Life on The Weald - March 2022

(and in the Garden)

Hellebores in the front garden 14 March

My first concern on returning home, after almost a fortnight away, was for my tomato seedings and fortunately they had all survived and were looking healthy.

Tomato seedlings indoors - 2 March

A visit to the plot on 3 March revealed little damage as a result of the February storms and all the plants had survived, although the kalette and broccoli stems were all at a jaunty angle as a result of the strong winds.  As expected, our plastic storage box was beyond repair and although the shed had survived, it was already in a poor condition and we had planned to replace it this year.

3 March - Broad Beans (Aquadulce)

November sown Broad Beans flowering

The garlic was looking healthy, both the Vallelado, planted in November and the Eden Rose, planted in January

Eden Rose Garlic (planted January) - 3 March 

Vallelado Garlic (planted November) - 3 March

The Mehnir shallots were also showing signs of growth and should be ready for harvesting in August/September.

 Mehnir Shallots (planted January) - 3 March

There was a good crop of purple sprouting broccoli to be picked.

3 March Purple sproting broccoli

3 March - a good head of PSB

3 March - Broccoli harvest

We removed one of the covers from the ruhubarb and were able to harvest a crop of well over 1/2 kilo and leave sufficient for another picking.  We decided to leave the other cover on for a few more days.

Forced rhubarb - 3 March

On Sunday 6 March I decided to plant a second row of Duke of York potatoes. 

6 March - second row of  Red Duke of York

Conventional advice is  that the the date for planting Red Duke of York potato seed should be calculated on the basis that seed potatoes will take four weeks before they appear above ground. Given that you want them to appear above ground only when the danger of frost has passed (the last week of April is the UK average) the last week of March is considered about the right time to plant them.  I took into account that we are in the south east of England, one of the mildest areas, that most historical advice has not taken global rising temperatures into account and past experience of early planting.  I planted one row of Duke of York as early as February and the second row, one month later.  If there is any threat of frost after the foliage appears, I will earth them up i.e. cover with soil.

Sylvi provided me with some good compost from the wormeries and I spread this over the area where the next lot of potatoes will go.

6 March - compost from wormery

Loads of happy worms - 6 March

On Monday 7 March I took a further risk and planted a row of Nicola First Early potatoes. 

Nicola on the left, 2 rows of Red Duke of York on the right

I also removed the covers from the rhubarb

Forced rhubarb - covers removed

I directly sowed 3 double rows of peas in raised beds, Oregon Sugar Pod, a mangetout variety, Hurst Green Shaft and Kelvedon Wonder, and covered the beds with sheets of horticultural fleece.  I also sowed a row of mixed varieties of "Rainbow" beetroot. 

The following day I spent at home and potted on the tomato seedlings which had been growing indoors in trays - these were all beefsteak varieties.

There was also time to make a Rhubarb and Ginger Yoghourt Cake 

Rhubarb and ginger yoghourt cake

On 9 March I planted out a row of Charlotte First Early potatoes. There was no evidence that the parsnip seeds I had sown a month earlier had germinated so, the following day, I bought a small tray of seedlings from the local garden centre and planted these out where the seeds had been sown.  I also sowed some boltardy beetroot.

I have not had much success with carrots in previous years but on 12 March I sowed some Carrot Flyaway F1 in a container hoping that theu will be at a sufficient height to avoid carrot fly.  The Flyaway variety is said to have low levels of the chemical that attracts carrot fly.  We shall see! 

We continued to harvest the forced rhubarb on a regular basis but with the covers removed have left the rest to nature.

The last of the forced rhubarb

At home we were beginning to see signs of germination.....

13 March - Kalettes

And the Basket of Fire  which had been grown in the open last year and potted up and brought indoors in the autumn was now flowering. 

13 March - Basket of Fire

Whilst this year's kalettes were germinating, we were still picking many from last year's crop.

13 March - harvested kalettes

14 March 

At home I had some garlic cloves left over from earlier planting so I have now planted these in a container in the garden.  I have also sown some mangetout peas in a length of guttering in the garden and several varieties of Basil in pots on the kitchen windowsill. I had a packet of Sweet Pea patio mix left over from last year and sowed these in a container in the garden. Instructions are to sow indoors from January to April or from mid-April outdoors as they are most likely to germinate with temperatures of 13-15C.  As it was a sunny day and 12C with temperatures in the next week predicted to be above 13C I decided to take the risk.

