Sunday 21 March 2010

Green leaping friends welcome...

Slugs are a major problem in every garden. They say that these slimy creatures are the gardener's number one enemy and this is very true. In a bid to encourage wildlife on lottieplotfour we decided to add a small wildlife pond. We are hoping that we will eventually have a small frog population. No miracle solution is expected, but every little thing helps!

A 3'x3' bed in a central location was choosen.



Ant dug a hole to fit our 'pond-liner'. We have choosen to use 2 plastic gardening trugs. This is an experiment and probably not a permanent solution. If we are successful this temporary pond will be replaced with something a bit nicer!



The trugs were added. There are quite strict restrictions on the size and depth of ponds on our site for safety reasons.



We used broken paving slabs to create an edge to the pond with plenty of platforms at different levels to allow any frogs easy access.



The only dissappointing thing is that it was very difficult to cover up the edges of the trugs. One idea is to add a couple of plants around the edge of the pond, which would improve the appearance.

Hopefully the pond will be functional - only time will tell!

The second project for today was to build a herb bed. We are pleased with the design and, once it fills out, it should add a bit of colour and help attract beneficial insects and pollinators.



Spring is definately here. The plot is beginning to show the first signs of growth.


We have expanded our strawberry crops with a new strawberry bed. These plants came from runners from our existing stock.



The rhubarb bed seems to be enjoying it's mulch of half-rotted leaves and within the space of 1 week has gone from not showing to this.



The other fruit bushes are starting to form leave buds. Here is a redcurrant.



The overwintering onions and garlic are growing well.

Sunday 7 March 2010

Pick a parsnip...



We have had a bumper harvest of parsnips, which we have been pulling since around Aug. After attempting to locate the 'snips christmas eve with a nearly a foot of snow, the lesson has been learnt to put a cane in to mark the rows!

One of the important jobs at this time of year is to make sure you dig up the remaining winter crops.

The number that was left in was quite a suprise. We only thought there were a couple left!

This bounty harvest will be hitting the freezer to last until this seasons harvest starts at the end of the summer

Saturday 6 March 2010

The growing season has started!

Today I planted some chillies, sweet peppers and a few early tomatoes.

The tomato is 'balconi yellow' and is a patio bush type. These little yellow toms are very sweet and did great for us last year planted in Nov and overwintered in the conservatory. Hopefully this years attempt at an early crop will also do well!

In terms of chillies, we are going for a few tried and tested favourites and some new varieties. Praire Fire and Ring O Fire have always done well for us and produced a good crop for general use. Hot pepper 'purple' is such a pretty plant that it is on the list again. These tiny dark purple peppers have a real kick, but the folliage is a nice deep colour. Hot 'patio sizzle' were on offer at Wilkos and they look very similar to praire fire so they have promise. In addition, we are trying 'chenzo' and 'cheyenne' which caught my eye when searching online.

I have never done well with sweet peppers, but refuse to be defeated. 'Gypsy' come highly recommended so I will cross my fingers that they will do better this year. In addition ' mini bell mixed' produce small peppers and 'big banana' produce very large ones. Here is hoping that one of these will give us a decent crop!!


All the above went in a heated propagator in the conservatory.

I also planted some sweet peas ' early fragrance mix' 'high scent' 'heirloom jaunita' and 'cupani'.

On lottieplotfour we have made some good progress on preparing for the main season.

Ant surveys the progress.



Some of the smaller beds have been piled up to be moved to their new location over the next couple of weeks.



We have increased our raspberry stocks (autumn bliss)





We purchased a new stainless steel burning bin.





Today's progress was the addition of these 4 beds