Penellype's 2016 Garden Diary

[Penellype]

A weekend of 2 halves - Saturday was cold, damp and miserable with very little scope for gardening, Sunday was absolutely gorgeous.

In my friend's garden:
Planted the last 6 Sarpo Mira potatoes
Harvested the overwintered carrots from the greenhouse (needed their bucket and compost for the above potatoes)
Sowed some leeks.
Measured the raised bed I am using for carrots and cabbages this year to make sure my idea for net protection works (it does)
Moved some strawberry plants into the greenhouse for hopefully early fruits.
Noticed the peas and spring onions in the greenhouse are germinating.
Dug more of the couch grass out of the path.
Harvested almost the last of the PSB, which has been massacred by slugs. Probably a result of growing it through weed matting

At home:
Moved the spinach and salads out of the growhouse to make room for more potatoes from the garage and the half pint peas which are finding it a bit hot on the windowsill.
Took the plastic sheet off the early peas as they were starting to press against it.
Removed the komatsuna from its saladgrow planter as it was starting to bolt. Replaced the compost with new and sowed some more spinach.
Mulched the blackcurrant and gooseberry pots with strulch.
The nantes frubund carrots are definitely germinating.
Moved the beetroot into the grow light garden and some of the lettuces upstairs onto the windowsill to replace some I had eaten.
Sowed celeriac and calabrese indoors.
Ordered the slug nematodes and a "popadome" for the raised bed at my friend's house.

Decided to take some photos today as everywhere is getting rather full:

[Penellype]

Bit of a quiet week after a very wet day on Tuesday meant the tide came back in! The weather forecast is having trouble making its mind up for this weekend, but after forecasting 2 inches of snow for Saturday morning earlier in the week it has settled down to an inch of rain and sleet (Yuck). The one thing that seems certain is that it will get colder, so I have covered as much as I can with cloches and will get out the bubble wrap tomorrow if necessary.

The spinach sown last weekend has germinated, and I now have 5 pots of 3 different varieties, although 2 were overwintered and are expected to bolt soon. I love spinach
Sowed some more peas (50 Hurst Greenshaft), 4 calabrese Sakura and 4 cabbage Hispi in the propagator.
Moved some of the Shirley tomato plants downstairs as they were getting too tall for the growlights. One of them is not looking well and has been isolated on the kitchen windowsill:



After last year's disaster with red spider mite, I took off one of the more damaged leaves and went over it with a magnifying glass, but I can't see any signs of the little beasties at all, so I have no idea what is wrong. The other plants from the same sowing and treated exactly the same are pretty much fine:



That is more than I can say for the sideshoots that I have potted up. 2 of them have died after going mouldy instead of rooting. I've been growing tomato sideshoots by exactly the same method (in a pot of compost with a plastic bag over) for years and never had this problem before. Its strange how each year is different and just as you think you have something cracked it backfires on you!

[Jungle Jane]

The other plants do look really good in comparison,how bizarre!

[Penellype]

Sometimes you just have to shrug your shoulders and go with the flow. Last year I sowed 2 Shirley seeds in January and both went a sad looking purplish colour and stopped growing at about 4 inches. They were overtaken by the seeds I sowed in March and I consigned them to the greenhouse in despair, expecting them to die. They recovered and went on to produce a good crop of tomatoes. This year I did the same thing with the same variety at the same time and the plants are now about 4ft tall and forming fruits.

As soon as the currently threatened frost is over I will take the sick looking one to the greenhouse where it can take its chances.

[vixylix]

Have those leaves been touching the window? Mine look a bit like that where they've touched the glass and I just assumed they'd got a bit cold in the night time temps

[Penellype]

No, they have been under grow lights, but the leaves have not been anywhere near the bulbs. Its really odd because all the plants have been treated exactly the same.

