What a Sow and Sow - February.

Hello there, before I begin here is my usual greeting at the start of all my posts, just incase this is your first visit, so best wishes to everybody as we are once again in lockdown and hope you are coping well physically and mentally.

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Right it's January 18th today and, as is the norm, I'm not getting up to much outside in the garden. Having said that I have begun some work in the polytunnel which is adding fresh compost in a couple of places. I also gave my compost 'daleks' a bit of a turning but if you have seen my recent super professional, 🤣 ,YouTube video you'll know I explained my plan of making two compost bays out of pallets. I really would like to get these made as soon as possible; Jon has access to as many pallets as we need so we can hopefully get this done by the beginning of next month.

Ok, seeds. These are the things we like to eat and that I hope to grow this year!

I may sow some Early Nantes carrots in the polytunnel in a container this month. However next month will begin the main sowing dates. As I said in my last post I'll be following advice from Charles Dowding and my polytunnel book; I've decided to keep sowing, keep sowing this year to make sure I have no gaps in the polytunnel or outside in the beds. I'm sometimes worried about wasting seeds but I often put things outside the front door in our egg house for people to help themselves to and hopefully I'll still be able to do that again should I still have some spare seedlings. During the first lockdown I enjoyed swapping lots of things, including plants, via our community Facebook page. 

Right February will begin with the following: (MS stands for multi-sow)

Turnips (MS) Purple Top Milan, the classic variety.

Spring Onions (MS) Ishikura, a mild flavoured bunching variety.

Khol Rabi Delicacy Purple tasting similar to stems of broccoli which I love in soups or stir fry.

Cabbage Greyhound, an early variety with pointy heads to harvest  from June/July.

Cauliflower All The Year Round, such a versatile seed.

Broccoli Matsuri F1 which is a compact variety, may be easier to protect from pests.

Aubergines Black Beauty which I'm trying really hard with as never been successful and so want my own ratatouille!

Salad leaves of various sorts, whatever takes my fancy really and these will go direct into the polytunnel near the door again so they don't get to hot.

Peppers including a Romano red one and one called Etiuda Orange, possibly a third that I may have ordered - more of that later.

Basil Red Leaved which is so very tasty and Sweet Green as it never fails.

I have some herbs in pots in the polytunnel ready to plant out when the weather is right.

Tomatoes are something I'm determined to keep improving on after last year's better efforts - 

Maskotka a bush variety to grow in pots, some outside and in the polytunnel.

ILDI F1 a lovely, small yellow plum type needing some support.

Marmande which are a large, fleshy, late maturing bush variety.

Big Mama Plum Large are good for soups, sauce and salsa - these I hope to have a go at bottling if I get enough!

Tumbling Toms which are not frost hardy so will be in hanging containers in the polytunnel.

Maghrebi are a fleshy, blight resistant variety.

Should be something to suit everybody out of that little lot.

In pots, not sure of the name but red, I have 60 sets in the poly house. Of those 20 are looking good but not so sure about the others. Here comes the order issues, I received an email the other day saying my order of Vulcan Spring planting onions are on their way! I don't remember ordering them but they may be a replacement as I've had a few issues with orders recently! Some space will have to be found for them along with something else. My seed spud order came but only half of it was right. I expected a 1st and 2nd early order but got the first and then some maincrop ones. I'd decided not to grow the latter as I just don't have room for the plants when they get to the full size and they are the only things I really like to rotate and that doesn't work well for me - where they'll go I don't know, probably growing bags as I do luckily have some of those in the poly house.

The MS items are the only things I will have tried this method with so far along with the leeks I'm still harvesting and we're really enjoying those in soups and pies just now.

Still on the subject of orders, I have coming in the next month or two Rhubarb crowns of  Temperley, an early harvesting variety and I'm also very excited about establishing an asparagus bed so have three crowns of Mondeo variety arriving in March - work to be done on the bed for those.

Flower wise I'll sow some marigolds to pop in between the tomatoes plus they look pretty. I have annuals outside the poly house and various perenials and others in the planters outside the Airbnb rooms.(Funny describing them as such seeing as we're not intending to take any guests throughout 2021.)

