And now the saga continuums

The first sowings of the year are now in the ground.

First up is Swift potatoes, which as their name suggests are supposed to be the quickest on the market - planting mid-February is supposed to result in a mid-April harvest. I picked this variety back in November, when I still thought the challenge would be a going concern and I was going to have to feed myself until June. Thankfully that's no longer the case, but I'm intrigued by the idea of a longer potato season and I'm hoping these will work as advertised. Last year's new potatoes were ready late June, so that's the mark they have to beat to be a success.

The seed potatoes have been chitting on my windowsill for the past couple of weeks, but with somewhat of a disappointing lack of results.

Underwhelming, and not promising for mid-April early potatoes.

Chitting is actually supposed to speed up potato growth, as it lets them get their first bit of growing done inside in the warmth, and I was hoping for a bit more from them. However, they're going in the potato growing bags today whether they like it or not, so hopefully they've got enough of a head start.

Due to special offers from the mail order company that I used, it was as cheap to have three packets of seed potatoes as it was to have two. Therefore I've also got Anya potatoes, a small, nobbly, tasty new potato that you may have seen in Sainsburys, and Purple Majesty, which are the logical extension of last year's Salad Blue variety. The Salad Blues were pleasingly mottled purple, but didn't taste particularly spectacular and went an unappetising grey when cooked, whereas the Purple Majesty are alleged to be purple through and through, stay purple when cooked and taste delicious. They are a vital part in my ambition of making purple soup, so hopefully they'll live up to their reputation as well.

Anyway, the downside of having three varieties of potatoes is that you cannot buy any of the interesting varieties in anything less than 1.5kg bags. I'm planting 5 sacks of the Swift and I'll still have 7-8 seed potatoes left over and I expect to have the same for the Anya as well (haven't calculated the purple ones yet).

With that in mind, is anyone in and around Bath planning on growing potatoes? If so, you are welcome to the seed potatoes free, the instructions are here from last year and I will even provide some old compost bags for you to grow them in - all you'd need to buy is about £5 worth of compost. Comment here or on Facebook please.

The same has happened with my onions - I buy them as sets (basically dried onion seedlings that you just put in the ground and they grow to full size) and you can only buy them in packets of 50. Since I'm growing both red and white onions and they have to be planted 12cm apart, that's an entire bed of 1.25m2 filled with the buggers and, while I like onions, I've got more interesting things to plant as well. So if anyone wants some onion sets, they're welcome to those as well, although they'd require ground rather than pots or bags, so only good to people who have a garden.

As for other early growers, I am repeating my experiment for indoor carrots again this year, with the hope of getting better results. Not sure I fancy my chances, but never mind. I've also planted some very early broccoli seedlings, in the hope that I'll be able to spread out my broccoli harvest this year, instead of a frantic few weeks of harvesting and freezing everything. They are both currently under the artificial sun that my wife built, which is still standing because I wasn't involved in its construction.

Outside, there are some overwintering plants that I suspect will mostly come to nothing. The mild winter has meant that the cauliflower has got cocky and started producing small heads already, which will almost certainly be destroyed in the inevitable late cold snap. The carrots are, well, carrots and we know my opinions on those already. The only bright sparks are the broad beans, which are going great guns having been sown in late November. Beans of varying varieties have been the major success story of the garden, so I'm hoping these will continue the fine traditions of those that went before them.

Maybe I should just harvest it now and save myself the disappointment? 

Broad beans, momentarily released from their cat protection for the photograph. I hate next door's cats, the little shitting nightmares.

Next bit of planting won't happen for another fortnight - the weather's got to brighten up a bit first. Hopefully it won't do anything weird like March snow again.

PJW

New Year, New Challenges

It's a new growing season and it's almost time to start planting things again!

Last year was all about 'the challenge' - whether I could grow an entire year's worth of vegetables in my back garden and go a calendar year without having to buy any. As it turns out, I couldn't. Well, I couldn't on my first attempt, certainly not with the number of mistakes I'd made or the choices of vegetables that I'd gone for.

Now, I did consider trying again. It is possible to do, but the problem is that it's not possible to do in a very interesting fashion - the answer seems to lie in planting nothing but lots of potatoes, green beans, courgettes and broccoli, and cramming the freezer full to survive winter. This strikes me as dull.

So instead, I've decided to give the challenge a miss and instead have a mixture of productive and fun. This means that carrots are still on the list, but sod growing any orange ones - I'm growing purple or nothing this year. Same with cauliflower. I have an ambition of growing the ingredients for a vibrant purple soup.

I am also growing a lot of plants that I've found in a very interesting book, James Wong's Homegrown Revolution. The theory behind it is that there are over 2,500 edible plants that can grow in the UK's climate, but most gardening books and garden centres only talk about 20-25: sprouts, swede, carrots, cauliflower, cabbages, potatoes, etc. Back in Victorian times, people grew all kinds of crazy things in their gardens; there are reports of people successfully growing pineapples using only glass and horse manure for heating. However, this all stopped with the World Wars and the emphasis on Dig For Victory - everyone was encouraged to Grow Your Own, but most people didn't know how. So the propaganda departments made leaflets and other literature telling people how and what to grow.

Nicked from https://emmymakesthings.wordpress.com/2013/10/27/vegetables-all-year-round/

So the reason why garden centres sell you cauliflowers, despite them being an absolute bitch to grow, is because a wartime bureaucrat had to make a list of patriotic vegetables - brassica made it in, while things like jerusalem artichokes and courgettes did not. After the war and rationing, people were in the habit of growing and eating the same old staid vegetables that the government told them it was patriotic to grow.

Homegrown Revolution's is a book about the many and varying vegetables that are fun, productive, make the best use of space and thrive in the UK climate. This year I will be trying out asparagus peas, kokihi, chop suey greens, electric daisies, saffron, purslane, sea kale, day lilies, dahlia yams, chinese artichokes and oca. Looking forward to new experiences from those!

January and February in the garden have mostly been about planning where I'm going to fit all of these things in. In previous years, there's been so much expansion of beds and creating new spaces, that most of the growing areas were filled with new compost and so rotation wasn't strictly necessary. This year, however, I'm absolutely determined I'm not going to create any more beds, so I've gone for some crop rotation and am resting my two oldest brassica beds to give them a chance to recover.

This means that I have two 1.25m square beds to use on interesting things. One of them is going to be set aside for root vegetables, which is a bit boring, but the second is going to be used for another go at The Three Sisters companion planting system. Last year, this experiment was notable for me planting the wrong type of beans (dwarf rather than climbing) and getting absolutely sod all out of planting a pumpkin. However, I did get some nice beans and sweetcorn out of it, and the idea of a three-way companion plant interests me enough to give it another go, but substituting courgettes in for the recalcitrant pumpkins. Plus, I found a variety of red sweetcorn to plant, which is worth the entrance fee on its own.

Do you see how cool this is!?

Here's the plan of how everything will fit together:

Click to embiggen.

This plan is already out of date and I've yet to actually plant anything out yet. Par for the course. Planting proper starts this week, beginning with early broccoli, indoor carrots, early onions and the first potato planting of the year. Looking forward to it.

PJW