Wellrooted - Gardening and vegetable growing diaries from the West Country

Is this the Spring?

Mar 24th 2010

By: Doug

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Well,

Good news is that we havent had one frost this week. Bad news is that the rain hasn’t let up once. All i have managed this week is a quick rake of my small raised bed. Not really good gardening weather!

The chickens really don’t seem to mind this weather one bit. they look funny with soaking wet feathers. I have covered one side of their run to give them a little shelter but they still just stand on the wet side. Perhaps they are not so bright after all.

I did manage to fully dismantle the old shed at the weekend, it now just needs the foundations extending by 2ft for the greenhouse. I have decided to raise the greenhouse up about a foot by building a one block high wall and then mounting the greenhouse on treated timber. Should look a bit better too. I did have to uproot and replant the bay tree at the weekend, it would have blocked too much light. I really hope it takes as it is a beautiful little tree. – at least it has had plenty of water over the last couple of days…

Not much progress on the growing front. Spring really is late this year.

The garlic is now 5″ tall and I have just seen the first signs of life from the onions sets planted in the Garden. “Centurians” are coming up first.

Dougs Garden
Greenhouse!

Mar 21st 2010

By: Paul

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At last my new greenhouse is complete and I can now start to build shelving ready for all of the plants to migrate from the window sills of the house. It actually turned out to be a relatively easy assembly in the end and I was very happy with the end result.

We have also added a new section, opposite the raised bed to accomodate strawberry and rasberry plants.

Complete greenhouse base

Greenhouse construction

Nearly there

Strawberry and rasberry bed

Pauls Garden
This weeks progress

Mar 16th 2010

By: Doug

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I woke up this morning to be confronted with another heavy frost. When will we get some signs of spring arriving? It always seems like such a long wait and then suddenly everyting in the garden bursts into life! – I cannot wait.

I planted my onion sets two weeks ago now and I am starting to wonder if it were too early, they must have had ten hard frosts since they went in! I have been doing my best to cover them with a fleece when it’s been really cold but I have missed a couple of nights. Time will tell. I planted four varieties this year. Centurian, Setton, Stuttgart mammouth and F1 Hercules. 100 planted in total. In addition to the sets I am growing Kelsae and Alisa Craig from seed for the first time. They went in in early february and are now at the two leaf stage.

I planted my garlic outside on the 4th of March, the potted ones have started to sprout but there are no signs from the ones in the garden yet.

On saturday I found a 12 foot aluminium greenhouse for sale in the local paper. It was only £65 and cost £800 20 years ago. A very nice greenhouse indeed. I have always wanted a greenhouse!! Paul kindly assisted me and it took us about five hours to take down. we took plenty of pictures and are confident we can put it back together ? – I will keep you updated… To make room for it I am having to sacrifice the shed. No great loss really as it filled with water every time it rained anyway!

Broad beans are coming on well – maybe a bit too well to be put outside, perhaps a greenhouse candidate.

Melons are coming through. too early?

Chilli plants are doing well, just four varieties this year, Fatalia, Bird eye, Hungarian hot wax and Bhut Jolokia. (Oh and Big red peppers!)

Heres some pics of the garden taken at 7am today.

Doug

Dougs Garden
Introducing the Ladies

Mar 16th 2010

By: Doug

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Well this Blog is about Chickens as well as gardens so I thought it about time I introduced the Ladies.

Emse is the one with White plumage and Mertle has black plumage. They are both very tame and have no problem being picked up and they regularly come right into the house. They are brilliant pets and have very interesting personalities!

Chickens are an amazing addition to the garden, they not only provide great compost from their bedding but they are an invaluable tool when combating garden pests such as slugs and snails. This year I even used them to rotivate the plot by moving their run around the raised bed.

For those who are not up on your chicken breeds, these are Warrens. They are fantastic pet’s and great egg layers…

The Chickens
Why Blog about gardening?

Mar 15th 2010

By: Doug

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A diary is a great tool for the grower, it makes perfect sense to keep a record of what worked and what didn’t. I cannot count the number of times that I wished I knew what time I planted something last year. Next year I will simply have to look back over the blog and see!

