The Veg Plot.

[garynortheast]

That’s looking very good Trev, it’s certainly a lot tidier than my plot!

I need to get out and take some pictures for an update. Plot is pretty much fully planted now although I have to find some room to plant out my leeks and some Bright Lights Swiss Chard grown from 9 year old seeds! Just been given some sprout plants too so I’ll need to make some space for them in the brassicas bed.

[Bibio]

Originally Posted by Sir Trev

Now I know I cannot host pics on Google Pics then.

Post above refreshed.

.

use google drive and you have to make each pic public.

[Sir Trev]

Originally Posted by Bibio

use google drive and you have to make each pic public.

Ah right, cheers Bibs. Don't really want to do that!

[garynortheast]

Update time.

It's been a mixed bag really. Carrots, parsnips, and onions just have not done it. I've sown three lots of parsnips and not one has germinated. I managed to germinate a row of carrots by sowing them in a length of guttering. They're now transferred to the roots bed. Onions from seed were equally poor. Three rows sown and two seeds germinated. I've now transplanted leeks into the rows where the onions should have been.

The rest of the plot has done much better, and with the mix of rain and warm sun is really starting to get going now.

Courgettes and cucumbers got off to a slow start when I first planted them out, and a couple were being chomped by slugs. I've put some of the sheeps wool slug pellets down around them which seems to be doing the trick. Cucumbers are right at the back of the picture and are still pretty small but have just started to put on growth.


Corgettes, cucumbers by garynortheast

I've been making butterfly mesh cloches for the brassica as there have been a couple of large cabbage whites flying around the garden. The first two are done and in place, got two more to make. The plants in the nearest cloche are Russian Red kale which seeds itelf all round the garden each year.


Cloches by garynortheast

I was given some purple sprouting broccoli plants to replace the ones that failed so they've just been planted out, and the green sprouting has been thinned out and moved about so I have properly spaced rows. I have several rows of cabbages and lots of Romanesco cauliflowers in too. The broccoli is only just starting to get going properly now.


Brassicas by garynortheast

The broad beans have been the real success story so far. Heavy crop of really tasty beans. I started by steaming the really small ones in their pods but lots of them are big enough to shell and eat now.


Broad beans by garynortheast

The peas are going well too. I made two sowings of them. You can just see the later sowing through the sticks to the left of the first lot. I noticed this evening that a few flowers are developing now.


Peas by garynortheast

Salad Bowl lettuce and sweetcorn. I have a climbing french bean spare which I am going to set to scramble up the sweetcorn later.
I also have spinach and chard in this top bed. The chard has been patchy but I have some Bright Lights chard in a tray which has germinated from 9 year old seeds! That will be going in to replace the failed chard on this top bed. Spinach has been patchy too. The annual spinach has done very poorly but the perpetual spinach has germinated very well.
You can see one of my wooden plant labels lying on the bed amongst the sweetcorn. The birds keep pulling them out, the little gits.


Sweetcorn, lettuce by garynortheast

The potato towers are generally doing ok although the Charlottes have been poor. One tower of them has failed completely and the other is growing but not as well as I'd hoped. I need to get the next tyres on some of these towers now.


Spuds by garynortheast

Three ridges of runners, and two of climbing French beans, all going well now. it was a bit of a battle to stop the sparrows from hoiking the beans out of the ground initially, but the CD bird scarers have done the job!


Runners, French beans by garynortheast

I've managed to get a couple of globe artichokes on the go. That piece of bracken will be coming out tomorrow though!


Globe artichoke by garynortheast

An assortment of stuff on the drive. Some will be staying there like the tomatoes, and the caulis in the crate, some, like the gooseberry cuttings, and the blackcurrant are waiting to be potted on or moved to a final position and some are dead pots for composting. There are a few germinating acorns as well which will go to my friends up the lane for their tree field.


Driveway assortment by garynortheast

This was a water butt stand. The water butt split and is waiting to go to the recycling centre so I turned the stand over, drilled a few drainage holes in the bottom and planted tomatoes, cucumbers, and a sunflower in it.


Toms, Cucumbers, Sunflower by garynortheast

Jobs for tomorrow include fetching more compost, planting out some of the Swiss chard, and finding space for four or five sprout plants.

[Adam Ef]

We're similar. Lots of stuff failed and a few things doing well, eventually. We now only have two courgette plants left out of the 8 but they are growing courgettes, one better than the other. Peas are doing really well. Runner beans are climbing but very slow. We have a surprise tomato that has seeded itself and is doing really well. Chives are also going crazy. Spinach is bolting very quickly in the heat.

[garynortheast]

Spinach often does better in partial shade Adam. It helps to stop it bolting.

[Sir Trev]

My lettuce is bolting very quickly now too. Was a bit grumpy this morning whilst weeding the beds when I realised the mud all over the last of the current lettuce batch was not actually mud. A wretched cat must have literally squatted on top of the plant and let loose. Now in the compost bin - the lettuce, not the cat... The next batch is a good week away from being ready and two of those have been dug up, presumably by cats as well. Grumble grumble.

[garynortheast]

I've not had a problem with cats but I have had to push twigs into the beds around the smaller stuff to stop Mabel from running across the planted areas! The Geoff Hamilton cloches are great at keeping animals off too.
I've just transplanted a load of beetroot to the beds and used another of his inventions to keep the birds and lurcher off. These are curved lengths of thick straining wire pushed into the ground with a sheet of clear heavy duty plastic secured over the tops like a mini polytunnel. I made the setup around twenty years ago after watching GH make them on Gardeners World. They've been sat in the shed for at least 12 years so it was nice to bring them back into use.

Planted out some of the Bright Lights chard on the top bed today, and a couple more of them in the front flower bed as they are so ornamental as well as good to eat. Also spaced out the few successfully germinated Flamingo Pink chard plants.

I need to thin out the spinach beet tomorrow.

[garynortheast]

First small picking of broad beans today. Had them with dinner. Yum!

[garynortheast]

We've had steady rain now since around the early hours of the morning and I've been listening to the very pleasing sound of my water butts filling up. They're now both ¾ full.