Wombling for a good cause

This week I'm channelling my inner womble and finally using up some of the stash of card, tissue paper, ribbons, cords and other bits and pieces from packaging and gifts that we've always known would come in useful one day. For the last few years the lovely folk at Transition Loughborough have taken part in the local church's Christmas Tree Festival to spread the message about low-impact living and offer practical hints and tips to folk who go along to enjoy the festivities. This year they are going for a giveaway of seeds as part of their display which means I can actually do something practical to help from here by making up some packages using our own saved seeds. So, dear reader I give you the cost-me-nothing and almost-completely-home-compostable seedy cracker!

1. Using quartered loo roll inners and tubes made from the card sheets that you get new clothes and similar stuff, I made little tubes.






2. A twist of newspaper is
filled with seed and short growing instructions written on a pretty label.

3. And then  popped inside the tube.

4. A wrap of paper soon becomes a cracker tied with cord, ribbon or oddments of embroidery thread.

4. A simple pretty little giveaway that, with the exception of some of the re-used ties and the little bit of sellotape is waste free but fun.



Obviously you can decorate them with all sorts and I did pop a button on one to make it pretty but then realised that the recipient would have to dispose of anything that couldn't be composted so went back to plain and simple.

Harvesting...

After a couple of wonderful wet days - yeah I know, strange statement, but the garden and allotment were desperate for a soaking and the front garden water butt was completely empty - today we popped up the allotment. Our onions have been a bit hit and miss so far, probably due to a vole or a mole we think, so J picked up some shallot sets in the bargain box of Poundland, at just 50p a bag we thought a late planting was worth a chance.  So let's see what happens now.

While he was doing that I picked some more cornflowers for the house. They are amazingly abundant this year and even after picking enough for two bunches for our house and another posy for our neighbour there are dozens and dozens left for the bees. The whole row of plants was covered in them and they even landed on the posies as I was cutting them - a really joyful sight and sound to behold and one of the many reasons we have flowers dotted all around the plot and never use pesticides. I made the most of the self-sown chamomile at the edge of the bean bed and added a few stems of that to the posies for contrast and scent too.

Next job was to pick some of the broad beans that are, at last, starting to develop plus some leaves from the chard plants and a few stalks of asparagus, we can truly say we are getting harvests from the plot now and are looking forward to those to come.

Climbing beans , peas and tagetes doing well

Purple Podded Peas and broad beans 

Pea flowers to rival any ornamental

Soon there will be spuds!

Chamomile and Cornflowers

How do your seeds grow?

We had a seedling shuffling session at the weekend to help prepare our plants for their future outdoors and create a bit of space on the window ledges for tender things that needed pricking out. When I looked around I realised what a mix of seed pots and planters we'd used this year - ideal for showing that you don't need to spend a fortune on new matching pots or expensive single use fibre pots to grow your own fruit, veg or flowers from seed and also to show ways of extending the life of the thousands of "disposable" items that come through our hands each year. Just a decent peat-free compost and a container that's deep enough to start your seedlings off. Why peat-free?- well that's a whole other post and others can explain it much better than I can - check out this article on Plantlife's website for many, many reasons why the peat we have left needs to stay in the ground and not in our plant pots and then check out Dalefoot, Fertile Fibre or Melcourt's Sylvagrow for really good growing mediums. We're also trying out Westland's New Horizon for potting things on as it's a bit more widely available than some of the others.

Meanwhile here's a whistle stop tour of this year's seedlings and what we've started them in:


Loo roll/kitchen roll inners - great as substitute root trainers but can dry out quickly so you need to make sure to keep watering. We've also found that they are better for things that don't need to be left in the tubes too long before planting out as they can disintegrate if left for too long. We pop shredded paper or a ball of newspaper in the bottom before filling with peat-free compost and then group them in 5/6 tube sets with a large elastic band round (think royal mail cast-offs). We then stand them in mushroom tubs or broken plant pots to help them stand up.



