The calabrese which looked like cress now looks like a small forest. The leeks are looking good and leeky. Nearly all the sweet peas are up. And the tomatoes are very hit and miss. :-(
Not a single teton du venus has come through. Not a single market king/czar. So far, anyhow.
I have made my first attempt at seed planting. Calabrese, leeks, sweet peas and 200 tomatoes. Yay.
Absolutely absolutely absolutely had to start sowing seeds today! Umm. Well, we bought some seed compost today, so I guess it's a bit of a step closer. :-/
I did find a bunch of bulbs which I'd bought for putting on the allotment, but the flower patch never got dug out, so they didn't get planted. All dated Sep-Dec for planting. Oops. Well, they mostly looked like they were well on their way, so shouldn't be /too/ far behind now.
Planted:
* yellow tulips
* white red edging tulips
* 2 lots of mixed tulips
* those long thin tulips with waists
* handful of crocus (yellow, white)
* couple of narcisus
* something else, can't remember what bt they were pretty and colourful
Also, bought some extras from Wilkinson, 2 of which went out today:
* pair of asiatic lilies (very pretty colour, not seen it before, kind of orangey-green with little spots)
* 10 gladioli in an unusual colour.
And I've still got a bunch of dahlia and fresias which can't go out until after last frost.
As well as planting, I've trimmed back a bunch of things in the garden (never sure what to do with clematis 'dead' looking stuff, cos they suddenly spring into new growth from the stuff I want to cut off and throw away!) and disposed of a load of dead looking stuff. Put some of the bulbs above into the giant planter under the window, tidied up some empty pots and seed trays, threw away a binbag full of junk and tat ...
Oh, and just remembered I missed the 18 hyacinth bulbs I spread around, too! Horrid evil things! the second I even looked at them my face and neck were itching uncontrollably. I swear I didn't touch them without gloves! *scratch*
Visited the seed swap, got some Thomas Etty seeds and some Growing Old (heirloom) seeds. Plus some garlic, onions, beans and peas from the main potato section.
Garlic: 3 bulbs of 'pink' garlic (Nick forgot to note down the name!)
Onions:
* 2 x Snowball onions sets
* 1 x Red Baron onion sets
1/2 pint each of:
* Alderman 'tall' peas
* Oregon sugar pod mangetout (erm .. I think we already have a load of those, Nick!)
* tendergreen dward beans (yum!)
* Imperial white longpod broad beans
* Crimson flowered broad beans (had these last year - very pretty!)
Thomas Etty:
* Teton de Venus Jaune (tits of Venus!) tomato
* White Wonder tomato
* Red Pear tomato
* Mortgage Lifter tomato
* Cosoluto Genovese tomato
* Cream Sausage tomato
Growing Old:
* Yellow Rattle flowers (some kind of semi-parasitic plant!)
* sweet pea - Painted Lady (bi-colour)
* sweet pea - Henry (scarlet orange)
* sweet pea - Just Jenny (dark purple)
* sweet pea - Mumsie (crimson)
Seed swap seeds:
* Pea - heritage 'Jeyes'
* Pea - Magnum Bonum
* Pea - Stenu
* Pepper - corno di toro rosso
* Pepper - jumbo sweet f1 hybrid
* Tomato - pink potato-leafed
* Tomato - striped cherry
* Tomato - mr novak
* Tomato - Czar/Market King
* Tomato - yellow peach
* Aubergine - listada de gandia
* Melon - Jeny Lind
* Watermelon - sugar baby
* Fennel - bronze
* Welsh onion - red
* Pumpkin - patty ('fun to grow' range)
* Pumpkin - narley
* Squash - Red Kuri
* Pak Choi - white petiole
* Bean - climbing Madeira maroon
* Bean - French climbing, blue
* Bean French dwarf bean, Sonesta (yellow wax bean)
* Bean - Jicama Yam Bean
* Bean - runner, 3 varieties
* Cauliflower - all the year round
That should keep us busy! :-)
Last Sunday we went to the Hampshire Potato Day to by in our spuds for this year. Yes, it's a bit silly going so far just to buy a couple of tubers, but y'know, it's a day out, and it has a nice seed swap and some kids' activities, etc ...
Potato List for this year:
1st Earlies: Riviera (huge bake/boil); hzd99-1437 (trial variety, like Charlottes)
2nd Earlies: Maya Twilight (white with red splodges); Kestrel (white with purple eyes, we like these - very showy); Yukon Gold (I think these are the waxy yellow ones I liked last year - our records got a bit muddled); Toluca (organic); Bonnie (new variety, like Estima)
Maincrop: Markies (1 has gone mouldy already!!); Rudolph; Orla (organic - think these are maincrop, they've not been labelled well)
Put them on the windowsill upstairs for chitting. All well on the way already except for the Markies.