In the polys, side shoots are being removed on the tomato plants, cucumbers are growing, spring onions continue to be thinned and replanted in extra rows, and pepper seedlings planted after rotovating manure into the soil.

Outdoors, comfrey is harvested for addition to the compost bins, preparation is underway for the pole beans, pea shoots are looking good and the new strawberry beds are being covered with nets, as they’re in a more exposed area than previously.

and a beautiful morning.

An automatic drip-line irrigation system has been installed in our largest polytunnel, which should reduce the time spent hand watering this year’s plants, tomatoes and cucumbers.

We harvested chard, leeks, broccoli, spinach and our first crop of the year, asparagus and radishes.

Work has commenced on what will be the sweetcorn bed ie removal of mypex, then weeding (it’s amazing how determined thistles are to grow under the mypex) and sieving the soil.

The under-cover broad beans are well in flower.

The worcesterberry bushes, (cut down earlier to see if they’ll recover from last year’s attack by gooseberry aphids), have new shoots, plus the removal of stinging nettle roots, or as many as could be located!

The construction of posts and bamboo supports in the polytunnel for this year’s tomato and cucumber plants, means many are now in situ.

Work has started to clear one of the polys in readiness for tomato plants, started at home but now definitely needing transplanting. In other polys, spring onions, spinach and radishes are growing.

Outdoors, the spinach/chard bed is being dug and shallots planted.

Weeds have started to push through the wood chips laid on the paths between the strawberry beds, so carboard is being spread, then wood chips but we may also add straw on top.

Kestral potatoes have been planted in one of the potato beds and then covered with plastic, while after a final rotovation of the onion beds, red and white sets are now in.

Our watering system is being modified to allow for automated watering.

The final photo for March, shows we’re still taking home a tasty harvest.

Jobs being done, when it’s not raining for a change – pruning autumn raspberries, continuing work on the hügelkultur bed, adding straw to the strawberry beds, placing weed suppressing mats around the young gooseberry bushes and “trying” to remove nettle roots entangled in the worcesterberry bushes. The bushes have been severely pruned in the hope they may regenerate, after no fruit last year and an inundation of gooseberry sawfly caterpillars.

In the polys, lettuces are flourishing and broad beans are well in flower.

Time to clean the plastic on the polytunnels; certainly the difference can be seen.

Work is continuing on our new hügelkultur bed.

It appears rats are appreciating warmth/protection under the cardboard covering a no-dig bed, while spinach and chard are still cropping in this area. Some cabbage stems have been left in the hope more small plants will be produced.

Our homemade compost is looking good and we must be doing something right, as our take-home produce looks (and tastes) great.

A beautiful morning, a very mild temperature and still a good take-home box of produce.

On a beautiful winter’s morning, among other jobs, we finished adding wood chips between the new strawberry beds and planted home started, spinach seedlings in one poly. The lettuce seedlings and broad beans in the other polys are growing, while the outdoor no-dig beds are protected under covers.

A frosty morning but exercise in the form of filling wheelbarrows with wood chips, wheeling them up to the top of the site and distributing the chips around the strawberry beds as a start to suppressing weeds, ensured energetic warmth.

Work on the new carrot bed is progressing well.

Happy New Year

It was good to see so many turn out for our first meeting of 2024.

A beautiful January morning encouraged outside work, non-stop weeding eg the summer raspberry patch is now ready to receive manure and then cardboard sheets lain between the rows to help suppress weeds, while the riddling of the carrot bed continues; watch this space for our summer crop.