Come on Spring!

Well it's been a week or so since I last posted an entry. This has been partly because I'm not working evenings at the moment (my workplace provides the ideal peace and quiet to blog) and also because we had a family funeral last week, the run up to which has left us all feeling rather drained.





There's been little progress on the allotment as the weather has been rather cold and wet. We managed to get an hour or two there at the weekend before the rain and mud finally drove us to take shelter and go home. There are lots of jobs to be done. Firstly we need to clear the ground where the kids' third raised bed is to go. two beds are already completed, but need to be filled with soil. All 3 allotment plots need to be edged (we have some boards, but nowhere near enough to do all the perimeters). We need to measure and order some enviromesh and assemble a protective 'cloche' for the carrots (made of blue water pipe). And very importantly, there is still lots of ground yet to be cleared which hasn't been dug for years.

Blue water pipe to be used as a framework for the cloches

Today I'd planned to get to the allotment, but ended up using the time to transplant the tomato seedlings which were starting to look crowded and pale. As always I've planted far too many and we now probably have around 40 pots of individual seedlings! And I don't even like raw tomatoes! Ah well, I'm sure someone will find a use for them...





The chilli seeds haven't germinated too well so I might have to plant some more, but the sweet chocolate peppers (long brown peppers) have come up well, so we should be amply supplied with these. The carrots I started off in some guttering have been slow, probably because of the cold weather (even in the greenhouse the nights are cold), but there is some sign of growth, so we'll see.





I planted a few more garlic cloves in the raised beds at home today. I've also got more onion sets to plant, but running out of space in the raised beds. Looks like a few might have to be planted at the allotment after all. I also sowed some more onion and leek seeds in seed trays yesterday. I'm hoping these will germinate better than the last ones I planted.

The germination of leek seeds has been slow