Paper cups - we don't usually have any drinks in these but a recent bout of hospital visits meant we'd acquired one so thought we'd try re-using it when we got home. The wooden stirrer even came in handy as a label.




Grape punnets - we have used these as mini propagator lids for a few years but after seeing someone on twitter use them as a planter we've sown some of our peas and beans in them and the extra depth seems to work really well. Most come complete with drainage holes so are ideal as deep seed trays. This batch of pea-shoots are also standing in an old mushroom tub which serves as drip catcher.


And then there's the obvious - it always alarms me when I read "living without plastic" articles and social media posts that advocate throwing out what you have and replacing it with terracotta/ceramic/paper etc. - NO! Please, please, please use any pots, modules and seed trays that you have.



Most of these have been around for years and still have plenty of years life left in them and the best thing we can do for the planet is to keep the plastic we have in use for as long as possible - once it's binned it's just hazard to our soils, waterways and wildlife and that's the last thing any of us need to be causing.

Citizen Science

There is now a growing movement ( well I've become more aware of it anyway!) towards lots of individuals all across the country observing, watching, trialling or deliberately looking out for things and then feeding that information back to Institutions, Membership Organisations, Universities or even folk like the BBC so that scientists can get a widespread picture of seasons, wildlife, pests and diseases or in our case how well a particular seed type reacts to different growing conditions. Most of you will have heard of things like the RSPB's Big Garden Bird Watch that I wrote about back in January so you know the sort of thing I mean but there are loads of other examples too so if you fancy giving it a go why not have a hunt around and see what's out there.

This year we signed up for 3 different Garden Organic experiments as things were ticking over nicely and we didn't think they would pose too much of a challenge if anything happened with my health. Luckily we have managed to complete two of them already and still have a little time left to kick off the third without skewing the data too much.

The first test was one for J - he had to run various quick and easy tests at the allotment that in theory, help determine what soil type we have. This he duly did one cold day earlier in the year. The odd thing for us is that we have been using our allotment for 10 years or more so we're pretty familiar with the vagaries of it's soil - it's very clearly, very obviously skin chaffing sand!! -  but it was interesting to see how the tests panned out and hopefully our feedback will help the organisers refine things a bit. We look forward to seeing the outcomes when then are published later this year.

The second test was more fun for me - we had to try to germinate 60 pea seeds of the same type using 3 different preparation methods 20 just popped into a compost tray and watered; 20 pre-soaked over-night and then popped into a compost tray and watered and the final  20 "scarified" - hard outer coat sanded and then popped into a compost tray and watered. Over the next 3 weeks we have had to check them each day to see how many germinate of each type - the ultimate aim is to see whether ether of the preparation methods actually make any appreciable difference to the number of seeds that germinate and the speed they germinate. The bonus is we get some really pretty salmon-flowered pea plants to add to the plot. Our new garden shelves came in really handy for this as I could keep an eye on them without having to slip and slide down the garden too often.

19th March 2019

30th March 2019

10th April 2019

The third and final test we have signed up for is a trial of lentil types to see how viable lentils are as a garden food crop - we have two different varieties and we have to sow some in April and some in May and then check them at agreed intervals. Hopefully J will be able to get that one started this weekend providing I keep the dramatics to a minimum...

Monday morning botherations

Well today's post was supposed to be a lovely cheery photo-filled peek at the front garden where this year's new bulbs are coming out beautifully, the clematis is starting to flower, the roses have lots of lovely fresh red and green leaves and the flowering currant is alive with bees. Well so much for planning ahead - it seems my camera SD card has decided it doesn't want to play anymore and is refusing to acknowledge it is in possession of my photos! Luckily I back them up pretty regularly so it can only hold yesterday's pictures hostage but it does mean I'll have to wait for the rain to stop before I can take anymore.

Things continue to improve here and hopefully when I go back to the clinic on Wednesday they'll decide I don't need the IV antibiotics anymore and my cannula (midline) can come out and I can have a proper shower at last! (TMI I know but I promise I have been washing properly in the meantime!!!)

