It's nearly time to get back in the garden, but before I start growing my summer fruits and vegetables again, there are some important things I need to get done.
1. Build new raised beds.
In the back garden, which is up some delightfully old stone steps (our house was built in 1834 so everything is very country and quaint), there are some raised beds. I have 2 larger beds which are about 2mx4m, and another two smaller brick beds which are around 2mx2m. These smaller ones are perfect for runner beans, mange tout, peas and broad beans, as they take up minimal space and, without sounding like much of a garden tart, the colour of the flowers against the red brick of the bed looks really rustic.
* I should tell you know, I am completely and utterly in love with my garden, and will continuously sing its praises and tell you how beautiful it is because quite frankly, I am a garden nerd.
One of my larger raised beds contained courgettes, pumpkins and squash last year, while the other had a continuous crop of beetroot and turnips. This year, I will grow a smaller amount of turnips elsewhere, and use a whole raised bed for my beetroot, as my Beetroot Chutney could not be made quick enough and I was always sold out. This year, I will have twice the amount of beetroot and twice the amount of my delicious chutney.
My plan is to build another two large plots in the back garden. Oh, and just to clarify, when I say "I build" or "I do", this usually means that I draw the picture or vaguely describe what I want, and my wonderfully handy father alters my crayon-scribbed doodles into something logical and then builds it.
This is what I'll be growing:
Courgettes - I'm going to limit myself to one variety of green courgette. Last year I tried about 4 different varieties, which were unique and beautiful on the plant, but in a pan of bubbling chutney it all looked the same and was relatively pointless. I need a good cropper, not something to enter in a vegetable beauty pageant.
Pumpkin - growing pumpkins is like wearing make-up; less is more. Last year I over crowded my pumpkin patch with too many plants expecting a bumper crop. Alas, I had fewer pumpkins and they weren't the giants I was hoping for. The ones I did have were gorgeous, and I made some beautiful Pumpkin Jam with citrus juices and ginger. Although most people grimaced when they asked what the bright orange jam was, after a taste, every single person bought a jar. Sold out within a week! Fantastic! This year, I need more pumpkins to make more delicious jam.
Squash - the squash was for personal use. I grew two varieties; butternut squash and Patty Pan, which is white with a scalloped edge. Very pretty, and very delicious. I'd never tried a squash that wasn't Butternut, so this was a very tasty new experience. I found its flesh to be more like marrow but the flesh was really milky and soft. I will definitely be growing this again.
In the other patch I will grow:
Beetroot: more than you could shake a stick at. By sowing a new line of beetroot every 2 weeks, I should have a relatively continuous crop that will meet the demands of my Beetroot Chutney lovers.
In my third final patch, I will grow:
Haven't a clue. I need to make a strawberry bed as my ones last year were in hanging baskets (read it in a blog that it worked well), but they failed miserably as they were up high and I forgot to water them as much as I should have. Perhaps I will put the remaining strawberry plants I have in this larger plot, and then after this years' crop I can plant the runners and start a little strawberry nursery. And build a white picked fence around the edge. Too cute.
2. Add compost/manure to the soil and cover with black plastic
Before I start putting anything in the ground, I need to prepare the soil. For this, I want horse poo and perhaps some chicken poo. I'll mulch it into the ground and then cover it with black plastic for the manure to rot down into the earth, and for the soil to heat up for the spring when I start transplanting little plants I've loved and nurtured, and sowing beetroot seeds.
Outside my french doors to my house I have a little gravel patch where I keep a dozen or so large pots and a few wooden boxes where I grow salad leaves, tomatoes, physallis (of all things...) and a few other things for my own use. There is also a larger space which I dug up last year, removing thousands, literally thousands, or bluebell bulbs, which is singlehandedly one of the most frustrating activities in the world. Perhaps this is an idea for capital punishment? Discuss.
Anyway, in this larger plot that I dug up I planted several raspberry canes, gooseberry bushes, tayberry bushes (which did nothing else apart from creep and sulk) and redcurrants, blackcurrants and a single whitecurrant bush. I'm not exactly sure what to do with the soil for these, so if any of you keen gardeners out there know a thing or two about fruit growing, I would be extremely grateful if you could let me know what it is that I can should do to ensure a lovely big healthy crop of summer fruits. Thank you in advance.
3. Clean the greenhouses and pots
All of these are filthy from debris and muck that the wonderful Welsh windy winter has thrown around for the past few weeks. I'll hose them down, rid them of any muck and yuck. I also have another little plastic greenhouse to build (it'll be second of this type) and they're around 6ft tall, 4ft wide and perhaps 3ft deep? Measurements are not my forte, but they have 3 shelves either side. Which, incidentally and rather superbly, fit a clear plastic storage box. I took the rack shelving off as these were unstable, and their instability was making me unstable as whenever they fell off they took some of my baby plants with them, and in their stead, I placed in a 40L plastic storage box, which not only safely holds around 20 5" growing pots, but also keeps them that little warmer. It was a complete fluke that they fitted, but a marvellous one none the less. I keep my chillies in these plastic boxes, and they love the extra heat the boxes bring.
Anyway, I have another one of these mini-plastic greenhouses to put up, which will contain 6 boxes of chillies during the summer. Perfect!
4. Buy the seeds for the year
I started doing this last night. Buying seeds from garden centres and DIY stores can be very expensive, and I found last year that I was buying seeds from these stores almost every week which was quite silly as I'd bought quite a few seeds from an online shop. This year, to save my pennies, I will be buying ALL of my seeds online. The ones I bought last year turned out really well, almost every seed I planted germinated and grew into huge plants. My tomatoes grew to be 7ft tall, and these were situated outdoors against the south facing wall of my house. Providing we have another good summer, I will definitely be using that wall again, whether its for tomatoes or something else.
So, I have started deciding what seeds to buy, as I made a list of the produce from last year which grew well and was well used. Which costs a fraction of the price.
5. Attract some allies for my never-ending war on slugs
This is what I would like to happen: I stand in the middle of my garden, shout "ASSEMBLE", and birds, badgers, frogs, a deer and a fox come racing to me and rinse my garden of slugs. However, this is not an ideal world and that won't happen. Instead, I will put some bird boxes up the back and build some mini-ponds. These are little ponds made in large garden pots, and just need some rocks, black plastic and some flowers. Apparently, and I read this on another blog, they attract frogs pretty quickly, and frogs like slugs like I love lemon drizzle cake.
My brother and sister-in-law bought me a fantastic little read for Christmas, titles "50 ways to kill a slug". I don't physically want to kill slugs, and I think pouring salt on them is utterly disgusting and torturous, so I'd rather bully them out of my garden or attract animals to eat them. Fortunately, my new book suggest lost of homemade ways to keep them out of your garden, rather than cutting them in half with the garden scissors.
I have so much work to do, I really should be doing all of this rather than writing a blog about it.
I'm going to put the kettle on and have a cuppa,
Ruth and Oscar
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