We paid a quick visit to the plot on Sunday - mainly to replenish our vegetable stocks. We're still harvesting a reasonable amount of fresh pickings.
The ground is still far too muddy for us to do any sort of gardening - everywhere is soggy and squelchy so it looks as though we could be in for a busy spring playing catch-up.
The sogginess didn't stop me from wandering around taking stock and taking photographs.
I was really keen to find out how the garlic planted directly in the ground was faring. As I mentioned previously, the garlic planted in a tub in the cold greenhouse has shoots. I planted two varieties Early Purple Wight (hard neck) and Provence Wight (soft neck) and on closer inspection it is just the Early Purple Wight that has shoots. I suppose being one of the earliest varieties to crop this was to be expected. And was there any sign of garlic shoots on the plot - yes there was!
Time will tell whether the plot grown plants will survive in the boggy conditions.
In the same bed we have our autumn planted onions. The sets, like the garlic, have been planted through weed control fabric. This is really an experiment and I was keen to find out whether. if the onions had managed to shoot, they had found there way through the slits in the covering. They had which was a bit of a relief.
Last December our autumn planted onions looked like this.
Last year we planted sets on 4 October compared to 14 October this year. This year we planted in wet soil and last year the soil was dry.
We would have planted sooner but having ordered the sets online we had to wait for them to arrive. Now that it seems there are the same varieties available in garden centres next year we'll buy locally which should hopefully allow us to make an earlier start.
Just to complete the allium round-up here's a photo of our leek bed.
Still plenty to go at here - don't look at the weeds!
So will we/won't we have a successful allium harvest? Who knows?
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