Today I intend to sort through some papers for a while before I heat up lunch - luckily whilst I was feeling good over the last few months I made extra portions whenever I cooked a stew, soup or similar meal so now all I have to do is defrost and reheat something each day until I feel like cooking properly again.

I did manage to take a couple of snaps on my phone of our seed-sowing session yesterday and will finish updating In the garden page later. So we're back to no flat surfaces but lots of lovely flowers for the cutting garden, a second sowing of broad beans and some salad leaves.

Bye for now

Seed Week

Thanks to, Sara Venn, one of the wonderful gardeners I follow on Twitter I discovered that today is the start of Seed Week - a promotional week launched by new-to-me organisation The Gaia Foundation - It's designed to raise awareness of the importance of bio-diversity in food crops, support small-scale organic seed growers and encourage you to save your own seed that is adapted to local conditions. The campaign has it's own website under the project name Seed Sovereignty and is packed with information.

Let's face it, History has it's own lessons to teach about the dangers of concentrating all our food production on a single species or even worse a single variety of a species  - potato blight was one of the causes of the devastation the wracked Ireland in the 1880s Famine and less devastating to us but not to the communities that rely on the income, we are now being told that banana supplies could be under threat as all commercial supplies are from a single species which is vulnerable to a fungal disease. We also never know when an old or native strain will prove the saviour of a crop we desperately need or a creature we really prize without the obvious joy they bring just by existing for their own sake.

I've written before about the joys of the Heritage Seed Library and the important work it does in preserving a range of old or unusual varieties but there are also lots of smaller companies and organisations that produce organically grown seed in relatively small quantities, of varieties that are suited to the climate and growing conditions in their environs - I've used Real Seeds before and no doubt will do so again - good quality seed in reasonable quantities and they not only encourage you to grow out part of your crop and save the seed for future use, they also explain how to do it. There are other companies out there too so please check out The Gaia Foundation's page on seed suppliers for a lower impact supplier near you.

We really enjoy saving our own seed especially beans, peas and flowers - we've got healthy hollyhocks growing in the back garden from seed saved from a plant that grew a few years ago in the front garden, our Kew Blue and Blue Lake beans come from crops saved over the years and the peas that I've set outside to start hardening off this morning were saved by a friend and promise to have beautiful purple pods. Oh and we've also got home-saved Chard, Kale, Leek and Sweetcorn waiting to be sown.

"Barry's" purple podded peas - a sweet surprise in a super tall pea

Will they come true from seed?

Home-saved ruby chard for early salads

 Enjoy your week.

Flat surface shortage begins

We seem to be hitting peak seedlings a bit earlier than normal this year due to my adventures with propagating the houseplants. There may be some tough decisions ahead as we ought to prioritise food crops and cutting flowers rather than succulents but then again I can always get creative with the living room sideboard and dressing table top I suppose!

Succulent babies emerging at last

For now we have peas, lentils and chickpeas that have all germinated and shot up very quickly. These will soon be hardened off outside ready for planting up the allotment in a couple of weeks time:

Purple podded and Jeyes peas, Italian lentils and chick peas.

We'll then start some more peas off and a few beans of various sorts for a succession of cropping. In theory they could be planted directly into the allotment bed but as we have plenty of wildlife on the plot including voles we tend to lose too many that way! 

The echiums and pansies have also coped well with their transplanting into bigger pots and we'll need to harden those off soon as well as I need room for cosmos, sunflowers and lots of other lovely cutting flowers too. 

Echium blue bedder - a new annual for us this year

Even the kitchen table garden and the bathroom window ledge are getting in on the act this year.

Aloes and Boblets thriving in the kitchen

Indoor azalea - happier now that it's in the right compost and a moist environment!

Meanwhile the outdoor shelves are filling up rather well too...

parsnips, brussels, caulis, herbs, flowers....

Happiness is a sprouting seed tray!!