The only problem with the blog method is that failures will be made public! – But every gardener has failures. At least others can learn from our mistakes too.

If you would like your own Garden blog on wellrooted get in touch…

Doug

Tips and Advice
Lessons learnt

Mar 15th 2010

By: Paul

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I have decided that my main error last year was overzealous planting. By this I mean putting 4 chilli plants into one pot for instance or 4 potato plants into one bag. Yes, the plants grew but they did not create the optimum amount of produce. Another error I made was to plant everything at once, instead of staggering the planting. When the produce was ready, it was all ready and a lot of it went to waste. I blame it on enthusiasm.

This year will be one of restraint. I am only planting items that will be of use and I am going to stagger seeding so that I can have a longer more ‘fruitful’ season if you pardon the pun.

Yesterday, I planted a clove of garlic and sowed a ‘Ten Commandments’ gourd seed that Doug had generously given me along with 10 ‘Sweet Big Red’ pepper seeds. The shed was removed and the base extended all ready for the greenhouse build next weekend. I can’t wait, I love to build flat pack stuff!

Base build

New Shed Base

Garlic

Garlic Planted

Pepper and Gourd

Pauls Garden
2010… the preparations begin

Mar 10th 2010

By: Paul

2 comments

Hello and welcome to my first garden blog! My name is Paul and I have always loved gardening, ever since I was at primary school and won competitions for the tallest sunflower and biggest tomato. I have only recently got back into it all though, within the last 3 years or so. I had a good growing season last year, tomatoes being the biggest success story.

I recently moved into an apartment that does not have a garden which in hindsight was probably a mistake for someone like me. The window sills are currently filled with propogators (much to the girlfriends annoyance) containing the seeds of what I hope will be my most successful growing year yet. My current growing location is my parents garden, where we have constructed a raised bed and have shifted the layout to be more ‘plant friendly’. Very soon we will be re-locating a shed to make room for a 6×6 foot greenhouse.

Here is a bit of the ground work I have done so far…

Soil shopping

Raised bed before starting

Raised bed after raking

Chicken manure pellets laid

Raised bed preperations complete

Clips that secure the netting

Sping onion tray

Spring onions planted

Peppers and Tomatos

Current shed location

One of the DIY cold frames

The pictures show where I am starting from this year. The raised bed was dug up to about 1 foot and then I laid down some chicked manure pellets, bought from a local garden centre. This will hopefully give my plants plenty to feed on. I then raked those into the soil and will hope for some rain to wash it all in. The other pictures show the first batch of soil picked up from local stores and my cold frames created last year from left over laminate flooring!

If you take a look at the picture that shows the shed at the back, this is the area that is due to be re-arranged. The shed is being moved to the bottom of the garden and the base widened ready for the new greenhouse.

Pauls Garden
Wellrooted seemed appropriate…

Mar 10th 2010

By: Doug

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Hi I am Doug,

I have been really looking forward to the time when i could really indulge my passion for growing things. I have been growing things for years but i have never really had the space to grow what i wanted. Aged 31, I have finally managed to move back into a House with a garden! I have been here only 2 months and already, i cannot imagine how i survived without one. It feels good to be able to finally grow my own produce.

This blog is here to provide a diary of the progress (and failures) throughout the year. I don’t want to take things to seriously, just want to grow good Fruit and Veg. For 2010 i have gone mad with the seeds. This year i seem to have a facination with Squash’s – I have five varieties to grow. For some reason i also want to grow some really big onions! I have some Ailsa Craig and some Kelsae that were planted in Feb coming on nicely. Any tips comment below. – Thanks.

I have been joined by Paul Millar who is also going to log his Gardens progress on the site. – If you would like to use wellrooted too – get in touch!

My seeds have been bought and my groundwork has started!

To follow is a picture of the Garden as it was when we bought the house.

Thanks, and please comment if you can help out.

Oh – wellrooted.co.uk… This was an old domain i bought 5 years ago to document my chilli growing progress. Unfortunately this was put a stop too due to moving into a house with no south facing windows. It seemed very appropriate for this site!

Doug

Dougs Garden
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