IN THE VEGGIE PATCH

Photo: Comfrey juice is an ideal plant food.

I’ve just recovered from a rather unpleasant cold. I haven’t had one as bad for years and to make matters worse the rest of the family were down with it too. For some reason though I seemed to come down with this illness far more severely than everyone else. I needed more attention, more medication and of course more time to get up onto my feet again. It’s funny how men seem to get these things worse than women and children!

Because of this affliction, I have been on light duties in the garden. I have been in the tunnel doing a few bits and bobs. One thing that I have to do in there is to tread carefully. This is because the frogs are now jumping around merrily and keeping the slugs down. They are only the size of your little fingernail but they can jump pretty well. I have also found an ant’s nest under one of the tomato plants. I find their comings and goings most interesting, as do my two lads. They have been tunnelling into the nest over the past few days to try and capture the queen, that way they can control the colony- then of course after that they can take over the world. The ants have got fed up with the constant barrage of attacks and have packed their bags and moved six feet to a safer area under some black polythene, taking all their eggs with them. Will the invaders find this new haven? I’ll keep you posted.

Tomatoes.
The tomato plants in the tunnel are getting to be too tall to stand on their own. I will be supporting them with thin hazel rods; care is needed to put these in as they could easily push their way through the plastic. I was trying to secure them with string but there aren’t enough places to tie it to. The tomatoes are also producing a lot of side shoots too. If we were living in the South of France we could let them all grow and have bumper crops of small tomatoes, but our growing season is shorter so we have to concentrate the growing into a shorter time. Therefore the side shoots need nipping out when they are about 2 inches long. They can be pushed into the soil to make new plants if you like. I’ve under planted the tomatoes with courgettes and lettuce to make good use of the space.

Lettuce.
The lettuce, although producing a bumper crop, is falling more and more into the clutches of the attack of the greenfly. I am picking them off but it’s proving to be too little too late. Instead of spraying them with a soapy solution I am pulling up the whole plant and throwing them out for the rabbits. Apparently, you shouldn’t give rabbits too much lettuce, as there is a chemical in the plant that makes the rabbits go hopping mad! It’ll make a welcome break from their diet of spinach at the moment. I have been throwing in the whole plants into the run, stalks and roots included; they can hardly move for the stuff and are now refusing to eat it. I had to pull up a fish box of spuds as well, as the leaves were also alive with greenfly. I thought it was time to harvest the crop as they were originally intended for use on Christmas day, but the frost killed the tops off. They came back and have produced a lovely crop of earlies that taste delicious.

Beans.
Most of my beans and peas have been planted outside this week. I couldn’t really put the planting off any longer. The plants were fully hardened off in their packs. The only reservation I had was the fact that my soil is so wet. So to overcome this I built small ridges and planted them into those. By the time the roots delve deeper into the ground, hopefully the ground will have drained a bit. I have put in dwarf French beans, mange tout, peas, runner beans and broad beans, all of which require well-drained soil. I put the broad beans in a row supported by hazel rods stretching up to about ten feet tall. I might be being a bit over enthusiastic here as on the packet it says they grow up to only four feet. I’ll be feeding them lots of comfrey juice!

Leeks. Leeks are less demanding than onions when it comes to soil. They will grow in any soil as long as it isn’t too wet or compacted. They will grow better if there is a bit of well-rotted compost added though. I grew my seeds in the plug containers. They were ready this week as well to put out as they had reached about 8 inches high. When I put them out I planted them in at around 6inches deep. I made a hole with a dibber then dropped the plug into it, the hole has been left as it was and not filled up with soil. This will help the plants expand throughout the growing season. As the plants grow I will be drawing dry soil up the stem, this will give the familiar white base to the leek. The great thing about leeks is that they will stay in the soil all winter and if you start lifting the plants when they are quite small then the harvesting season can last up to six months.

Horticultural.