Seed box stocktake

It finally stopped raining this weekend so I dashed outside and picked up some rubbish that had blown into the garden and got my seedbox from the shed. The garden is looking really sorry for itself, this year I must do something to make the courtyard close to the house look a bit nicer. I need an attractive climber to grow along a wall and lots of big green plants to put into pots. I keep pinning things to my garden board on pinterest in the hope that desire will lead to action.

Anyway, seeds I have left over from last year:

Seed	Sow	Harvest
Mesclun salad	April to October
Chamomile	Spring
Purple Sprouting Broccoli	March to May	(hopefully) edible the following year.
Sugar snap peas	April & May	June & July
Sage	April & May
Mangetout	April to June	August to October
Sunflowers	January to June
Busy Lizzies	February to April	flowers July to October

So I need to buy potatoes, squash, and tomatoes.

Thinking about 2013

I can't believe it has been a year since I started growing my own food. I've learned a lot in the past year and I plan to make some changes for next year.Last year I grew too much of lots of things and too many different things (2012 plan). This year I'm going to focus on the produce I really enjoyed and try some new varieties.

I'm keeping all of my fruit (rhubarb, strawberries, blackberries, blueberries and  cherries) and of course the kiwi vine. I'd like to get an apple tree so I'll have a think about where I could put one. Maybe I'll buy a dwarf tree in a massive pot until I decide.

I'll grow potatoes again, they are so easy and useful (and such fun to dig up) and I'll keep trying celeriac. Butternut squash is another definite as are tomatoes, lettuce and peas. I'll grow more herbs and I'll hope for some asparagus from my asparagus bed next year.

Turnips are out (they make that end of the garden smell like turnip and I really hated it) and I'm not going to bother with leeks, onions or garlic. Cauliflower was a waste of time, the slugs got to it so quickly I got the heebie jeebies just thinking about eating any of it.

When it stops raining I'm going to go out to the shed and get my seed tin to see what I have and I'll start planning what I will need to buy.

tidying up

We had an unexpectedly nice day today so I got outside to do a little pottering around and general tidying.

The compost bin had developed a serious lean so after I lifted all of the tomato plants (which I'm hoping will ripen in my kitchen) we tipped out the compost, repositioned the bin and refilled it.  I took the opportunity to get long suffering husband to tip all of the dead container plants and used soil into the bin so that I could wash all of the pots out. Of course, when I came back into the house I walked past an old potato bag full of soil that I'd forgotten; we'll maybe get it next time!

I pulled up a leek and harvested one of my butternut squash while I was out there, a couple of onions and a garlic bulb from the shed and a carrot and potato from the supermarket made a big pot of squash soup which is delicious.  I do think that the squash have been really satisfying to grow; they are interesting as plants, have beautiful flowers and turn into a resilient veg that makes me smile. I'll definitely grow them next year.

I have two artichokes which could probably be eaten but I've decided to let them flower instead.

It's been a while

A combination of terrible weather and first trimester exhaustion has kept me out of the garden for months but today we finally got a dry weekend when I had energy and no other plans so I could get outside at last.

Some of my plants have survived the neglect and others have not. The cauliflowers have been badly eaten by slugs so they all went straight to the compost bin. Some of the tomato plants have early blight so I salvaged what I could and disposed of the plant that was beyond saving; I now have a bowl of green tomatoes in my kitchen which I'm hoping will ripen. A few of my turnips looked wrong, I think they have suffered from a mineral deficiency perhaps because of the rain? One had little holes in it and a slug nearby so it went into the compost too. There are still a few healthy looking turnips in the ground which I hope will last over the winter.

Other than that I earthed up the leeks, did some weeding and admired my butternut squash which are sprawling and climbing in amazing directions.

Next year I'm not going to bother with leeks, cauliflower, garlic or onions, I haven't really enjoyed growing them, I'll grow more fruit and peas instead.