Leeks, toms and peas ...

As mentioned in a previous the post, the leeks (sown on the 1st Feb) have not germinated  very well. So far, we only have 32 seedlings out of about 150 seeds sown:

Of course, we might get a few more plants but I'm not taking any chances so I've sown another tray of approx 100 seeds. In contrast, the onion seed that was sown on the same day is having a fabulous time:

Some more plants have appeared over the last few days. The tomato seed sown just four days ago is looking very promising and already beginning to germinate. Marmande is in the lead, with all three seeds having germinated. Gardeners delight is next with two seedlings followed by one seedling of each of the other varieties (sun baby, garden pearl, money-maker).

Finally, since the weather is so nice today (11 degrees) I have decided to start off some peas in loo rolls squeezed into miniature cup-cake trays:

These are Hurst Greenshaft - an early variety. I have put these into our plastic grow-house outside. It will be interesting to see how long these take to germinate!

Last year's harvest: Chilli Demon Red

Last year (before allotment-ing restarted) we grew some chilli plants outside in a little plastic greenhouse. One of the plants we grew was from a free seedling plant which came through the post (i.e. you pay postage & hopefully order lots of things with it, was from Gardener's World magazine I think) - Demon Red. This made hundreds of little fruits which are relatively hot but have little in the way of flavour.

Anyhow we have been drying a little pot of these in the airing cupboard for a couple of months & finally got around today to chopping the little hats off (boring job) and grinding them up - total harvest around 7g / 0.25oz (but that's dry weight so quite a lot of heat).

Tomato seeds planted

Now we are beginning to move towards the intense sowing season I have decided to get my tomato seeds going whilst there is still a little bit of space in the propagator. I sowed 4 seeds per 3 inch pot of 5 different varieties:

These are:

Moneymaker: A versatile salad tomato that I have grown many times before. Quite prolific even if grown outside (as is the case for me). Not a lot of flavour but great roasted.

Garden Pearl: A new-to-me small cherry variety that can be grown in hanging baskets and did well in a Gardeners World trial in terms of number of fruits and flavour. I plan to put these in hanging baskets too.

Gardeners Delight: Sweet cherry variety I have grown many times before and do well outside.

Marmande: A beefsteak variety, will be interesting to see if I can get these to ripen outside!!

Sunbaby: A yellow cherry variety also not grown before. Awarded an RHS garden of merit.

In other news the cabbage Golden Acre and cauliflower All Year Round are growing away nicely so these have been moved into our utility which is quite bright but not very warm (about 10 degrees cooler than the house).

I have also sown some more salad in compostable modules: Lollo Rosso (my daughters favourite) and red and green salad bowl mix.

Seedling race ...

First place goes to the coriander which will be ready for harvesting soon and will be a welcome addition to our sandwiches:

The purple basil is somewhat slower to get going! Both pots have now been moved out of the propagator to a sunny windowsill, but are still kept covered by a sandwich bag.

The onion seedlings have also been moved onto a windowsill and given a light haircut:

I read somewhere that you can cut the seed off the end of the young plant (which refuses to drop off in most cases) and this helps to keep the seedling more upright. The onion sets Sturon that we purchased last weekend have been planted into individual cells (118 in total).

The cabbages, cauliflowers, dill and cosmos are all up (sown 9 days ago):

I have to say I am very impressed with the cheap mixed packs of seeds ... I reckon we have had 90-100% germination rate for everything sown.

In the propagator the chillis are doing well in their pots but the leeks are slow to germinate. So far we have approx 30 leek seedlings out of about 150 seeds sown. I may end up sowing the rest of the pack if there is not much more germination:

The alpine strawberries (right-most tray) are just beginning to germinate. I have also sown another pot of coriander in the propagator. In addition, I have also sown 11 Hispi F1 cabbage Johnsons seeds in a pot on the windowsill ... thanks for the seeds dad!

At the weekend we spent some time down the allotment (see previous post) and decided to plant out some strawberry plants that dad had given us:

Dad is not sure on the variety although they are prolific fruiters. Apparently they are the runners from a strawberry plant that Alys Fowler gave him at the plant swap at Gardeners World Live several years ago! We have 16 plantlets in total. The "sticks" on the right hand side of the above pic are blackcurrant canes ... also courtesy of dad. We have 4 in total.

Buildin' walls

Following from the world's smallest polytunnel Winter Allotments brings you the smallest wall in Wantage:

Made from some old pallet scavenged from work, small metal plates from Haynes & some green fence stain. Aim is to mark the boundary of the plot, so pretty much job done there. Now need more pallets to get the other three sides done. Plan is to grass the area to the left of the wall in this image (between wall & hoops) to make a boundary path, though no-one has moved in next door yet...

Spuds

Got the seed potatoes going today - good job we've been saving egg boxes for a while. As this is year 1 we don't know what varieties we want to grow so just went to Charlton Park to get 10 x 5 different varieties as follows:

• First early #1 Lady Christl: bright smooth skin, excellent cooking qualities, high resistance to common scab and P.C.N., susceptible to foliage blight
• First early #2 Pentland Javelin: white oval tubers, high yield, good sized tubers, white flesh, firm waxy texture, good cooking qualities, can be forced under glass, free from after cooking discolouration
• Second early #1 Estima: oval tubers, creamy white flesh, waxy texture, good for boiling & baking, keeps well all winter [second early keeps all winter?!? - Ed], good resistance to blight, slug damage, drought
• Main crop #1 Scarpo Mira: claimed to be totally blight resistant, high yield, large tubers with good flavour, floury texture makes it good for jacket spuds, roasting & mashing
• Main crop #2 Pink Fir Apple: long thin pink tubers, high yield, good size tubers, creamy flesh, waxy texture, excellent salad potato, improves with keeping

The descriptions are taken verbatim from the signs at the garden centre. Went for Scarpo Mira on recommendation from friend who has plot on same allotment site, Pink Fir Apple for fun, Lady Christl as we had them before. The duddo of the week award goes to this individual:

Now that's one ugly spud. They should be going in the ground in about six weeks now, so will be more updates then. Meantimes need to clear the ground for them.