So that is my plan for February so far, quite a lot of work but I'm really looking forward to it. The weather here in Wales is quite wet and miz right now and I'm only inclined to get outside if the sun is shining a little bit, guilting me to get my wellies on and so something! I love it when I get out there, though, and here's why.

I'll keep you up to date when I get started but would also love to know if you are growing something for the first time and how you get on with it.

Bye for now, 

Lou.xx

 

How Are You All Diddling?

Hi!

Its been just over two weeks since my last confession blog post! A lot has happened at home and in the outside world, too.

Here in Wales the schools have said they will open on June 29; my boys may not be going back until later in the proceedings or at all; we just don't know which children are going to go back in first. I think it would make more sense for the vulnerable ones to go and catch up with their teachers along with those choosing options and the ones who were expected to take their exams this year. Fortunately, neither of our boys fit into any of those categories and a lot can change from now until then as shown by the English primary schools no longer opening before the summer holidays.

Ooh, just have to say I am typing this post on my new laptop as the other one went caput at the weekend. It is lovely!!

Anyhow, where was I? 

Yes, changes in the outside world. With restrictions being lifted in England, which is all the 
P M talks about and pretty much ignores the rest of the UK, Wales has had some unwelcome visitors in various locations, there have been openings of certain places for the public to visit and some rules have been put in place for seeing family and friends. 

To be honest, we are not changing any of our habits really; I'm still happy to stay close to home generally. I remember thinking that when we get back to a sort of new normal people will have to be different, live their lives in a changed way with an altered mindset because of how we have been forced to live. However it doesn't seem to me that people are willing to "pause the system" as it is sometimes described. Seeing the queues a mile long and more  just for people to get a McDonald's takeaway does not fill me with hope that people have considered what they can or cannot really do without in the grand scheme of things.

Aaaaanyway, onto here at home and our little patch of paradise.

We've had a mixed bag of weather over the last couple of weeks - sunshine, showers, wind, hail! - which in the most part for our sowing and growing has helped bring on things which have been planted outside as well as those in the poly tunnel. I can't believe how different it looks. The first photo is me planting up the dwarf beans on May 9th and then today which is just about five weeks after that!

There are still trays and pots of things waiting to be potted on and planted inside and out.

These include more dwarf beans and peas, cabbages, PSB and peppers.

In the outside beds and tyres edibles including the courgettes, sweetcorn and broccoli are all coming along nicely, as are most of the potatoes.  

I've chosen not to make public the Heath Robinson-esque netted frame I have over the broccoli! 

We've been eating lots of salad leaves and had our first radishes this week. 

The carrots are looking healthy although Wednesday was meant to be the June day for last sowing but the weather was not too clever then, or for the rest of the week it seems, but hope to get those in by the weekend. (Not bothering with a photo as not too clear.) Recent new sowings have included radishes, khol rabi, marigolds, chives and garlic chives, parlsey plus two varieties of basil. I've planted out caulis, an established khol rabi I was given and potted on peppers.

In the poly tunnel I've been pinching out the tomatoes in the mornings, supposed to be the best time to do it, and there are flowers on the four biggest plants; I have some nettle feed soaking so when I sieve that next week I'll feed them with it, will need a mask for that! 

The peas, even though they're a dwarf variety, need supporting so held them up with some hazel sticks. The third and final kale plant has been put in as well as an aubergine; the whole of the poly tunnel is coming on really well and I just can't wait to see how it looks at the end of this month.

The onions are so close to coming up; 

needed to use one the other day, the top of which had completely fallen over. Can't wait to get the cabbage in here but need to sort our some netting to keep off the retched cabbage whites!

At the weekend we unfortunately lost the smallest of the orphan lambs we've been looking after. To be honest it was not right or well from the start, struggled to take any milk, had an issue with its back and front legs, seemed to have a couple of fits towards the end and we even think it may have been brain damaged. He spent his last hours, luckily, laying in the sun with the sound of the chooks in the back ground and drifted off to somewhere without pain we hope.

