New Allotment

So after waiting a long while we've finally got an allotment in the village. Woo Hoo!

These were all new plots in the top of a grass field near the existing allotments. Now, naively I (and the rest of the new plot holders) was expecting the plots to be nicely ploughed and and all tidy, ready for planting. Wrong! They simply rotovated the grass and chopped it up into little bits for us to clear or dig in. Thanks for that!

Our new rotovated allotment plot

With all the rain that's been falling lately today was the first real chance of getting to do any work on the plot. The first problem was what to do with the sods of grass. I decided that I just wanted to get my potatoes in and worry about the grass later. So after pegging out a path down one side of my plot, I pegged out my first bed. I raked off the grass and piled it all up at the end of the plot. I plan to either dig it in somewhere else on the plot or cover it in black plastic and let it the grass rot down.

First plot for potatoes

I then came home for a spot of lunch - and to give my back a rest. My back has never hurt before but something happened today and I'm not liking it! Emily and I then returned with all our seed potatoes which had been going mad chitting in the garage for what seems like ages.

Mixed potatoes ready for planting

I proceeded to dig the trenches whilst Emily put the potatoes in. I then filled the trench in with the soil from the next trench. After a couple of trenches I decided that I could actually lose some of those sods of grass in the trenches first. Better late then never I guess. Emily was also in charge of the admin of recording what potatoes were going where.

Emily planting potatoes

So this is what we've planted (I'm writing it here to remind me of what's what later, when I can't remember anything!)

• Pink Fir Apple, 13 tubers
• Pink Fir Apple, 11
• International Kidney, 11
• International Kidney, 8
• Salad Blue, 9
• Nicola, 10
• Sharpe's Express, 10

72 tubers in all. Can't wait to try them - especially the blue ones.

This year's potatoes

The other day I got my seed potatoes from Coventry market. All in all, I got just over 3kg for £4. When I counted them up, there were 75 tubers - I think I may have gone a bit over the top, oh well!

They're now sitting under the window in the garage, waiting for the weather to warm up a tad to get them chitting.

This season's potatoes chitting in the garage

This year I've gone for a few different varieties:

• Red Duke of York - 1st early. 10 tubers, 0.4kg
• Pentland Javelin - 1st early. 15 tubers, 0.5kg
• Kestrel - 2nd early. 23 tubers, 0.8kg
• Pink Fir Apple - salad. 11 tubers, 0.5kg
• Charlotte - salad, 16 tubers, 1kg

I think most interesting of all are the Pink Fir Apple ones which are long and knobbly - needless to say, you don't peel these! Despite their strange appearance they are supposed to taste great. Can't wait to find out.

Pink Fir Apple potato tubers

April Fools

Well it seems like ages since I posted anything but time has not stood still in Matt's Patch - far from it. We're into April and have had a good few days of sunny weather. A lot of the garden has sprung into life and it's very interesting seeing what happens. Plants that we never knew were there suddenly burst into flower. Even one of our strawberry plants has gone mad and produced a flower! They're still in their pots as we have not had time to plant them out yet.

The sole courgette plant has been re-potted into something bigger. Out of a packet of 6 seeds, I initially planted 4. Only one germinated. Boo. So the other day I decided to soak the two remaining seeds overnight and planted them the following morning, just to see if that would help speed up the process at all.

I have also planted some French Dwarf Beans, some straight out of the packet and some soaked overnight. There were a couple of days between the normal ones and the soaked ones being planed so it'll be interesting to see what happens.

After what seemed like ages of nothing happening with the pepper seeds, they seem to have decided that conditions are now right and have come up quite well. Which is more than I can say about the cucumbers. There were only 5 in the packet so they all got planted. One came up (eventually) so I poked around in the other pots. A couple seemed to have germinated but either were too deep and could not get above ground level. In order to help them I removed some of the earth from around the yellowish leaves (yellow due to lack of light) and they seem to be moving on a bit now. I'll be lucky if I get three plants from that lot.

