Now that spring is really here – the planting is going full tilt. Our propagators and cold frames are stuffed with peppers, tomatoes, beans, courgettes, peas and chillis. It is great to see the seeds coming on so quickly - the salad leaves are looking lush and we are already eating the baby spinach.
The weather at the weekend was beautiful…just right for some back breaking toil at the field! We earthed up six rows of potatoes – doesn’t sound like much, but they are very long rows and it’s pretty heavy soil. We also got to try out the new rotovator – which really does the job. Would have taken us several weeks of hard digging to get anything like the lovely fine tilth it produced in no time. Having said that it is a heavy bit of machinery and a good work out for the upper arms.
Despite the not very fine soil when we started planting a month or so ago, we have seen some great progress already…the broad beans are coming up really well and the asparagus is growing so fast it may need to be staked to avoid serious wind damage. The currants and raspberries and gooseberries are also doing well – currants in flower and may soon need protection from the dreaded pigeons.
We did a lot of hoeing and had to resort to weedkiller to get the worst affected areas sorted. Another heavy job with a backpack sprayer – but thankfully a very still day so no chance of destroying anyone else’s crops (I hope!). All in all a very satisfying day…and looking forward to more progress next week.
One last update, I spoke to the farmer today about our pigs and they are going off to slaughter in 2 weeks time - so very soon we will be having our own pork on the menu - how very exciting!
That's all for now...
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