welcome to my little suburban oasis, filled with flowers,fruit trees and vegetables

Sunday 28 March 2010

set this week

seem to be spending all my time sowing seeds, so instead of listing them as and when they're set, I thought it would be easier just to list them at the end of the week.
tendergreen french beans, incredible sweetcorn - proper corn this year not babycorn, delikett peas - mangetout type, spring onions, kohl rabi, green magic broccoli - hopefully grown, cropped and out by July, courgettes, pumpkins from home grown seed, ophelia aubergines, nasturtiums, pyrethrums - a bit late to flower this year, pink evening primroses, and duchess blue ice asters

Friday 26 March 2010

first day of Spring.



a rather late post of photos taken last weekend - first day of Spring.


some snowdrops still in less sunny areas of garden.

leaves coming on the honeysuckle, daffodils in bud. bergenia, crocus and polyanthus starting to flower.

Sunday 21 March 2010

picked this week

brussels still cropping. lots of lettuce coming ready as leaves though not full sized lettuce. spinach leaves and bits of others - american land cress, rocket and some larger leaved bitter cress.

Friday 19 March 2010

crocus - better late than never


potato surprise


decided to dig some garden to sow radishes, had to move the self-set aquilegias and foxgloves from veg patch to flower bed, so had to weed the invasive campanula out of the flower bed. back at the veg patch digging, I discovered potatoes left behind somehow from last year - amazingly not rotted but also bigger than the ones we lifted and ate!

Tuesday 16 March 2010

growing

crocus flowering. daffodils, forsythia and kerria japonica in bud.
beetroot, lettuce, rocket, cabbages, cauliflowers, peas and broad beans all through in greenhouse.
tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers and, at last, chillies growing in the inside propagators and a po of basil coming through on the kitchen windowsill

Sunday 14 March 2010

picked this week

brussels again! still doing well, not many at one time but enough here and there for a dinner. starting to have more salad leaves ready - winter density and small quantity of red salad bowl lettuce, spinach, american land cress, perennial rocket and chives.

chives and brussels

chives starting to grow again













still have brussels

Tuesday 9 March 2010

seeds again

sunny day - busy sewing yet more seeds - basil on kitchen windowsill, rocket in greenhouse and supersteak and ferline tomatoes in airing cupboard.

Monday 8 March 2010

mini propagators





I've found a use for all the empty pudding/yogurt pots we seem to end up with - just the right size for 3" pots

Sunday 7 March 2010

picked this week

a week of good sunshine most days though with over night frosts.

started picking little bits of salad leaves this week - american land cress, chives and perennial rocket from outdoors - winter density lettuce and spinach from the greenhouse.

still brussels sprouts for dinner, though some are starting to burst with this weeks sunshine.

Wednesday 3 March 2010

american land cress


had forgotten about this - fortunately it's managed to survive winter without my attention - a single root of american land cress, an easy growing alternative to watercress, ready for early salads.

Tuesday 2 March 2010

flowering in March





a couple of days of sunshine has really brought out the crocus flowers - mainly yellow ones so far, odd purple ones around though. And snowdrops again.

sprouting potatoes


found this hiding in the back of the cupboard where the potatoes are kept - don't know how long it's been there!
have now buried it safely under a couple on inches of soil in a really large pot (14" or so) and being kept in the greenhouse - might have some potatoes with luck.

Monday 1 March 2010

mixed brassicas


the state of the 'mixed brassica' bed. some very small spring cabbage, some winter cabbage that haven't 'hearted up' yet and a broccoli - early purple sprouting, I think.