Today a lovely thing happened. I met a friend who lives about 20 minutes away from me; she was going to Tregaron to fetch a prescription so we socially distanced and had a lovely chat! She brought me some PSB and perpetual spinach - love that - which is now in the bed with the cauli,

and I swapped with a Jerusalem artichoke! 

I just HAVE to show you the fig tree now it has been in the poly tunnel a few weeks. I'm sooo chuffed it's doing this well!

So, I hope you have enjoyed my ramblings, but more importantly that you are all keeping well and safe but seeing family and friends when it is safe to do so. 

Bye for now, Lou.xx

Bank Holiday Weekend Work.

Good morning.

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I'm going to start off by saying that I absolutely love living in such a rural place but it can be challenging at times regarding the circle of life. We all need to make sure we are keeping to rules and regulations and respect everything around us.

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Hi everybody, how did you get on over the Bank Holiday? Obviously another strange one but didn't stop a lot of us getting outside I am sure. However, I started off the weekend on Saturday by catching up with Gardener's World - lovely start to the day but still a little sad not seeing Nigel. I decided to do a bit of planning for work in the garden so I knew what needed doing for the next few weeks. Love doing that, makes it very exciting knowing what it coming up, in more than one sense of the word!

Sunday was a great day outside. I planted kale in the poly tunnel and broccoli outside. 

The broccoli are the plants in the middle of the bed (radishes at the far end and courgettes closest in the photo). They will have a frame to protect them as I've never managed to grow it without getting eaten by something other than us! We're utilising this which was over the bed behind the poly house and our eldest and I made a good start but just needs the netting putting on it now.

I did some potting on outside the poly tunnel in the sunshine.

This involved cabbages Greyhound, a Black Beauty aubergine (always have trouble germinating those but keep trying) and a sunflower to hopefully have outside the tunnel if the lambs don't eat it!! Oh and what I think is the last tomato plant.

The eldest also helped me put up my bunting in the tunnel, need a little girly-ness in there.

I have now moved the Brown Turkey fig tree into the poly tunnel and it is going great guns already. 

A couple of other jobs included earthing up the first early spuds; these look to be recovering from the frost damage with plenty of new growth showing.

I've been saving woodash from the Rayburn and read somewhere that it is good for onions when they start bulbing so I'm giving it a go - can't do any harm.

Finally I cut back the oregano in the herb sink and it is now drying nicely in the conservatory and will be added to our box of herbs in the kitchen; 

this is something I really want to keep doing when I can this year. It was the last job of a really satisfying day and the best thing was we had another day to do it all again!

Yesterday morning, after a lovely brekky of scrammbled eggs, I set to deciding on the jobs for the day. These were partly helped by watching the latest YouTube video by Kev here at An English Homestead; he gave us a great tour of his garden and poly tunnel and I took a few hints and tips along the way. 

I got outside and sowed the following:

Dwarf Bean Speedy in a tray of 15 cells

Dwarf Pea Hurst Green Shaft the same

Beetroot Bolthardy, again in a tray of cells 

These have gone, along with a pot of Sweet Basil, into the poly tunnel so I can pick them at the same time as salad leaves.

The bed shown here is from where we took the old frame to use for the broccoli protection. It was going to be for parsnips but I've changed my mind. I found a number of weeds that seemed to have something like rizehomes but it wasn't the dreaded ground elder as far as I could tell. Anyhow, it is all prepared as I covered it over with cardboard, which I luckily still had, and then covered in fresh compost no dig style. I'll add some more when I get it but this bed is now going to be for cabbage or cauli, not decided which yet. 

I'd already started putting down cardboard around it so hopefully nothing nasty will get in.

My tunnel is coming along well but there are still has a few spaces as, obviously, I'm starting from nothing so don't have a full year of sowing and growing happening. 

Here is a butternut squash Spaghetti given to me by a friend. Funny, she says mine is doing better than hers!

