Monday 16th Jan

This afternoon Zoe and I paid a visit to the plot. It was looking a bit sad and empty! We added a wheelbarrow full of compost to some of the bare areas, then covered them back over with mulch. The corn got a bit of compost too, and some more seaweed fertilizer as it is still looking really yellowy. More nitrogen required I think- any organic ideas anyone?

We harvested a lettuce and some wee broccolis. A woman at the garden told me to harvest the garlic, and I took her advice. I'm glad I did- while cleaning and braiding it at home this evening, I found that quite a few of the plants were starting to flower. So we would have lost the bulbs if we'd left them in the ground much longer. It's hanging in a cupboard at my house, drying- you girls are welcome to take it all as I already have lots of garlic from Matt! Let me know if you want to come pick it up.

Cheers, Alex

Babies can Garden #2

Today Abby, Heidi, Zoe and I went to the garden for a late-afternoon visit. We did some weeding, planted a few basil seedlings and added compost to the areas where we've already harvested things- these areas are now ready to plant again. We harvested lettuces, radishes, silverbeet and a broccoli. Yum! The babies did well, but both of the mums had close encounters with stinging things- Abby knelt in a pile of stinging nettle, and Alex was stung by a bee. Ouch on both counts!

Thursday morning

Woops, this is a late post about our gardening session on Thursday morning. Zoe and I did heaps of weeding (we pulled out an entire wheelbarrow full of weeds), and put mulch on the freshly-weeded areas. We planted some more soya beans and harvested a big lettuce, some mizuna and some radishes. There were lots of other people at the garden, so we had a fun time. Zoe was given yoghurt by a nice lady from Bhutan. Combined with the beetroot that she had already been eating, it made a pretty picture...

There were some young basil seedlings that would be great to plant- unfortunately we ran out of time. Also, it would be great to put some more carrots in. Next time maybe!

Friday visit

Friday afternoon (Dec 2) Heidi and I made our way to the garden to water it. However we only watered some smaller plants as the irrigation has now been installed! We talked with other gardeners and harvested a few lettuces and radishes. There were no seedlings out to plant so we decided to return another day. Everything is coming along nicely!

Sun and more sun

Zoe and I visited Tenderfoot early on Wednesday morning- due to what felt like a huge effort to get ready in the morning, we managed to get there by 9am! Hooray! We (I) planted some more bush beans, scarlet runner beans, some coriander seedlings and some more of the edible flowers (I forget what kind of flower they are). Oh, and more sweetcorn in the remaining free space. We gave the garden a bit of water as well. We harvested one big, beautiful lettuce which so far has been made into 3 salads and is still going strong, and some mizuna. And, as you can see below, we harvested tons of big, red, slug-chewed radishes- lots more where those came from! Yum yum!

Babies can Garden!

Today Abby, Heidi, Zoe and I (Alex) went to Tenderfoot. The plot was looking great, with lots of new growth since my last visit. The lettuces are ready to be harvested and the radishes were HUGE! There is also mizuna (a salad green) ready for the taking. Abby and I planted lots of new seedlings, including lettuces, herbs, flowers, tomatoes, pumpkins, cayenne peppers and a courgette or two. We watered them in and removed some rogue potatoes from various sections where they shouldn't have been growing! I put mulch around the emerging corn seedlings. Zoe helped by eating mulch, and dirt, and all kinds of other bad things.

Some of the brassicas have gone to flower, which is a shame- let's not plant too many more until much later in the summer. We can use the space for herbs and flowers if we want.

We should sow some more sweetcorn and beans/peas as well- more space in both of these sections.

Sun, Frost-bite and Tomatoes

Today Zoe and I attended the co-ordinator's meeting, and then did a bit of gardening afterwards. It was a lovely warm, sunny day. Our plot is looking good, although the slugs continue to be noticeable and I think some of our plants could use more water. Lettuces are ready to harvest! Maybe some radishes too...?

There were some lovely looking tomato seedlings, so I planted some in section 2 along with two kamo-kamo plants (kamo-kamo is a kind of pumpkiny-squash). PLEASE WATER THEM when you visit! They will need lots of water while they're so little.

There was a frost over the weekend, and our potatoes got hit hard! Jen says that they will recover. Here is a photo of the frost-bitten potatoes:

Sweetcorn has germinated in Section 4. Let's plant more! We can keep planting it until the end of this month, but after that it will be too late (according to Jen).

Last week (in the session with Abby and Heid

i, which we haven't blogged about -sorry!), I made some little paths in the garden and marked them with blue string and bamboo. Please try to keep to these paths and/or just garden from the sides. The less we walk on our beds, the better for the plants.

I also planted Japanese onions ('Ishikuro' and 'Red Beard'), feel free to give these a water if you're visiting. They should germinate in a week or two. Oh, and last time I planted beans. You'll see the little (budget) labels on these newly planted areas.