Vegmonkey and the Mrs.

The tomatoes that we planted ages ago have been growing slowly, but surely in our makeshift greenhouse at the back of the garden. It’s not hugely warm in there, but at night it protects the plants from the colder temperatures and the evil beasties that emerge.

I’ve planted:

Gardeners’ Delight - a staple which should have no problem producing lots of flavoursome juicy toms. We were really quite unimpressed with the Tumbling Tom variety grown last summer which produced very little, and of which the Mrs. didn’t like the texture.

Oregon Spring - an early tomato developed in the US that is meant to produce lots of large, relatively seedless fruits. It should begin fruiting 65 days after transplanting which will be about the 10th of July if my maths is right, which is the Mrs.’ birthday! That’ll be a nice present!

The plants in the kitchen are twice the size due to the warmer conditions and will need to be hardened off in the greenhouse before they are planted out in grow bags. I’m going to plant some in between where the beans will go too, to use the space…that’ll be interesting!

I’m reluctant to move them though, i think they look quite nice sat on the top shelf.

Right i’m off to pester BT about our intermittent internet…there may not be a post for a few days!

The peas i planted out back in April are doing well.This may have something to do with the amazing weather we have been having these last few days. Rather than put netting up i have decided to let the peas climb of their own accord, and tie them up using green twine, rather than that horrid plasticy stuff i used last year. The slugs and snails have pretty much left them alone, largely helped by the copper tape that the Mrs. has strategically and expertly stuck around the beds. It is surprisingly hard-wearing, most of it lasting the winter, and only now does is it starting to need renewing.

The mistake i made with the peas was not labelling which were Feltham First and which were Mange-Tout. It’s going to be interesting when the plants start flowering to see how many of each plant we have. I was going to sow successionally so that we had a supply of peas throughout the summer, but sadly don’t have the space.

I’m going to grow a supply of plants in guttering in July and plant them out if the peas stop producing.  Having never grown peas before, i’m not sure how long this will be, so it will be interesting. I’m assuming they will be like Runner Beans and keep cropping as long as i keep picking.

I just wandered out into the veggie garden, in search of our first harvest and found something! A plump pink radish nestling slightly under the soil. I can tell when a radish is ready pretty much by just looking at the leaves…sad i know, but i spotted it, picked it, washed it and shared it with the Mrs. Radishes are much nicer early as they seem to get spicier as time goes on. The big crunchy ones we had in the ground late last summer almost burnt our tongues out. The next harvest will probably be some form of leaves followed by either baby turnips or potatoes.

Either way, i know that come the end of May, our little patch of earth will looka lot busier than it does now!

I’ve been tagged by a few people lately and feel like i should carry out my duties as a blogger/veg grower! Two were a general tag, and two were with specific headings so i’ve sort of combined them! Hope that’s within the rules… The picture of the bug in a bug mug isn’t really relevant, i just wanted to use it and it didn’t really warrant a post about bugs…so there it is!

These are the rules i have followed.

• Link to the person who tagged you - Our pint sized veg plot, Growing Our Own, Marigold and Seeded.
• Post the rules on your blog - done!
• Write some random/specific things about yourself - that’s below.
• Let each person you tag know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog - i think eveyone has already been tagged by the look of it!

What was i doing 10 years ago?

I was just starting uni (BEd teaching degree) in Cheltenham, having moved from a little village near Boston in Lincolnshire - a bit of a culture shock but i got used to it quite quickly. The Mrs. was in the first year of her Heritage and Tourism Management HND in Carlisle. Neither of us expected us to be where we are now…little did she know a Vegmonkey would come and sweep her off her feet…

What i did today/intended to do?

I drove the 40 or so minutes to work, did a lot of filing, made a few phonecalls, cancelled a cricket match, begun to plan a couple of events, did some more filing/organising, stressed a little, drank quite a bit of tea, ate some monster munch and some raisins with my sandwiches…not in them, drove the 40 or so minutes home, felt tired…will be having an early night after watching the snooker and a bit of footie. Cooked gammon, broccoli and chips for dinner. That is pretty much what i had planned.

