Winter Veg

We planted some winter broad beans towards the end of 2008. They have come along nicely and as can be seen are now covered in flower. We now need to give them a bit of support to ensure they are not blown over and damaged. However in an adjacent plot there are some spring planted beans that are only a bit smaller than ours. It does beg the question if it is worth planting a winter variety. We'll see what the advantage is when it's time to harvest.

We also planted our garlic in October 2008. Garlic grows best when it has a prolonged period below 7 deg C. Therefore it is ideally suited to the British climate. It also stores well so a row of garlic will last a long time once harvested. The garlic can be seen at the front of the picture below.

We also put in some winter onions. We planted both red and white varities and these are doing quite well. Onions don't like to have weeds around them and by growing over winter they can develop in a relatively weed free situation. Now it's warming up the weeds are starting to grow so we'll have to get to work with a hoe. That's the reason rows are planted at least 8 inches apart. It gives you enough room to work the hoe between them. Again, as with most things grown on the plot, the onions will keep well in an open mesh bag in the garage. We actually still have some from mid 2008 that are perfectly good to eat.

Potatoes

The potatoes are all in now. You can see what we've planted in the growing today section on the right. The first earlies were planted in the third week of March. More were planted each week until the late maincrop went in at the end of April. Earlies need 10 to 12 weeks of growing before digging up whereas the maincrop need about 20 weeks. This means the first new potatoes will be ready at the start of June and we'll be harvesting until the end of September. We put in 140 seed potatoes. Even with only 1kg of spuds per plant that's still 140Kg. With the manure and added organic potato fertiliser I would be hopeful of getting at least 200Kg of spuds in 2009.

When it's time to harvest they'll go into potato sacks. Last year's crop were still being eaten in January this year. Unlike shop bought spuds which sprout after a few days, even in the dark, the allotment spuds are happy in a sack in the garage for a few months. Makes you wonder what they do to the shop spuds before they sell them.

And when it comes to taste there is no comparison to the shop bought stuff. That was the biggest revelation the first time I grew my own potatoes. They actually had flavour and the different varieties could be told apart. As it's such a staple of the British diet it's amazing what we put up with from the supermarkets. If there's one thing I'd recommend, even if you only have a small back garden, it's to grow some potatoes. You can do this in an old dustbin, a large sack or a special potato planter. Get some good seed potatoes and see the difference. There are plenty of internet sites which give advice on how to do this.

A load of $%&*

A few weeks ago we became proud owners of a trailer load of horse $%&*. We had to pay for it (there are probably people somewhere who will give it away) but for the quantity we received it was good value. What needs to be remembered is that growing vegetables take a lot out of the soil. A good way to put it back is by using manure. It not only adds to the soil nutritionally but improves the composition by adding organic matter. We have already used it to bottom fill the potato trenches (potatoes require a lot of food), spread it over the asparagus bed and put loads into the bean pits. I'm expecting a good crop from the beans this year. What's left of the pile will be dug in over the rest of the plot as required.

We got our manure from a contact number displayed in the allotment shop. The load arrived bang on time and the tractor driver was able to skillfully drop it on the end of our plot. It may be $%&* but it's good $%&* !

Asparagus

Here's a picture of the raised bed where I planted 10 crowns of asparagus, variety guelph millenium. Asparagus really needs to be free of weeds but I doubt if that will be the case here. I'm not keen on using any chemicals to kill weeds so I didn't prepare the ground very well. I will probably have to keep this free by hand. Three weeks after planting the first asparagus tip has appeared. However I must resist temptation. Asparagus should not be cut in its first year. And even in the second year it's wise to harvest exceedingly sparingly. It will be 2011 before I get the full benefit of this years planting. The wait will be worth it though!

Mushroom

I'm not a funghi expert but as this grew up out of the manure I guess it's a horse mushroom!