Planting time

Last weekend we spent in Manchester with Miss L and her Gran. We went over to Liverpool to look at art. We went to the Walker, Fact and the Tate. H was much taken with all the galleries but Miss L was taken with the Tate. The river Mersey was looking great in the spring sunshine.

I had managed to get my early spuds in over the last few weeks but my main crop spuds, Cara, are chitting like mad so need to go in soon. The plot is looking weedy so it need fixing. I need to plant my peas and beans so I decided to start with clearing bed1. I started with spot weeding the dock and thistle. After that I got on my hands and knees and used my green spade as a hoe. The "hoe" cut a swath through he Red dead nettle and Chickweed. The Chickweed is coming into flower so the chickweed needs to come out. I cleared the plot up to the half way point and the double row of bolted Swedes. I went back to the bottom of bed1 and dug a trench, 12 foot long, 6inches wide and 8inches deep. Into the trench I tipped a wheelbarrow full of manure. I raked in half the soil from the trench back into the trench. I tipped in two watering cans of water into the trench. With the soil well soaked I sprinkled in handfuls of peas and pulled over the remaining soil. Then another two watering cans of water.

I repeated this process another four times. The first trench contains Twinkle peas, the next trench has Petit Pois, the next Witkem Broad Beans, the next Optima Broad Beans. In the final trench I planted out the Deadnought Broad Beans that I had propagated at home. The air was not very warm but the sun was bright and made for very hot working conditions. The last thing I did was to harvest the leeks that managed the over winter. It is suprising what good condition they are in. There is no sign of virus and the shafts are nice and solid.

Today I went back for more of the same. I did the poo run first. I did more of less the same process, spot weeding followed by clearing surface weeds. I cleared the bolted swedes, chopped them up and dropped them into the compo bin. There were a dozen or so Parsnips that had over wintered. Again they were in good order, no canker. It is a pity they did not decide to grow last year. I took out another trench, same as the day before, and planted out the other two trays of Dreadnought Broad Beans. If anything it was hotter today than yesterday. Sweat was dripping off the end of my nose and my clothes were soaking wet. H popped in early in the afternoon with sandwiches and tin of lager. Very nice on a hot day. Once H had left I set the onions. Planting of the onions is well overdue. I gave the area a good soaking. I pulled a few stalks of Rhubarb and trundled home.