Monday's musings

Brightening the day with flowers from the garden

'Twas a really weird afternoon yesterday with brilliant sunshine, really heavy rain, high winds, huge flakes of really soggy snow and then a pretty sunset so what was there to do but bury my head into the wonderful The Girl in the tower, this is really living up to the promise of the first book in the trilogy and I only have about a third of it left - it's one of those that you want to keep reading to find out what is going on but at the same time I really don't want it to end - good job the third part is sitting on the shelf just waiting for me!

All ready to pot on

The morning was a little more productive mind - potting on and pricking out the seedlings that have been germinating in the back bedroom for the last few weeks. So we now have little pots of pansies, violas, welsh onions and big pots of sweet peas all ready to grow on.

Today has been a similar mix of chores and chilling - lots of sorting out upstairs as Mum is due for a visit at the end of the week and her bed was buried under a mountain of stuff! There's a bit less rubbish in there now but more to do before she gets a cosy night's sleep.

Violets emerging

By the time I'd done with chores for the day I couldn't resist a quick potter outside in the sunshine (boy is it chilly today!) - the violets are starting to appear now and the odd cowslip is sending up bud stalks just as the crocuses are starting to go over, so the wheel turns again. I couldn't resist bringing a few flowers indoors so a mug of hellebores, large daffodils and little tête-a-têtes has joined the re-potted peace lily and other bits and bob on the living room sideboard.

Now where did I put that book.....

.

Cuttings, seedlings and sowings - health check time

Today was health check day both for me and for all the seedlings and cuttings dotted on the window ledges.

The echiums, violas and pansies are all doing well and are ready to be pricked out. The welsh onions are okay but could probably doing with leaving a little while longer before we pot them on and cauliflowers are only just starting to show. Unfortunately there is no sign yet of the Brussels Sprouts or parsnips but they can be a bit slow so we'll give them a little more time before re-sowing.

The Boblets - our rubber plant cuttings - seem to be surviving well, that is to say none have keeled over yet so I'm hopeful that we'll have mini-Bobs to share. All the various succulent leaf cuttings that have been living on the windowsills for the last few months seem to be surviving well and now have roots so it's time they were pricked out into individual pots - a job for tomorrow methinks. Bob also seems to have survived his haircut and is already putting on new shoots and leaves.


At the weekend we discovered that two of the stems of twisted hazel we received in a bunch of flowers had sprouted roots in their vase so these have been popped into the ground on the off-chance we get two new shrubs from them. The wall-flower cuttings that we set to root in compost have had about a 50% success rate so they have been tidied up and set outside in their propagator to harden off and most of the lavender rooted cuttings are doing nicely too so they will need to be potted up into individual pots shortly and trimmed to encourage bushier growth - we'll probably leave these in pots until next spring so that they can really get established before planting into the ground.

Oh and as for my health check - the consultant is happy with my blood results and the treatment will continue as it is for a few more months  - so good news for me and for the plants!

Knowing your onions

No dig beds - covered to stop the birds unseating the early sown sets.

A couple of happy hours at the allotment on Saturday mean that we now have all our onion and garlic planted up ready for harvesting in the late summer and early autumn. I say we - I broke up the garlic cloves and wrote out the bed labels whilst J did the rest, of course! This week our Red Baron and Sturon onions went in the ground alongside the Shenshyu Yellow sets sown back in October/November. We've also got some of both varieties left over and will sow those in modules here ready to fill in any gaps that emerge over the next few months. The Garlic bulbs are Vigour which is a new one to us and acquired through the Transition Loughborough Potato Day order last month. They are supposed to be happy planted later in the growing year than other varieties but we still hope to get sufficient cold to cause the bulbs to split into decent sized cloves when we harvest in July. Our autumn sown ones have a head start on this in theory but there aren't that many showing in the beds at the moment. We're just hoping that whatever ate them last year can't find the new bed! We still have to find a bit of space for the leeks to go out in late Summer but other than that we now have all our allium beds full - let's just hope the gods, voles, pests and weather are kind to us in the months to come!

