I only have one major harvest to report this week, but it's quite a good 'un.....a lovely big load of purple sprouting broccoli. I helped out at the community farm again and it was the last harvest from their site before they have a bit of a hiatus whilst sorting out the next place. So I did actually pick this myself but didn't grow it!
It was nice to actually help with the harvest as up until now I've mainly been hauling stuff around / folding up absolutely huge sheets of enviromesh (one of them was ginormous, I cannot describe how massive it was...and a real challenge to fold up and tie with rope to be transported for storage, even with three of us manhandling it).
So anyway, this was my portion of the PSB....delicious
Back at home, my tomatoes are getting rather large....ideally I've have potted them on by now but I'm holding off until I've collected some horse poo with a friend (hopefully this weekend coming). The pots are drying out really quickly, they're far too small. Luckily, even if the toms get a bit droopy they perk back up quite quickly after a watering.
I did plant out two of the toms though, just using some bought-in compost (peat-free). I also popped in a little basil plant with them as its meant to help keep pests away. When the basil gets a bit bigger I'll pinch its top out to encourage it to bush-up. I have some other basils that I've potted on too. In the tub behind the toms I've got a couple of cucumbers - I haven't grown them in here for a couple of years as I started to get red spider mite and wanted to break the cycle. So we'll see how they do this year. I have an old bit of trellis for them to climb up (that I got from a skip of course). The sticks are to stop our cat digging up the compost (which she would definitely enjoy doing!)
I'm continuing to harden-off the plants that will be set out in the back garden or allotment eventually. It's a bit of a faff taking them all in and out of the lean-to each day but it will be worth it as they'll have got used to being outside. It's also important to check under / along the sides of the trays for slugs and snails as they try and hitch a lift and then rampage through all the plants overnight.
This afternoon at the allotment I've been weeding the two beds where my sweetcorn will go....they're my priority to get planted out first as they don't like having their roots disturbed (here they are in the pic below in loo rolls). The beds were riddled with couch grass..so tedious to weed, though quite satisfying when you pull out a really long root all in one go.
I have a few runner beans in loo rolls too for up at the plot, which also really need to get planted out....another job for this week but more weeding needed first. The squashes are all getting big as well...basically everything is needing to go out, argh.
So that's me...weeding, potting on and (hopefully) planting out this coming week. Oh, and re-sowing things that didn't work or have been eaten by slugs, ugh ( I have found some slug hidey-places and am trying to be more vigilant checking them).
I'm linking in as usual with Harvest Monday hosted by Dave at Our Happy Acres
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Slugs and snails lurking under pots here as well, I've lost a few things. You've been working hard, it's all looking really good. It's always a relief when everything is in its final spot though isn't it. CJ xx
ReplyDeleteHi CJ, I have found so many more slug and snail hidey places since writing this post! But at least I'm discovering them before most things are planted out and trying to remove the hidey places too where possible (like under bricks dotted around the plot....I'm not really using them at the moment so I'm stacking them in one place).
DeleteYes I can't wait for everything to be planted. Fingers crossed for getting some horse poo tomorrow :)
Those tomatoes are huge, what a great start you have. I keep forgetting to get my plants out regularly for hardening off but I still have a couple of weeks to go (so far I've only had them out this past weekend).
ReplyDeleteHi Susie, thanks, I should be going to get the horse poo tomorrow so I expect the next few days after will be busy potting the toms into their final tubs and planting out the squashes on the allotment. It's so dry here though, the soil is like dust. And now its windy too which will dry things even more...moan moan. I'll try and mulch as much as possible after planting things out, to keep the moisture in.
DeleteSnap with the PSB. Your tomatoes are big and well done for growing them from seed. Slugs and snails have made my gardening antics unpleasant and disheartening, as I am clering the garden I have also found loads and I mean the whole family from great great granny to great nephew lurking under pots - shame we have not had a proper cold snap to kill of the bugs.
ReplyDeleteThanks shaheen, I start my tom seeds inside before moving them into the lean-to after potting-on.
DeleteHa, yeah I'm with you there, the whole slug families are hiding out. I've never seen so many tiny ones too. I even found two lovely toads under a bit of wood, but with about 10 slugs surrounding them, sigh. But I don't think there's been any Spanish slugs yet this year, they are absolutely massive. Yes it's very disheartening when plants you've nurtured get eaten by pests. Actually, Jan cut my hair today, I was going use some of it as slug defence around the runner beans but forgot...maybe tomorrow.
Just a load of rhubarb here. We gardeners are very strange creatures when we gain great satisfaction from talking out a long root of a weed. It's a pity that the slugs and snails don't like weeds as much as they like our plants.
ReplyDeleteHi sue, haha yep it's a weird satisfaction to pull out a long weed root. It's especially satisfying when you manage to do it just by loosening the soil with a handfork, working along the length of root, not disturbing the soil too much. Nice.
DeleteYes if only our veggies weren't so lovely and tender, the slugs and snails wouldn't give them a second look.
The PSB is lovely, and you have some good looking seedlings too! It looks like you will be busy setting things out. That couch grass sounds like it's a pain to weed. Thankfully we don't have it, though we do have Bermuda grass which spreads by runners too.
ReplyDeleteThanks Dave, the PSB was very tender, yum. I've been doing lots of weeding on the allotment the last couple of days so that once I've got the horse poo I can work through quite quickly planting everything out. The toms take a lot longer though as I mix up bought compost with my own compost plus the horse poo and can only mix up small-ish batches at a time. But once it's done, it's done.
DeleteBermuda grass sounds similar. It's hard to get the couch grass out but it's worth the effort if you can.
Yes, it's the time of year when EVERYTHING needs planting-out! I feel self-satisfied because today I planted out my 12 "maincrop" tomato plants, which like yours were getting too big for their little pots. good advice about hardening-off and checking for snails too!
ReplyDeleteHi mark, well done on planting out your toms. Yep, pretty much everything wants planting out right now!
DeleteDefinitely check for snails and slugs when you're bringing things in and out for hardening off....I noticed a couple of my bean plants were getting eaten and found a couple of slugs that had hidden amongst the loo rolls. They're sneaky!