Good Bad Ugly

After removing all the green turnips and a ton of weeds the bed on the left was somewhat empty. Of the parsnips planted, only 3 (or was it 4) germinated, all from Niche (none from Yates). Not many carrots had germinated either - perhaps all because the irrigation system had somehow been turned off.

What to do with an empty bed in January - plant with winter crops. A new row of parsnips went in and the spaced between the plants filled with new seeds. The same with the mixed coloured carrots, and a new row of Red Barron orange carrots (thats a row of mixed colours a, a row of orange, and filling the gaps with mixed colours).

The row of white turnips was filled too.

Finally, a few days ago 4 brussel sprout plants were planted out into the brassica bed. It looks like the brassica bed is doing well, lets hope for success over winter and into summer (thankfully the rabbit hasn't been seen all summer).

As for the ugly - the cos lettuce have started to bolt. One more was harvested today. Thats 3 for the season. Seeds in the green room have germinated so more soon (hopefully).

TurnipTime

Four kinds of turnips have been growing in the patch this year, the Red, Green, White, and Purple. Of these the best are the red and white, followed by the purple. None of us like the green much. Here's a pic of the pick.

Onions and Radishes

After getting a fresh bag of Yates Black Magic seed raising mix it was time to see if the cause of the onion germination problems was the potting mix. Other onions this year have been germinated in Yates Thrive. In went one seed tray worth of the borettana onions, 40 seeds in total.

Out of the seed tray of thrive went one borettana and one red onion into the patch. As all the radishes have been eaten, so too did three rows of radishes, two of the watermellon radish and one of the black radish.

On the topic of watermellon, some have germinated as have cucumber. Probably too late for this season but they'll be kept inside in the hope of someting good happening.

Pick of the day

Brasicca Beds
Planted and ready for the winter. With some luck they'll take root and be hardy enough by the time the snow comes.

Rhubarb
Perhaps time to start harbesting?

Borlotto Beans
Flowering is nearly over and the pods are beginning to form.

Zucchini
Finally the first Zucchini is in flower. Lets hope a bee finds a way to do the necessary.

General Comments

Spend the day today (and yesterday) weeking and taking stock of the vege-patch. Here's the run-down:

Nearly everything in with the rhubarb was smothered by the rhubarb. The exceptions being the artichokes which are quite some way from the rhubarb.

We ate the red turnips before going and planted new ones which have germinated.

Carrots are growing slowly.

The strawberry spinach has grown to about the size of a fingernail.

The parsley did nothing and hasn't even germinated.

Finally, planted cauliflower in seed trays before leaving and planted 17 green cauli and 15 snowball cauli into the patch yesterday.

Three of four zucchini germinated and were planted out today.

The black raddish didn't germinate, the othes went to seed, but are good none the less.

Harvested a lettuce today - tates good.

The Story of the One-Pound Turnip

When we left for holiday three weeks ago this turnip wasn't visible above the surface of the soil. On return it has grown to a whapping one pound. There's another in ground about the same size and also ready for eating. The one in the photo is on the oven for tonight's dinner.