Tuesday 20 May 2008

The Patch!

Over the past few months I have been growing things in pots from seed and chitting potatoes on the window in preparation for my new vegatable venture.

I had a go last year in the tree house in Surrey but the elements were against me, including gale force winds blowing almost everything over... but I have not given in.

Back in February I took myself off to the local garden centre (I say local, nothing is really local around here, it was a 60 mile round trip), but I came back armed with packets of seeds and bags of compost. Since then I have grown 4 varieties of Tomato plants, which promise to give me a selection of yellow and red tomatoes.

My salad leaves are coming on very well indeed and I think we could even start grazing on them.

I also planted some broccoli seeds indoors back in late Feb and last week they were ready to go out into the patch. Their stalks are still rather thin but I hope they will grow to be strong. At the same time I also planted a few stronger plants straight outside, this included the elephant garlic and onions. Both these are coming along very well and they made it through all the snow we had.

Now the weather has improved I have put a few more things straight into the ground, including radishes, beetroots, potatoes, dwarf beans, and carrots. My potatoes would you believe were only planted 2 weeks ago and they have gone crazy, I hope I planted them deep enough, this is my biggest worry, other than my cat Frank being a complete bastard and digging everything up. I swear he is so full of self importance that he thinks I am making these dirt areas as outdoor litter trays for him.

Katy over at the potting shed gave me some of her finest Cauliflowers to rear in the patch. She also gave me a wonderful Strawberry tip which was to arange 3 Strawberry plants in a hanging basket and then the strawbs will grow over the edge ready for eating. This way no slugs can get them and they cannot rot on the ground.

9 comments:

Martha said...

What a bumper crop that is going to turn out to be. I'll be popping round for tea at harvest time!

XXYXX said...

Looks lovely badger. Glad to see you're putting down roots! Personally I've gone off gardening, but I do love home grown food. Mmmmmmm delicious.

BTW, is Stray even alive any more? Has Ms MMmmmmmmm become a recluse?
They haven't run off into the hills and left you there all alone?

Ms Melancholy said...

Hey lovely Bobo,

I can assure you that Stray is alive and well and doing clever things with numbers as we speak. I can't guarantee that I haven't become a recluse, though :)

But Why? said...

Nice work! Will you be branching out into animal husbandry as well?

Jenny Beattie said...

Oooh, I'm rather jealous of those tomato plants. Yum yum.

purplefiona said...

Just looking at them is making me hungry!! wow! yum. Mr Sir D and I grew some sugar snap peas the other summer- they came up tiny but delicious

purplefiona said...

What is chitting potatoes by the way? Is it like small talk? :)

TJam said...

consider me very very impressed. I grew a lettuce once.

BTW that is chitting with a "ch" isn't it? otherwise you should see a doctor for sure.

Badger said...

Hee! Chitting is when you leave your potatoes out and these long shoots grow out of them, then when they are nice and longish - but not gone green, you shove them in the soil. I chitted mine for about 6 weeks.
No doubt you have chitted your own potatoes without realising just by leaving them in the cupboard and forgetting to eat them, and then when you go to find them its like an alien invasion.

Badger x