This is what the tagging was for wasn’t it? You wanted to know this

Snacks i enjoy?

I’m more of a savoury man, like my marmite on toast more than a chocolate bar (although i am partial as an energy boost…currently sat here eating a bag of minstrels!). The Mrs is addicted to chocolate. I’m not joking when i say we can’t have it in the house. I would love to have some in the fridge for a nibble now and again, but i can’t…it would be devoured within seconds - anytime of the day or night. But she remains beautiful!

Bad Habits?

1. Picking at, and frequently changing, spelling mistakes on those restaurant menu chalkboards
2. Too much online scrabble
3. Putting my feet on the coffee table (so says the Mrs. as i’m typing!)

Jobs we’ve had

We’ve been, in no particular order, and i’m not saying who’s done what, you’ll have to work that out…a gooseberry picker, marketing co-ordinator, grape vine pruner, Isle of man TT steward, oxfam volunteer, shelf stacker/till bod in Woolworths, teacher, barmaid, waiter, photographer (i got paid so it counts!), assistant operations manager, internet salesperson, van driver, waitress, museum assistant, cleaner…that’ll do.

I hope that gives some sort of insight into us and our lives. Quite enjoyed writing that, back to reality now…

Have just watched gardeners’ world and feel compelled to write a post. I read somewhere recently that Joe Swift was ridiculed, for his use of a rotavator to clear his plot.  Rotavating the weeds in means he will have a real problem with weeds in the near future and for much longer. I am having my first problems with bindweed this year, and am currently looking at the best way to rid the plot of weeds without having to resort to spraying.

It also annoyed me a little that he had all that earth ‘delivered’ right to his plot…i found it a lot harder than that lugging it through the house and certainly didn’t have as much help. It feels a little like Berryfields has been re-located to an allotment site in North London!

Finally on this topic, isn’t the whole point of raised beds that they can be accessed from ALL SIDES! Joe’s are triangular and diamond shaped and are huge. Having raised beds makes absolutely no sense at all if they are going to be trampled all over and the soil compacted (by his children in the show).

I watch Gardeners’ World for exemplar practice, and usually really enjoy the parts about growing food. Carol and Monty (having a rest!) never disappoint.  Monty’s own garden shows that….the perfect example.

In my own garden the ‘Spring Leaves’ above have been planted out and are growing well. The snails love them but the plants are growing slowly. I’ll post on them again when we start eating them, which should be within a couple of weeks…

Thanks for all the comments on Diluting the growing blogs, i’m glad it isn’t just me! I’m really thinking about doing something to run in August, as a middling to end of season awards thing. It will probably take the form of a blog page ‘where nominations happen,’ rather than something tacked onto Vegmonkey.

I’d happily welcome any other ideas as comments on the blog, emails etc as to the format of the awards, scope, time and so on. I think categories can wait a while. It is also maybe that others of you are thinking about doing this and resources could be pooled…(particularly if you know how to make sidebar widgets!). I particularly liked Patrick’s idea about celebrating particular things about blogs rather than the ‘blog’ in general.

Anyway, enough rambling on that for now…but more soon…

I was hunting through my seed boxes for some ‘leaves’ to plant a few weeks ago when i came across a packet that i had received attached to Grow Your Own magazine. I always keep my eye out for the magazine when shopping (or Kitchen Garden - a fact found hilariously funny by my friends as they leaf through Nuts, Loaded and FHM - one day they will understand ;)) It was entitled ‘Mixed Salad Leaves’ and contained seeds for Mizuna, Mibuna, Mustard ‘Red Giant’, Greek Cress and Green Pak Choi. I’ve grown endive in the past but most of these are new to me.

I planted about 30 seeds in threes plugs (in a seed tray) and waited. As can be seen from the photo, they are coming on great guns and will be adding some much needed colour to the veg garden for this time of year. They will very soon be planted out in the Legumes bed, as i have a little room at the end next to where the Runner Beans will go. As soon as they go in, i’ll plant up another lot of seed trays ready for when we have eaten (or the slugs have) the first lot.

