What I did today 2021

[annie8]

Made brassica collars from cardboard and put them on my red cabbages. More to make for my cauliflowers.

[annie8]

I played musical pots with cucumber, chilli and pepper plants. Everyone gets a bigger home to move into.

Often play that game later in the season. Although it feels like I have loads of pots, never enough of the size I want.

[ameno]

Emptied my allotment compost bin, fished out the bigger twigs and other not properly rotted bits, and dug it into the bed where I plant to plant my squashes and melons.

[bramble]

Spent the afternoon sowing lots of salad crop.
Several varieties of mixed lettuce leaves and radishes.
Also sowed some Shasta daisies.
Potted on some pansies and nicotania.

[Mr Bones]

Made brassica collars from cardboard and put them on my red cabbages. More to make for my cauliflowers.

We use rhubarb leaves to make brassica collars Annie. Rip a slit in a piece to fit snuggly round the brassica stem and bury the edges in the soil.

[annie8]

That’s a really interesting idea. Might try that, was just thinking I’d harvest some rhubarb.

[Bren In Pots]

We use rhubarb leaves to make brassica collars Annie. Rip a slit in a piece to fit snuggly round the brassica stem and bury the edges in the soil.

They sound a good idea, when I first started gardening I was a bit rough with store bought and homemade collars I ended up decapitating some of my brassicas

[Mr Bones]

That’s a really interesting idea. Might try that, was just thinking I’d harvest some rhubarb.

Works well for us. The leaves make a well fitting but gentle physical barrier, the flies are apparently not keen on the smell and oxalic acid in the rhubarb helps to deter club root.

[StephenH]

AT LAST! My 'Pink Fir Apple' spuds have appeared above ground! The 'Salad Blue's appeared over a week ago, and I was beginning to despair of the PFA. It joins my cabbages and Swiss Chard, which I'd also given up on, which all appeared in the last 24 hours or so, and some of my onions, planted out a few weeks ago, and which I thought had died, have also resurrected!
I assume this is all thanks to the heavy rain of the past 48 hours. I have been keeping the plot watered with my oscillating sprinkler, but that is probably not as effective as rain, since it only wets a given spot for about one second in ten.

[ameno]

We use rhubarb leaves to make brassica collars Annie. Rip a slit in a piece to fit snuggly round the brassica stem and bury the edges in the soil.

I use squares of denim cut from an old pair of jeans.
Card and cardboard are a bit stiff, so there is a risk of damaging the stems, and they also rot away pretty quickly so I find they don't last the full season. Squares of denim are soft enough not to damage the stems, but heavy enough to stay in place in all but the strongest winds, and last a full season before they start to rot (at which point I put them on the compost heap).

[ameno]

Refilled the compost bin with the contents of the back-up bin, along with a big sack of already decomposing shreddings, a couple buckets of weeds, and a bin bag of fresh chicken manure one of the other plot holders gave me.

[peanut]

Finally got my potatoes in the ground, still got some to go in pots/bags etc This year I've got Ulster Sceptre, Charlotte and Nicola.

[quanglewangle]

Ordered THIRD lot of sweetcorn seeds. Lost first two plantings to unseasonable cold weather.

Good job sweetcorn germinates quickly.

[Bren In Pots]

Potted on Aubergines and courgettes. Did some weeding in-between the showers.

[burnie]

Morning, I have trays of stuff with roots coming out the bottom, so they have to go in the ground, more peas planted as the first lot look ok, leeks to go in next, I've tried some cut and come again lettuce, they are surviving, but not exactly thriving in the cold, with temps in the greenhouse down to 1.5 last night I'm hoping they are used to the cold now. Still putting fleece on the tomatoes and chillies/peppers, they seem to be growing ok, had to the tommies arm pits this morning lol.