The Kitchen garden in December (and early January)

Happy New Year! The kids are back at school and I’ve spent a lovely day in the garden tidying winter debris and moving daffodil bulbs. During the Christmas period I’ve only set foot in the kitchen garden to harvest winter salad and vegetables. It was a refreshing change to be back outside, the rain held off and there were patches of blue sky. Sometimes I garden with Radio 4, but today it was to bird song and my thoughts, plotting and planning the next batch of garden projects to be completed over the coming months. High on the agenda is a new composting area and the landscaping of my main lawn.

Veg patch in early JanuaryThe winter vegetable patch

It’s not all rosy in the kitchen garden though. So far we’ve had a mild and wet winter with only three frosts (yup, I’m counting), the result, my kale is covered in white fly, I’m sharing my spinach with hungry caterpillars and the thriving slug population is munching its way through anything green. Early daffodils which usually flower in mid February started blooming in late December, my Japanese Quince is putting on a beautiful display of blossom, but my snowdrops, generally the first blooms of winter are still little shoots. It is all wrong. I fear that without a cold spell, gardening next year will be an uphill battle, the slugs and snail population will be enormous, pests and diseases rife. My fruit trees have a tendency to attract brown rot, last year we had very little, but I suspect it will be back with vengeance without a cold spell to cleanse our gardens of ills.

All this doom and gloom was soon swept to the back of my mind as the husband presented me with a package this afternoon. He’d been tidying up his studio and discovered my main Christmas present which he’d completely forgotten about, a tripod for my camera. I’m thrilled with it; no more balancing the camera on make shift structures attempting to keep it still and the subject in focus. The husband is definitely in my good books, he’s even finished painting the wood inside and out of my conservatory/potting shed, the colour is Grey Moss by Little Green Company and it looks smashing, a little bit of kitchen garden chic.

Conservatory, potting shedThe newly painted potting shed/conservatory

Now for the usual monthly garden summary in pictures:

 

Pelargonium sidoides in a vasePelargonium sidoides still flowering in the potting shed

Snowdrop shootsSnow drop shoots

Japanese Quince blossomJapanese Quince blossom

Daffodils flowering in DecemberDaffodils flowering in December

Caterpillar eaten hardy geraniumHardy Geranium leaves yet to die back for winter, nibbled by caterpillars and slugs

Cockerel statueChristmas present from my middle son, in pride of place looking over the kitchen garden

Braodbean plantsAutumn sown broadbeans growing well in this mild weather, we could be in for an early crop this year – not all bad!

Garlic and SpinachGarlic and Spinach

Green ManureOne of my beds of Green manure, a vetch and rye grass mix

Purple Srpouting BrocolliMy favourite delicacy at this time of year, Purple Sprouting Broccoli, and it’s pest free!

Green manure

Regular readers of my blog will know that I love money and time saving, gardening concepts. Sowing green manure is a double whammy! It’s a cheap (price of a packet of seeds) garden manure, enriches your soil which results in strong healthy plants. Winter weeds are suppressed in your vegetable or cut flowers beds, it just needs digging in a couple of weeks before you’re ready to sow seed or plant up come spring.

This is the first time I’ve grown green manure so it’s a bit of an experiment. First of all I cleared the vegetable beds, quickly hoed them and removed any weeds. Then I thinly sprinkled the seed over the beds.

Vegetable bed prepared for green manure seedThe first vegetable bed prepared for the green manure seed

I have selected two green manure seed mixes; mustard from Nuts n’cones, which is a quick grower, I noticed this morning that it’s germinated in the four days since sowing. The other is a winter seed mix of rye and vetch, from Suttons seeds. Green manure seed

Come spring when you’re ready to dig in the manure, get the strimmer out and chop the green manure to a fine mulch, this will help it rot down in the soil quickly.

I am a little late sowing the manure, they say September/October is the optimum time for winter green manure, but, my vegetable and cutting garden beds have been in full swing up until now so fingers crossed it will have sufficient autumnal time to develop. I will report back on the results come spring.