I also had some Jacaranda  seeds that I brought home from Spain last year so sowed a few in pots indoors.

In the garden, the true Quince, Serbian Gold, that I had planted in the autumn was beginning to come into leaf.

Quince - Serbian Gold - 14 March

On the plot there was still plenty of purple sprouting broccoli to be harvested.

Purple sprouting broccoli - 17 March

Purple sprouting broccoli - 17 March

The Duke of York  potatoes were beginning to show so I earthed them up slightly.  I had cut the lawn at home for the first time this year and I used the grass mowings to provide a mulch for the potatoes.  No rain is forecast over the next week and it has been very warm and sunny, so the ground is very dry.  The mulch will help conserve water.

Duke of York potatoes on St Patrick's Day

Two days later, I spotted a Peacock butterfly and what I think was a Tortoiseshell competing for the nectar on a dandelion, but the Peacock won and the other flew off and I couldn't be sure if I had identified it correctly.

19 March - two butterflies and a dandelion

19 March

It is certainly a colourful time of year

In the front garden, the tulips were just beginning to flower

Tulips - 22 March

Things were also happening in the animal world - frogs had been busy as there was now a lot of frogspawn in the pond.

Frogspawn - 22 March

And the worms in our wormeries had also been busy, producing lots of compost which I spread in some of the rasised beds.

Worm compost - -24 March

I was beginning to lose track of what I had sown or planted - I had some scribbled notes but decided to get more organised and created a table:

Sowing schedule March 2022
Date	Seeds	Indoors/ Outside	Seedlings/plants	Expected date for harvest
6/3		Outside	Potatoes Red Duke of York (chitted)
7/3	Peas Oregon sugar pod	Outside
7/3	Peas Kelvedon Wonder	Outside
7/3	Peas Hurst Green Shaft	Outside
7/3		Outside	Potatoes Nicola (chitted)
7/3	Beetroot – Rainbow	Outside
8/3	Tomatoes Yellow Perfection	Indoors		July/September
8/3	Tomatoes Chocolate  Cherry	Indoors		July/September
8/3	Tomatoes Crazon F1	Indoors		July/September
8/3		Indoors	Tomatoes Tres Cantos Potted on	July/September
8/3		Indoors	Tomatoes Super Mama Potted on	July/September
8/3		Indoors	Tomatoes Marmande Potted on	July/September
8/3	Kalettes (mixed)	Indoors		October/March
8/3	Cavolo Nero	Indoors		October/March
9/3	Purple sprouting broccoli Santee	Indoors		September/March
9/3	Purple sprouting broccoli Rudolph	Indoors		October/April
10/3	Beetroot – Boltardy	Outside
12/3	Carrots – Flyaway F1	Outside In container		July/October
12/3			Potatoes Charlotte (chittted)
14/3			Garlic – Vallelado In patio container
14/3	Peas – Mangetout Sweet Horizon	Outside In rainwater guttering		June/July
15/3	Butternut Squash Hawk F1	Indoors		September/October
15/3	Butternut Squash Harrier F1	Indoors		September/November
15/3	Sweet Peas – mixed	Outside Patio pot		Flower June/September
15/3	Tomatoes Summerblast	Indoors		July/October
15/3	Basil – Red Rubin	Indoors		July/October
15/3	Basil – Thai	Indoors		July/October
15/3	Basil - Lemon	Indoors		July/October
23/3			Asparagus Pacific Purple Gijnlim Connover’s Colossal	Next year (April/June) or 2024
23/3			Little gem lettuce
23/3			Jerusalem Artichoke Fuseau	4/6 weeks after flowering
23/3			Potatoes Salad Blue (chitted)	September

Having got everything in order it was time for our trip to Spain.  I watered the allotment in case there was no rain in the following week and i put al the pots with seedlings in bowls or trays of water, hoping that they would survive.  There is nothing more that I can do except cross my fingers and hope.

John Austin

Hove, March 2022