55. Kitchen Garden - Mid Summer
After a very slow spring start the kitchen garden has suddenly come into its own. I have kept planting relatively simple this year and just focused on the crops that I like using in the kitchen. The last few weeks of sun with intermittent showers has given all the beds a new lease of life.
The raised salad table is dedicated to lettuce: little gem, cos and an iceberg-type, interspersed with spring onions. There is also a row of sorrel in there as well; the leaves add a delicious sharp lemon taste to my salads. It is best to grow salads plants in partial shade as too much sun can make them bolt into early flowering. This is shadiest bed I have so it does work well for the lettuce, but the sorrel still needs regular cutting back to prevent it bolting. There is new netting on this bed this season: the green anti-bird netting has been replaced by a finer mesh black anti-moth netting, and will hopefully reduce the caterpillar population on the plants.
The other raised beds are planted with a mixture of my staples: radishes, carrots, beetroot, celeriac, perpetual spinach, celery and various types of onions. Most of these are grown from seed and were very slow to start, but the recent sunshine has helped. The radishes are ready to harvest now and the celery and spinach need regular picking to keep them under control. I have used successive planting for the carrots and beetroot, hopefully giving me a row to pick every few weeks over the season. The onions grow between the other crops and can be picked as and when they are needed for my cooking.
Two of these three raised beds have net coverings, but the third one I left open to give the spinach and celeriac more height to grow. The criss-crossed pieces of wood are there to deter the local cats from using it as a litter tray. An interesting finding is that I get many more weeds in the open (un-netted) bed compared to the two netted ones. I am not sure why that is, but am assuming that it is birds that transfer the weed seeds into the beds, and they have better access to the soil without the netting. I will be giving that bed a thorough weeding tomorrow, and will reinstate the nets after that.
The taller bean and pea plants are growing in the planters along the back wall. They too were slow to start, but I now have a promising looking crop of borlotti beans, broadbeans and peas growing fast up the canes.
The potatoes are doing well in their air-pot planters and need mounding up again, for the third time. The pots make it much easier to mound up than it would be in the ground - I just pour another bag of compost into the pot. There are 8 potato pots this year and I am hoping to be able to pick my first crop of baby potatoes in the next couple of weeks.
The poor tomatoes are very late indeed, and are only just getting into their stride. Usually I would be seeing my first fruit by now, but this year they have taken ages to settle in and I haven’t had any trusses of flowers yet. It is tempting to put some tomato feed in, but shouldn’t do that until they have flowered. I do hope there is enough time (and sunlight) for them to ripen before the end of the season.
Both the potatoes and the tomatoes need to be kept well watered in their pots - I keep the water reservoirs at the bottom of the tomato pots topped up at all times.
The strawberry beds are doing well. The metal raised bed is covered in netting, and although quite crowded it has a lot of fruit hidden underneath all those leaves. Those plants are crowding each other out and will need to be divided for next season. The old wheelbarrow has a small but steady crop which keeps the local birds and squirrels supplied, and my two little terriers if they find them first. Flora and Maisie both love strawberries, and it is lovely to come out every morning to pick a handful of berries for my breakfast.
This year I have a new companion planting experiment called “The Three Sisters” in the other metal raised bed: it is a combination of beans, squash and corn. This is a traditional planting method used by the Iroquois Indians, with the three plants growing symbiotically to deter weeds and pests, enrich the soil, and support each other. The tall corn acts as a support for the beans, the beans provide nitrogen to feed the soil and the squash provides an ideal ground cover. I have used a combination of strawberry popping corn, french beans and gem squash to try out this method of growing. The plants are too young to see much progress yet, but it will be interesting to see how it turns out.