28 February 2023

At the allotment, Feb 2023

It's good to get out into the garden and allotment after the winter.  I always need that few months of break time, and when the days get longer and the spring flowers start to bloom, I feel refreshed and ready for a new year.

This past weekend the whole family visited the allotment to sow the pre-sprouted broad beans and snap peas.  The son and I made two large trenches and then we put down the seeds somewhat evenly;  I knew roughly how many seeds there were, so I put down a divider in the middle of the trench and we counted out half for each side.  After we finished sowing we covered the trenches with insect mesh (weighed down on all sides with more soil);  hopefully this stops the mice/rats/birds digging the seed out.  I'll take it off once the plants are up.

While digging at the allotment, I discovered two large-ish overwintered beets I'd missed in my last harvest;  the woodlice seemed to have overwintered with them as they were pretty holey--I decided to compost them.  I also found a dozen or so overwintered onions;  these I grew from seed last year and were pretty pathetic at harvest time.  I didn't bother with these smallest ones, still growing now.  They actually look like they might go on to produce something worthwhile this year!  I'll let them carry on.

My garlic patch too is growing strongly, though the grass is coming in pretty strongly as well.  I've given up on eradicating the grass.  My new strategy is to knock it back long enough to get my plants up and growing (using sheet mulch).  Well to be honest that's my old strategy too, but it was in the hopes that the grass would actually be defeated.  

The leeks, planted out last spring, are in a patch that will need a solid sheet mulching again--very thick luscious grass.  The leeks managed to get a good foothold when I planted them, and are of acceptable size;  the last one I harvested had an amazing root ball which I replanted in a new spot after cutting off the leek to eat.

Finally, I picked some kale from my two year old plant, still going strong.  I picked some last week too, and discovered a fat green caterpillar on it--how did it survive all that prolonged frost we had?  That kale just keeps on giving;  I'm hoping to get it some friends growing this year too.

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