However, I'm chuffed how things are working out but we did have a little visit from a mole the other day - I check today and all seems well, fingers crossed.

This year I am sooo late with my sweet peas but have a few called Bright and Breezy that germinated. I planted up three in a fairly big pot plus wigwam then in the top of the herb loo I've put a couple to brighten up the poly house area. The only other things I potted on yesterday were half a dozen All The Year Round cauli.

We're still feeding the youngest of the lambs who is really taking time to bulk up but I fed him a good 400ml of Lamlac this morning which is great.

After we came in from the garden I did some of my papercrafting. I've just started on my second junk journal. I think you can tell I love the vintage look and feel of things when I'm in a creative mode. I love finding anything from old sheet music and magazines, old adverts, books, paper, letters, labels, stickers, you get the idea. So... should you come across anything like this you know to give me a shout.😀

Ok, time to get on, after one more cup of tea. Not a lot on the agenda today but maybe a little bit of baking later on and deciding what will be on the menu for today and the rest of the week.

Hope you enjoyed the Bank Holiday and that you are just keeping on keeping on and managing mentally. With restrictions starting to change here as well as things in the news I've been feeling rather anxious. I've had to delete my Facebook feed since the weekend as too much negativity going on that is affecting my anxiety, plus I've muted some things from Twitter for the same reasons. Here, we are just concentrating on simply staying home and staying safe so I hope you are doing what ever you need to do wherever you are.

Bye for now,

Lou.xx

In And Out Of The Garden

Hello?!

I'm still here. It has been a while since my last post but I thought it was time for me to have a bit of a ramble. I have some good things, hopefully you agree, to share. (Apologies to those who follow me on Twitter who may have seen some of my ramblings there.)

Of course let us start in the garden. (I'm doing the wordy bit first then will add the photos so if it looks a bit skew apologies but just want to get something down!)

Right, the veg patches are coming on well plus we've have had some good things to eat. These are the views from each end of the growing area a few days ago I think. I'm sure you can see the potatoes in the middle of the main patch; very pleased with these after total failure with maincrop last year.

The onions have been taken up and,along with the shallots and you can see they are now in the cellar drying out and will be ready to store very soon. I did see Darren Lakin, I think, on Twitter talking of pickling shallots for Christmas; I'd would be interested in trying that.



Other yummy treats we have had from the garden have been the early spuds, courgettes, cabbage, dwarf peas and I can't forget about the sweet peas (obvs not for eating).



However, one of THE most exciting things in the garden is this. People say they are very hard to grow and I have to say I have taken super good care of them and look -  a cauli!!!!!

And I have 4 of them I think!

Other seemingly successful edibles this year are cabbages,

garlic is now drying in the poly house due to the rain,not a massive harvest but enough for our needs,

and we are picking red and green lettuce bowl daily - this is my BEST year yet and proves I should not really bother trying to grow it in the poly house, much better result outside.

Also outside I have celery for the first time; these are looking healthy as are the other two plants in the bed outside the poly house. Growing this for Jon.

I haven't taken up any carrots yet; they've not been the most successful of edibles in the past and not all have taken this year but will take a look at them soon.

There are lots of flowers on my dwarf beans but nothing else yet. I did well with a smaller number of plants last year so I really hope to have a good yield this year.

Ah finally the PSB. Was very grateful to be given these plants, along with the celery.

Into the poly house now and the two Marketmore cucumber plants at the back are just flowering and the Butterbush squash is doing well, too. 

I have some seeds which have germinated, on the left are some more cucumber which I'm going to chance my arm with and plant out shortly where the onions were. Top left are cabbages and Kale at the bottom, again to see what they do outside over the next couple of months.

My basil posts continue to thrive. I've given some away and put one in the kitchen but I just like taking a leaf off when I pop into the poly tunnel, especially from the purple one which is delicious.

Tomatoes have, again, not been good for me this year. But, I have two fairly healthy plants - don't ask me what variety they are!

Lastly I have been given three red currant bushes and a goji berry one. I have them in the poly house as there is no way for me to net them; hope they survive.