Better news on the Broad Bean front. There are some decent plants coming along now. I'm still staggered by how complicated the leaf structure is compared to everything else which just seems to have a pair of leaves initially. The broad beans are more like a complete plant folded up very carefully which slowly opens out.

The lettuces are also doing well. The first crop have been moved out into troughs along with a few of the spinach plants that came up. As a little present for them I've just bought some nitrogen-rich fertiliser to help their leaves! As for the other salad crops the land cress is going great guns and I have planted a 2nd crop of them. Well, when I say 'another crop' I really mean another pot. I put some rocket seeds down last weekend and within two days they had germinated. They're doing very well. With such speedy growth it's no wonder it's called rocket!

Last but not least all the seed potatoes have chitted very well and will have to go in the ground this weekend. I think some can go in the now-redundant recycling bins but the main crop ones will have to go in the garden beds somewhere. I've got some bonemeal for a slow release feed and also some phosphorus which had pictures of root vegetables on the box!

Strawberry Fields

In our last house Emily had a very successful strawberry patch and we want to grow a new one in Matt's Patch. So over the weekend when we were in the local garden centre we bought three young strawberry plants. I never know which ones to get, but this problem was solved by the fact that they really only had one variety - Cambridge Favourite. I've since looked it up and it seems that this variety is popular with the 'pick your own' growers as they are flavoursome and hold up well on the plants. We shall see.

There are already raspberry canes in the garden and we had some nice fruit off them when we first moved in. I'm toying with the idea of putting the strawberry plants in the same area, to create a fruit corner, but I don't think there'll be enough sun as it's surrounded by some bushes that I moved that were blocking off the whole corner.

At the moment the strawbs are still in their pots in the greenhouse. I'm treating them like a new pet, where you have to let them get used to their new home before you let them out.

Potatoes
A few days ago I have moved my seed potatoes into the sun room at the back of the house as I was worried that they were not getting enough light in the garage to do their chitting. They seem to be doing better now but that could be my imagination. I'll just have to make sure that two-year-old Megan does not discover them!

Seeds
I'm starting to get anxious about the seeds I've planted. So far only the lettuce and land cress have decided to have any inclination of joining Matt's Patch. The seeds have been in for about two and a half weeks now and not a sign. I think I need to be more patient.
Emily also wants to grow some sweetcorn so I bought some yesterday and we'll hopefully get them in pots tonight.

Chit Chat

Potatoes. Spuds. Taters. Tatties.
Boiled, mashed, fried, chipped, roasted, baked. Is there a more versatile vegetable than the humble potato?

So in honour of the potato I have decided to try growing a few of my own as a bit of a challenge. However, as I don't know the first thing about growing spuds, this could prove interesting.

A bit of research on the internet says that apart from growing in drills in the soil, they can be grown in all sorts of containers, from dustbins to plant pots to stacks of tyres.

So with my brain overloaded with 'tater data' imagine my joy when I happened to spot a seed stall in Coventry market. Outside they had about 30 different varieties of seed potato. I tried making a mental note of some of the names and then it was back on Google to do some more research. I never knew that Golden Wonder was actually a type of potato! The Potato Council website has some good info. I know! A potato council! I hope there's no such thing at the potato police.

So armed with some more info I went and bought some seed potatoes from the market. I didn't go overboard although it would have been so easy! I spent a bank-breaking £1.70 and bought 3 or 4 of each of the following varieties:

• Red Duke of York (First Early)
• Charlotte (Salad)
• King Edward (Main)
• Desiree (Main)

Hopefully the main season ones will produces a nice crop for jackets. Mrs. Matt does like her jackets (and shoes and handbags but I haven't found a way of growing them yet!).

At the moment all my potatoes are in their own egg boxes next to the window in the garage so that they can get their sprouts going. This process is called 'chitting' to those in the know. The aim is to get nice strong dark coloured shoots, rather than thin spindly white shoots.


So while my potatoes are getting their sprouts out I'm going to have to think about where I can plant them when they're ready to go which should be in a few weeks.