My vegetable garden

Started in 2003, my vegetable garden, at the local allotments, broke the mould. Typically plots were based on traditional methods, with much digging, weeds were widespread, and whilst those who had well established plots and time did well, many other struggled.

I had just had a back operation and so my outlook was very different. I was keen to put into practice, albeit on a small scale, my professional knowledge of soils, minimal tillage and weed control combining this with my long held desire to get back to growing vegetables that I had done years before.

Now you can follow my own experiences through the year.

• current activities
• successes
• learnings
• and even my experiments
• produce

My vegetable garden beds

Spring has stayed and we have enjoyed 10-15C this last few weeks, sunshine and little rain until a few days ago - the feared return to winter and more snow has not happened in Southern England, although temperatures here have dropped to 5-10C by day and we had a frost last night, however Scotland and Northern Ireland have just had 15-50cm snow.

With dry soils I was able to catch up on removing the winter weeds and marvel at the lovely crumbly soil the easy vegetable gardening techniques have helped me build. The great thing is that most plots on my allotment will not need any digging.

To sow the carrots and broadbeans last week I just used a couple of passes of a rake to level the ground, drew seed rows, sowed the seeds, covered and the job was easily done in 10 minutes.

The old stems on the Aspargus and cane fruit has been removed. I even carefully moved the Gooseberry bush to make space for the Tayberry that grows 3m either way.

The compost heap has been cleared and fresh compost is ready for use as needed, however, I still need to move the home heap to the allotment - hard work for a cold Easter!

The current main vegetable plot looks mostly very tidy except a new area I need to clean weeds from and plan what to do with. The plots await sowing/ planting over the next 2 months.

Recent rain and the threat of cold weather means I've delayed my planting of my onion and shallot sets until after Easter. Cold wet soils are good for rotting diseases - not growth of sets.

Next week I need to dig the four potato plots, the first ready for planting a first early variety Swift.

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