Vegmonkey and the Mrs.

I sort of decided too late that veg for Christmas dinner would be a good idea, so we only had a few ickle baby carrots as shown below. Still, quite rewarding considering it is almost January. 12 degrees where we are today, who’d a’ thought it (almost warm enough to start planting)! We also ate carrots that had been blanched then frozen from September, and parsnips and leeks that had been harvested and stored in sand for the last couple of months.

This was our first Christmas in the new house, and also our first married Christmas, so it was extra special. We had both sets of parents visiting for Christmas day, and a lot of Christmas food. Needless to say we have rather a lot still left over…looks like turkey for dinner ’til 2009!

It’s also 8 months since we started doing what we are doing! The garden is alive and well, a few things anyway. I’ve left the rest of the carrots that were planted for Christmas lunch in the soil, with a cover over so that come Feb we will hopefully have some lovely big carrots…i hope…it’s worth an experiment anyhow, never overwintered then before!

Finally, the garden had a new present of it’s own today, 2 brand new 6V batteries in the cat scarer….it’s now ‘purring’ perfectly.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all who visit us here.

Vegmonkey and the Mrs.

Not only do the onions fill a winter gap where the soil would otherwise be unused, they fit perfectly into the rotation. Bed 1 (for want of a better name!) is the roots bed (houses carrots, parsnips, leeks and onions) which will become the Cucurbit bed next year. I don’t need the half being used by the onions until Late June/Early July, so the onions will sit happily. They will be replaced by a variety of squash, raised in pots and transplanted in later.

When i plant the standard onion sets next year, there will be no less than 200 onions sitting in a space no bigger than 2.5 square metres. Easy as that. Whoever said veg growing wasn’t easy

The most difficult job this winter, and incidentally, one of the most rewarding, is to (realistically) update the planting scheme, without overdoing it.

Has anyone had any bad experiences with Senshyu or other overwintering onions? I don’t mean muggings or bad attitudes! , but pests or problems. A bit of advance warning is never a bad thing.

The winter field bean was planted early November and the beans quickly sprouted. We planted them in the bed that previously had the courgettes etc in it and in the legumes bed.

They have grown steadily to the height they are now and have even survived having a few barrowloads of manure dumped on them - they grew right through it.

The plan is for the green manure to be dug in, in February. This will give it a good 4 months to grow. Next year the ground will be a little more used but it seemed sensible to plant something so the soil didn’t break down and lose all its nutrients.  I specifically chose this as it doesn’t leave horrid seed heads in the soil like other green manures when dug in that will be a pain to remove in future years.

I don’t think the green manure on its own is all the soil needs, so we’ll be adding some more manure to the beds that need it when i can get hold of some.