Getting Organised

I have finally had time to sit down and order my seed potatoes, onions and garlic and figure out what order I am going to rotate my raised beds. And its something that isn't stopped by the weather, so I have no excuses for taking so long!!

Had another good Saturday in the garden clearing weeds and clearing out the last of the unused veg from the beds. I now only have 2 half of beds to finish off ( but only about 1/4 of the non-raised section ready!) Also, spent a couple of hours on my strawberry bed - it had gone wild with runners. I planted up a whole new bed with the runners as well as filling out the current bed (yes I know it should have been done at the end of the summer, but at least its done now!). A lot of the runners will be donated to friends as there is more that I need once I am sure which will take and which will fail. Unfortunately I didn't take any photos of the bed beforehand - will try to get some of the finished bed in the next couple of weeks.

Last year I just picked up my onion sets and seed potatoes from a local hardware store, but this year I decided to order online. I ordered the below from Mr Middleton shop online:
Potato:
After all the blight last year ( even with weekly spraying), I decided to give Sarpo Mira a go for my potatoes. Not going to grow as many as last year, just went with 2.5kg bag. Note - I have searched many of the big name DIY stores around my area and couldn't find this variety which is supposed to be one of the most blight resistant varieties.
Onions/Shallots:
Red Baron for my red onions - had these last year and they did wonderfully
Stuttgarter Giant for my white onions
French Shallots - Vigarmor
There is a good selection online - it depends on your personal taste.
Garlic:
Going to try 3 varieties this year - all different. And going to resist my normal temptation to shove a few of my own or last years growth into the ground as this gives a higher chance of rust growing on the garlics.
Garlic 'Elephant', Garlic 'Cristo', Garlic 'Solent Wright'

I had never seen the Elephant Garlic before and got a bit of a shock at the size of the 2 cloves that were sent!

Some serious cloves - you would want to love Garlic to eat these!!!

Anyhow - onto my bed order for the next two years. I have 5 beds in total.

2012	2013	2014
Strawberries /lettuce	Strawberries	Strawberries
Potatoes	Spring Onions & Lettuce/  Shallots – ½ bed each	Shallots /Spring Onions & Lettuce – ½ bed each rotated
Onions/ Leeks / Garlic	Calebrese / Brussels Sprouts/ Radishes	Carrots / Parsnips / Beetroot
Carrots / Parsnips / Beetroot	Onions/ Leeks / Garlic	Calebrese / Brussels Sprouts / Radishes
Calebrese / Brussels Sprouts/ Radishes	Carrots / Parsnips / Beetroot	Onions/ Leeks / Garlic

I have retired the potatoes out of the raised beds as my beds are nearly 2 foot high and I found them hard to dig out. Increased Strawberries to a full bed for this year on their own - I also have a bed in the back garden near the garage of Strawberries, but you can never have enough! :-)
So instead of a rotation of 5 beds, I am reducing down to a rotation of 3 beds and just rotating in the one bed for the other. This is also not an ideal order, but is what works space wise for me based on the veg we like to eat most. Please feel free to leave comments or improvement suggestions!! All feedback welcome.

Another year begins

Finally time to get back in the garden getting everything ready. Great to finally have a few dry days, been such a wet winter here. So many weeds have taken over in just a short few months of neglect. Its great that to have at least something still growing - tried purple sprouting broccoli for the first time last year and its looking good so far - hopefully will be able to get a few dinners out of it in a few months. We had a bit of trouble in late summer/autumn keeping the butterflies off it from laying their eggs - fed quite a few caterpillars.

I dug out my purple bed in preparation for March/April planting and had a lovely surprise. I had left 3 potato plants in the bed that never got picked as all others in the bed were tiny and had left those to grow meaning to pick them at the end of the season. By this stage I had assumed that they would all have rotted but to my great surprise, there was a great collection - easily enough for a few dinners for our family of four. I think as the raised bed is so high, it saved them from rotting.

 

Bed ready for some compost - weed free and turned over. Only 4 more beds to go ...

The last of the leeks - very tasty and  they have done well despite the neglect through all the wet weather.

Started digging over all the outside too - this may not look much, but I have been slowly digging over a section a week - will all be done by the time its needed in March/April. I had compost down and some cardboard in some of the sections to help limit the weeds and I have to say, it did a fairly good job. Taking it slowly to allow the muscles time to remember what its like to do work! My poor hands were a lovely red colour after the few hours work.

Split my rhubarb plant - probably a month or two late, but better late than never. Covered them both with a nice heap of manure to help protect from the frosts. Picked a nice corner that will get plenty of sun in another month or so when the sun rises. The other has full sun even at this time of year and has shelter on three sides, two walls and the small "glasshouse". 

Time to get planning on what I am going to put in each of the beds this year.