My Tiny Plot

Last year my carrots were an embarrassment. Most were stunted, all were invaded by carrot fly and consequently none of them made it to the dinner table. This year will be different because I have devised ‘The Carrot Plan’. Armed with information garnered from many sources I have put together a watertight plan designed to fool the enemy (carrot fly) and enable mtp to produce long, straight, sweet, whole carrots. Here’s the plan. Choose a spot that is the most free from stones (on mtp that is the middle diamond). Dig in some sharp sand (carrots like drainage). Plant garlic, shallots and onion sets all around the chosen site. Cover intended carrot patch with black polythene to warm the soil for 2 weeks before planting. Secure with heavy stones after black polythene attempt number one is swept away by weekend tornado (dur…). Up to now my plan is on track. Part two will deal with germination issues, and fly guards.

Yeeha! My seed potatoes arrived last week. I ordered two varieties from the Organic Catalogue. The first is Maris Bard (early) and the second is Robinta (early maincrop) and I was quite happy with my small selection until I visited mtp. I bumped into Clive who assured me that he would be growing no less than nine varieties this year. One of which would be the superior Pink Fir Apple (very knobbly and difficult to peel, says Clive, but worth every minute). So, the next day I also bought a bag of Pink Fir Apple (salad) potatoes from the local garden centre. Now I have three varieties chitting happily in the dining room. The photo shows Robinta, which is the first to start sprouting, with Maris Bard not far behind. PFA is yet to show.

I’m back - after a minor disaster with a storage drive mtp is back online. This week sees more garlic being planted. More? I hear you cry. But of course. We love garlic and in our opinion you can never have too much. It’s a little late in the year to be planting garlic. I already put around 10 cloves in before Christmas and another 8 - 10 in January so we should be okay. But as the first batch of cloves from Marshalls were found to be rotten on arrival we didn’t have much choice with the last lot but to wait for the replacements to arrive (btw Marshalls were very helpful and apologetic about the rotten delivery). So here’s hoping we get one last cold snap to set them on their way. Off now to eat my yummy Valentine’s dinner cooked by Ryan.