Outside my wild flower chimney outside is proving very pretty. 

I've been working hard on the flowers outside the Airbnb rooms and have taken new photos to put on the listing details. The hanging baskets have wowed me and the planters are now full to the brim outside the first two rooms.

I'm going to have a brew now and then turn round the room from guests who left earlier this morning. My bookings have gone crazy; so good, so very busy for the next three weeks at least and it isn't even August yet!

Right, I think that is enough of a ramble for the day. Apologies again for those on Twitter who may have seen some of my progress.

Bye for now. 

Lou.xx

Progress, Plants and People

Hello.

It has been over two weeks since my last post - sounds like I'm at confession!! so settle down with a brew as this may take a while!

Things have been pretty busy recently in all aspects here on our little homestead.

You may see in my left side bar the latest of our Airbnb listings. We are so very excited to finally have this available. The progress of the project was great fun when putting it together because of the theme and we absolutely love it. It isn't like the other two rooms we have as people book those last minute for a night away or a couple of days when the weather is good. Because this new listing is a self-catering unit I think we have to be a little more patient for bookings; we expect people to come and stay with us for a few days which obviously needs a little more planning on their part but are optimistic for a good season once we get some reviews in.

Talking of reviews, we've had fab great reviews from all the guests over the last two weeks; we were busy in the run up to and over the Bank Holiday of the year which was fantastic.

Now, the garden. My little patch of paradise is coming along very nicely thanks very much. Due to the wet and warm weather we've been having recently it seems all the plans are getting what they need.

This is the main patch with the maincrop spuds; (they're actually a bit bigger than this now)

obviously I'm having a bit of a potato panic due to there being so much foliage - praying (back to the confession theme) the spuds themselves come out ok especially after last year's dis-ar-ster dhaling!!

I have to admit that these seem to be doing better than the early ones...

In the background you may have seen the onions..

which I'm chuffed with; they are looking so healthy and I'll be keeping an eye on the tops dying back in the coming weeks ready to take them up, hopefully when they can dry out in the sunshine.

As usual I've planted quite a few courgette plants! This is the first of two outside which are currently flowering very nicely.

Yesterday I took the peas up out of the poly house ready to plant two cucumber and a squash plant. I harvested the last few peas - the plants I had in there gave me almost 1.5 lb of peas which are in the freezer. I have more plants in bed three and the one outside the poly house so hope to get another couple of lbs. I had a nice little harvest to take indoors.

The sweet peas are growing really well, I'm cutting them regularly and I just love the fragrance, 

here are some with one of the front door roses, eeek I love them!

Salad leaves are having their best year yet; I think I've finally got the successional sowing of these figured out. Yay, go me!

The turnips are one things that didn't do well with the wet and warm weather; they had all pretty much gone to seed so I picked one and gave the chooks a treat of the leaves. I've already sown some more in with the cabbages and will probably re-sow the bed.

The cabbages have been a real revelation. These were overwintered in the deceased greenhouse and planted out in about February. These were only about five and some were sold or eaten as Spring greens, some given away and we are still eating them now - just two left. Nothing nibbled them, they have grown really healthily so I think I'll go for them again.

I was given some begonias and trailing plants so I bought hanging baskets to make up for the rooms. I'm quite pleased withe them for my first effort.

Something else not quite so welcome but here due to the wet and warm weather were the weeds. This is the far end of the growing area where the weeds had consumed everything...

and then Jon strimmed it for me...

and NOW you can see the planter I'll be using for the outside tomatoes - I love a before and after photo!

I have two fruit trees and two blackcurrant bushes towards the back as well as the raspberry buses which run alongside veg patch 3 (2nd early spuds on the very right). I'm very grateful the ground elder hasn't spread from near the poly house and if we do our best to keep on top of the weeds and grass it should be ok. Because the far right hand side of patch 3 is stony with lots of tree roots I'd love to see if I can use the area to grow borage.

Ok, I've rambled on enough I think and anyway its lunch time.

Bye for now.

Lou.x