One week on ....

Last Sunday the propagator looked like this:

Now it looks like this:

Most of the onions have germinated (left tray), the leeks are just starting to germinate (right tray) as are the chillis (3 small pots). Success! The coriander and basil are up so I've moved them onto a bright sunny windowsill to grow on. In their place I have put a tray of alpine strawberries that require 18-21 degrees for germination. I have also sown:

• 1 pot of cauliflower "All The Year Round" from the mix veg pack of seeds (8 seeds sown)
• 1 pot of cabbage "Golden Acre" from the mix veg pack of seeds (8 seeds sown)
• 1 pot Dill (these seeds smell amazing!)
• 1 tray of Cosmos "Psyche White" (approx 20 seeds)

These are all currently residing on a sunny windowsill. The Cosmos and Dill are for the cutting patch at the allotment. Most of the other flower seeds can't be sown until March. I have a feeling that every free bit of windowsill is going to be packed with pots by Easter!

World's smallest poly tunnel

Wanted to find a way to support some enviromesh over salad crops for the allotment (to be specific, we have a 6 x 10 foot piece of the stuff, and wanted to use it to cover stuff like pak choi which little beetly critters [flea beetles - ed] love to munch). Was initially planning to make a timber construction then Helen found a recipe on youtube for a little poly tunnel. Decided that this was a neat idea so purchased this afternoon:

• 50m of 20mm MDPE water tubing (overkill, but will make more of these)
• 90 degree 60mm angle brackets
• 20mm wood drill bit
• Treated timber 50mm x 50mm x 1800 fence posts x 6 (enough for 2 frames)
• Staple gun

The idea is to make a 3 x 6 foot rectangle from the 2" x 2" fence posts, use the wood drill to make holes about an inch deep to push 4 x 6 foot sections of MDPE pipe into. Getting started:

About an hour later:

Good to go with the enviromesh - staple gun at the ready, time to transport it to the allotment (at the dead of night as a preference, will look pretty odd carrying it) and get it pegged down. The piece of mesh we have fits a treat. Next job is to make something very similar but with wider spaced netting to protect a strawberry patch. 

Mid week update

Astonishingly the onion seeds are already beginning to germinate, even though they were only sown 4 days ago! The propagator is about 5 degrees warmer than room temperature, ranging from about 18-25 degrees Celsius. Obviously perfect for promoting onion seed germination!

Today I decided to sow a couple more things from the hot and spicy mixed pack of seeds shown on the previous post:

1 pot of mustard greens (approx 20 seeds sown)
1 pot of oriental spicy leaf mix (approx 20-30 seeds sown)

These will have to fend for themselves on the windowsill with a sandwich bag over the top of each pot since the propagator is full!

I have never grown mustard greens (aka "mustard spinach" or "leaf mustard") before. Apparently this is the same plant that yields mustard seeds and all parts of the plant (including the roots) are edible. The baby leaves can be used in salads/sandwiches and have a bit of a bite. If the leaves are picked when large they become very spicy and are good for stir fries. They are meant to be extremely nutritious and very high in Vitamin A, C and iron.

The oriental spicy leaf mix includes Mizuna, Cima Rapa, Green Pak Choi and Red Mustard. I managed to sow 4 different-looking seeds so hopefully I will get some of each! I have not heard of Cima Rapa before. After a quick google I learnt that they are also know as "Turnip Tops" or "Rapini" and have spiked leaves that cluster around green buds that resemble small heads of broccoli. It is described as being akin to purple sprouting but much quicker to mature. Interesting!

First seeds planted

Yesterday Graeme and I went for an amble around Wantage and came across some cheap packs of seeds. Each of these mixed packs was only 99p - bargin!

It is still quite early for sowing most things, and also very cold! However, there are one or two things that can be sown now indoors:

In the propagator I have sown:

• 1 tray of onion seed rijnsberger from veg patch mix seeds shown above (approx 100 seeds, all of pack)
• 3 small pots of chilli cayenne from hot & spicy mix shown above (3 seeds in each, all of pack)
• 1 large pot coriander from hot and spicy mix shown above (approx 40 seeds, half of pack)
• 1 large pot basil Dark Opal from hot and spicy mix shown above (approx 50 seeds, half of pack)
• 1 tray of leek seed autumn giant 3 from Wilko (approx 150 seeds, half of pack)

It will be interesting to see what the germination rate is like! I have put little plastic bags on the chilli pots to increase the humidity and hopefully help with germination. I have also lined the back of the progator lid with foil to reflect what little light there is and hopefully prevent the seedlings leaning so much towards the window.

I have also purchased a net of Sturon onion sets (bolt resistant) for £1.50. I think there is approx 80-100 sets in the bag. I plan to start each one off in an individual cell and wait until they show signs of growth (i.e. green shoots) before planting out down the allotment. This was a tip that I got from a Gardeners World magazine. Although its extra work, it does reduce the chances of birds pulling them out of the ground.