The garden compost bins finally reached capacity at the weekend and due to the cold weather aren't processing the waste as quickly as they will later in the year so J emptied out several bags of half-done compost and used them to fill up a bean trench at the allotment - the waste will decompose over the next couple of months and then provide some much-needed warmth to give the climbing beans a good start in May. It also means I now have some room for kitchen waste and the early year tidy up of the strawberry pots that is now due.

privet prunings make a base

then the part done compost

then a layer of soil & a bean bed is ready

I may not have been doing much in the way of work but I did have a chance to check on the transplanted cornflower and spinach beet and admire the catkins and wildflowers that are gracing the plot right now. The early flowers are incredibly important to the bumble bees and other insects that start flying now and we leave them alone as much as we can - only clearing those that are in active beds to give the critters as much of a chance of survival as possible.

Spinach beet and self-sown but transplanted cornflowers

Glorious golden catkins

sparkling speedwell

red dead-nettle

Sowing Time - well sort of..

Despite good intentions we just couldn't resist the call of the seed box on Monday. All gardeners must hear it surely, that little tiny voice that starts quietly and gets subtley more insistent as the days start to lengthen: "go on sow me, it'll be fine, there's plenty of room on the window sills, you know it makes sense, I don't even need to be indoors you know, you've already warmed the compost up shame to waste it...." 

So we succumbed and now have loo rolls sown with brussels sprouts, cauliflowers and parsnips - just a few, to get ahead, you know how it is...

Oh and a few of last autumn's late sown chard just cried out to be potted on - they may grow on, you never know...

Oh and there may be a few sweet peas, welsh onions, echiums, pansies and violas on the go in the back bedroom under propagator lids but there aren't any photos of those so no proof just yet...! Now what was that weather forecast?

Pruning and pottering and wildlife camera challenges

Whilst I've been pottering in the kitchen and resting my bones J has used the break to get the fruit trees pruned and continue getting beds ready at the allotment. He's also been playing with his action camera to see what sort of films he can produce. So I give you "HOE CAM" !

We've also been trying to film the wildlife in the garden but despite happily posing when I'm here on my own they are singularly video-camera shy and despite several attempts all we have managed to capture is this fearsome beastie:

In addition to sowing some Aquadulce Claudia broad beans in pots here at the house, he has also managed to transplant a couple of rows of self-sown spinach beet and uncovered some beautifully healthy looking flower plants at the plot so there will be leaves and flowers in the spring. (photos when I next visit as I forgot to take my camera up when I went to pick him up on Sunday). 

Next steps will be to sow some peppers and onions here at the house later this month. Spring will come!!

Seedlist savoured - selections made

"Your order has been dispatched" - Happiness in an email!!

As promised we perused the Heritage Seed Library seed-list over the weekend and were relatively well-behaved, ordering more or less only the vegetables we needed- 2 carrots; 2 beetroot; 1 leek and ermm yes, the beautiful deep crimson red bean that just couldn't be resisted. If we are really lucky there will also be a surprise in the pack too as we get a lucky dip packet if we want one - and of course who could possibly say no?

So next Spring we will be sowing:
"Armenian" and "Blood Red" beetroot - one will be traditional ball shaped with defined rings and the other long rooted and slow to go woody.
"London Market" and "Manchester Table" carrots - one a deep red stumpy early variety and the other later and longer and more orangey.
"Coloma" Leek which is supposed early and long cropping with dark green leaves.

And oh yes, did I mention "Portuguese" the really beautiful crimson coloured climbing bean...

Thanks to all at Heritage Seed Library for another great list to choose from.

July 2012 Allotment beds - something to aspire to again

Savouring the Seed List

December is the month for planning our new year vegetable growing as we look back at what has done well, what hasn't done so well and what we still have in the seed box...ermm okay I confess there are seed boxes...and then the icing on the cake -  the email that announces the new Heritage Seed Library list of seeds for members to choose from. This wonderful organisation keeps the seeds of generations gone by safe for future generations, it encourages current gardeners to keep varieties alive long after they have dropped off the commercial seed lists, and is made up of amazing Seed Guardians who grow on crops just to ensure there are sufficient seeds to share and other marvellous folk who collect, cherish and collate the seeds ready to send them out over the next few months. The focus is on open-pollinated varieties - that is varieties that will grow true from seed each year and that means you can then grow from your own seeds in future years if the variety does well for you and, most importantly, tastes good!