[vixylix]

how strange! hope they perk up soon

[arnoldy]

At last asparagus showing and conference pear blossom out (Bristol)

[Penellype]

I wish I had space for asparagus. I put my name down for an allotment a couple of years ago, and asparagus is one of the things I would plant if I got one.

Keep an eye on the weather forecast for your pear blossom. There are some night frosts forecast tonight and on and off for the rest of the month, so if you can protect it with fleece on the nights when cold is forecast it might be a good idea.

[Penellype]

Another impossibly wet Saturday, although frustratingly the sun is out a lot of the time. The natural underfloor self watering system in the greenhouse is working overtime and doing anything at my friend's garden is absolutely hopeless today.

Ordered some half hardy flowers from T&M - I wanted some tuberous begonias (they do a nice one called Apricot Shades) for the front garden. Also ordered some trailing cape daisies for the fence pots to make a change from million bells, and some fuchsias which apparently have edible berries. I like fuchsias anyway, so edible fruit is just a bonus.
Went to Wilko and bought a blowaway greenhouse to go inside the greenhouse and provide protected shelving for plants. Since everything I have ordered is half hardy I am likely to need the space!
Shuffled things around a bit under the grow lights as the calabrese has germinated. The french beans have gone upstairs under the taller grow lights in the hope of keeping them reasonably compact this time. They turned into triffids on the windowsill last year despite being of the dwarf variety!
Sowed some lettuce, mispoona and komatsuna in a pot in the garage (will go outside after the frost goes) for cut and come again salad leaves.
Replanted the onions that next door's cat had dug up

[Penellype]

A much better day today and the tide has gone out somewhat.

At my friend's
Took the beetroot seedlings to the greenhouse to make some room in the grow light garden.
Spent some time putting up one of those mini greenhouses inside the greenhouse to give me protected shelf space for tomatoes. Wilko have changed the design and no longer have the rigid side supports that the poles slot into, using the sort of corner fixings you often find on fruit cages instead. Probably cheaper to make, but not as easy to put together especially in a confined space!
Rearranged the potato buckets in the greenhouse to accommodate the shelving.
Sowed 2 rows of carrots and one of parsnips in the raised bed, which thankfully has dried out slightly.
Put up a "Popadome" over the raised bed. This was somewhat of a challenge to put together and I was glad that my friend has a fairly large space in front of her garage, as I would never have managed otherwise. It fits nicely over the 4ft x 4ft raised bed and I will put the insect mesh cover on in a few days when I am sure that the thing isn't going to take off in the wind.
Harvested the last of the PSB and some parsnips which are beginning to regrow.

At home
Potted up the red cabbage seedlings into individual pots now that I have room under lights.
Emptied the bottom layer of the wormery to use for potatoes which still need more compost. I've had the wormery over a year but this is the first time I've emptied it. The literature cheerfully says that the worms will move into the top layers, but nobody has told my worms. It took me most of the afternoon to carefully scoop out the compost without injuring too many worms, and to pick out as many as I could to go back in the wormery. On the plus side, there was about a bucket full of gorgeous worm compost

[Penellype]

Feeling very frustrated today. The weather is gorgeous - sunny and warm. I'd earmarked today for gardening.

I've been trying to get a local builder to repoint the gable end of my house for a while, because it desperately needs doing. So having said they wanted to start at the end of the week, they have now started today. They are grinding out the old pointing, and while it is much less noisy than I anticipated, the air is full of fine mortar dust. It is drifting into the back garden on a light breeze and covering everything in a thick layer of dust. There is no way I can go out there and garden today.

Hopefully they will finish the grinding out today and I can catch up with the gardening tomorrow...

[Lumpy]

As usual your write ups are an inspiration! Keep them coming so I can poach more ideas off you!

[Penellype]

Thanks Lumpy. I try to keep things interesting and include stuff that doesn't always fit well into other parts of this forum, as well as the usual stuff about sowing, planting etc.

[Nannysally99]

I also like catching up on your garden Penellype