despite tomato blight a reasonable number were gathered. Potatoes did well, again, despite the blight, that fortunately with my earlier planting of the seed potato had only a small affect on the plants and less on the eventual crop. Haricot vert and buerre did ok as did the water melons. Over wintered broad beans did well as did the follow on spring sowing. Onions ok but could have better I fear and there was a good crop of shallots which I turned into pickled onions! Beetroot. Well, those self seeded in the poly tunnel did very well. Outside, not so good. Squash. Yes a good year. Pumpkins. No, a poor year. Brassicas. A very good year although the sprouts have left a little to be desire for but we got enough for Christmas dinner! Cauliflower. A couple of heads but I have always found cauliflower hit and miss. Carrots. Oh yes very good year with, what, at least six sowings with at least three being very good. Strawberries. Wow! New plants planted in a no dig bed and a crop of strawberries I have never had before. Sweet peppers, good, chilli's good. Sweet corn good. Peas. Well, one good sowing which would seem to be the norm. Successive sowings just fail for whatever reason. Lettuce did well in the poly tunnel with some very good heads of Great Lakes (like an Ice Berg lettuce) but later sowings outside did not produce. Parsnips poor but enough for Christmas dinner! Courgettes, round and straight, enough for what we needed. The vegetable plot more than paid for itself. 

   January 1st was a very mild day so I took the opportunity to weed and fork the seed bed at the end of the poly tunnel. I also created a new one where the chicken manure compost heap had been. I also covered up the rhubarb patch. Beds covered over to stop the chickens from scratching!

   The hens produced 1209 eggs which includes 8 cracked ones but did not return a profit. I fear a lot of feed was lost to rats and I have now invested in pedal feeders so hopefully that will reduce the wastage. A campaign of rat extermination has been conducted and a very marked reduction in the rat population has been noted. The campaign continues on a watchful state.

Estimated value of the total crop before expenses: 1,133 euros

Estimated profit: 922 euros

All potatoes: 203Kgs from 12Kgs of seed potatoes (Anoe, BF-15, Desiree)

Haricot vert/buerre: 19Kgs

Seed beds and rhubarb patch.