SO the big question is - what do we choose? We get to pick 6 varieties for our membership fee from a list of dozens and dozens of varieties. From sorting our seeds last month I know we only really need beetroot, carrots, parsnips and maybe some leeks but whilst there is only 1 variety of leek this year, there are 2 varieties of beetroot on the list and 7 of carrot so choices need to be made - interestingly there are no parsnips this year so obviously it was a problem crop for other folk over the last couple of years too. And we definitely don't need any bean or pea seeds but then again there is a beautiful crimson coloured climbing bean called Portuguese that is screaming out pick me, pick me I'm pretty pick me!!

So my friends, watch this space, some decisions need to be made this weekend and decisions aren't my strong point these days!

Beautiful bountiful beans don't really need any new companions, but...

Mea Culpa

I'm sorry - the fact that it's 4th April and we've got snowy hail in the Midlands, again, is all my fault. This week I'm on gardening leave - and no I didn't do anything dreadful at work - I thought I'd extend the Easter holiday and knock the lotty in to shape. After all, its April isn't it? You know mid-Spring, that wonderful month of yellow daffodils and fluffy white lambs and yes okay I'll accept showers, but of the lightly warm, gently watering the land sort not of the sharp, biting, cruel icy variety.  They belong to February or at a push early March.

So after a lovely long weekend catching up with family my plans for today have been adjusted slightly. March was a lot darker and colder than expected which means that despite a heated propagator most of our poor little tomato seedlings have keeled over and given up the ghost. Cue a morning of pot shuffling and re-sowing - Salt Spring Sunrise, Roma, Garden Pearl and Moneymaker popped in fresh pots with fresh compost and a lot of hope.

Whilst I had the compost - Vital Earth peat free of course - and pots to hand I also made a start on sowing my birthday flowers. Now we have trays full of Sweet Peas "Perfume Delight"; Sunflowers -"Earthwalker" & "Valentine"; Candytuft and Scabiosa " Tall Crown" all jockeying for space in the conservatory and on windowsills.  In a few months these are destined to be filling jugs and pots all round the house with sweet smelling home grown posies.

Dreaming of home-grown flowers

After a quick check on the wonderful Higgledygarden website I also popped my Cerinthe seeds in a little pot of tepid water to soak - evidently they have quite a hard shell and germinate better with a bit of softening so that's tomorrow's gardening sorted :)

I think the squashes better wait for a few more weeks, don't you?

Moving forward

With the move into March we have finally had chance to start preparing ground at the lottie.

We now have beds cleared of weeds, covered in cardboard and layered with composted bark mix ready to set the spuds into in a few weeks time. Last year we tried this no dig method for the first time and found the spuds easy to harvest and clean to pick. We garden on light sand at the lotty which means that when we used the trenches we both grew up with we'd end up losing spuds deep into the ground and find volunteers popping up in the same place years later which completely mucked up our rotation and held the door open for all kinds of bugs and diseases. So the future is beds mulched with compost and spuds sheltered by grass clippings.

sleeping beds waiting for seed potatoes

Weirdly snow and freezing hail returned today so after preparing the bed for these beauties yesterday our gardening endeavours were confined to indoors.

More patience required - too cold to put these out yet

So we set to sowing tomatoes - 4 different sorts - the ever-reliable Moneymaker; sweet little Garden Pearl; Heritage Seed Library variety Salt Spring Sunrise and the little plum shaped cooking tomato Roma - and after blight wrecked the crops again last year we'll just be growing in the conservatory and hoping for more success.

Broad Bean risotto in waiting

Other new starters this weekend - Pea Early Onward; Crimson-flowered Broad Bean; Leek King Richard; Oregano and the delicious orange scented thyme.

Orange Thyme - Bees love it and so do I.

All we need now is for a bit of sun and some warmth and then we can start potting things on and filling the rest of the windowsills. Can't wait :)