A mammoth couple of visits over Saturday and Sunday meant that we have ticked quite a few jobs off the ‘things to do’ list. While we didn’t have much sunshine (not totally unexpected for a British bank holiday weekend!) it was great weather for getting lots done and plot 118 was our focus. On Saturday, Neil planted out the last of our chitted potatoes, Charlotte this time, whilst I weeded the onion bed. The weather last week has been the perfect combination of warm and wet so there were weeds absolutely everywhere you looked. It’s difficult to know where to start but the priority had to be those beds with produce in them. So next for a blitz was the raspberry bed. They really need to be weed free as they are so shallow rooted so to try and keep on top of it we covered the cleared bed with a few sheets of dampened newspaper and then plenty of hops to form a barrier, which will hopefully last a couple of months. In a lucky twist of timing, Simon was wanting rid of several heavy sheets of tarpaulin so we relieved him of them to lay at the back of the plot where weeds and grass carpet the area. They should provide enough coverage to prevent further growth until we clear that fully, which might not be until next year.
On Sunday we planted out some flowers and evergreen plants that we had bought from the garden centre on Friday, after some more weeding of course! We have some echinops, lupins, tulips, iris and a lovely rhododendron (had to check the spelling on that one!) and Bob very kindly gave us some plants he had grown extra of which should give us plenty of coverage throughout more than just the summer months. Neil completed the front fence in almost record breaking time, but sod’s law meant that as soon as he took the lid off the woodstain to finish the job we had our first shower of rain.
To complete the general tidying up, Neil worked wonders with the area just behind the fence where there were a fair few neglected strawberry plants hidden amongst a mass of weeds. We know from experience that they are hardy little blighters so as he cleared the weeds he replanted the strawberries into their own raised rows. Fingers crossed that they take to their new location as it will mean many more strawbs this year than we first thought!
I managed to get out of any more weeding and set to planting out those seeds that can go straight outside at this time of year. So we now have neat (although not as neat as Bob’s) rows of parsnips (Countess and Imperial Crown), a half row of turnips (Purple Top) which will be successionally sown again later on and three rows of beetroot (Bolthardy, Chioggia and Golden). Lines of string mark them out until we can differentiate the seedlings from the ever appearing weeds. On plot 97 I also planted some 60 day broccoli (Raab) and two types of spinach (Medania and Perpetual).
Having seen everyone elses broad beans popping up outside over the last few weeks it was time to move ours from the coldframe to a bed on plot 118. I planted them out in a block but also included a further block of seeds which should mean a longer crop and greater chance of many more delicious broad beans than last year! Just seen the weather report after the news and there is a risk of frost tonight but hopefully this will be another example of them getting the forecast wrong otherwise some of our good jobs today may be scuppered!
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