Either way, the leaves will taste a hundred times better - and be a hundred times better for us - than anything bought in a supermarket!

There are sooooooooo many blogs out in cyber-growing-land!

There are a lot in America, most infact, and the majority i have seen are either ‘flower growing’ gardening blogs or ‘general’ garden blogs with a little fruit and veg thrown in.

I suppose this makes sense, America is a big country, which in turn means lots of gardens.

But i want to read fruit and veg growing blogs.

I know blotanical is useful for finding blogs, but i really do have no desire to grow anything that will not ‘produce’ for me, (just a personal preference) and the website doesn’t allow a specific search for this.

So the purpose of this post is to highlight decent fruit and veg growing blogs in the U.K.  Simple as that. (There are lots of fabulous non-U.K. based blogs in my sidebar…but that’s a post for another day!)

Fork In Hell - An neat little allotment blog based near us, in Gloucester.

Fresh as a daisy - They describe their site as a ‘Veggie Garden Experience,’ which is alright by me.

Growing our own - Another Gloucester allotment, focused on fruit and veg growing.

Manor Stables Veg Plot - A much larger project…and still mostly focused on veg!

Nomegrown - A large plot and a back garden in St Albans.

The smallest smallholding - I’d love this much space and chickens!

Souper Allotment - Adventures getting started with an allotment.

I’m sure there are more that are equally as super, but these are the ones i read regularly. I’d love to hear of any others that i might like, but it’s where to find them! The best place i think is other people’s blogrolls… perhaps we need an award system similar to Mouse & Trowel for veg blogs! Any takers?

I received a new lens for my camera today and could not resist taking a load of pictures out in the garden! The picture doesn’t exactly show the prettiest thing in the world though, but neither are the sprouts it came from or the resulting potatoes that will result. At least the flowers will be nice.

Expect more close ups, although i am still learning…

Due to only having a small space, we have to be exact. Planning what we plant enables us to use the ground twice in one year.

‘Bed One’ housed the Root crops last year, namely carrots, parsnips, onions and leeks. They all grew well but were harvested by the end of the summer which left a bed full of empty ground.

To use up half of the space, we planted ‘Senshyu’ Japanese Onions that would grow overwinter. The idea was that by the time the bed is rotated (it will become the cucurbit bed), the onions will have been harvested and the courgettes, squashes etc will be planted. 

To complicate matters further, we planted Ulster Sceptre in the other half of the bed, a first early type of potato that takes 10 weeks to mature from planting. Again, the thinking was that they would be harvested in time for the courgettes etc to go in.

We planted the potatoes back in mid-March, so by my reckoning, they will be ready for harvesting around the end of May (10 weeks). The Senshyu onions were planted in September and will be ready for harvesting mid-late June. 

The courgettes and squash plants - not too many mind, due to the space - will have been raised in pots from the beginning of May, maybe end of April and will fill the space occupied previously by the onions and potatoes. That will give them a good 3 months in the ground which is plenty to produce a good harvest.

This way, that one bed will produce a decent size crop of onions, potatoes, courgettes and squash in the space of one year. Not bad for a 2 metre square space! I’d be interested to hear how other people use crop rotation to help produce regular crops of veg. This year i’m going to try growing sweetcorn within the cucurbit bed…if the soil allows!

I feel so priveliged! Global warming visited our house last night and has stuck around for most of the morning in one form or another. A couple of inches of snow throughout the night, followed by oodles of sunshine! The Mrs. and I were married at pretty much this time last year, in 21 degree heat.

Am i supposed to have a planting plan for every eventuality? Luckily, the snow didn’t freeze, so hopefully all th elittle seedlings will be happy and growing still. Bizarrely, the cauliflowers i sowed last year seem to have got bigger.

Either way, i think this a good time to introduce a new member of our family - welcome to Snowmonkey - the tail sort of gives it away.