A Hard Nights Day

well, recovered from my three night stint at work (ok with a 24h snooze) and so got out early into the garden and onto the plot. Decided today i would finish the digging of the potato patch. I very nearly did so, but with about four square foot of top 'bench' to dig and around sixteen square foot of the double digging to do, i was too tired to carry on.

The reason was that during the digging i discovered a load of building waste, plastic sheeting, a plastic bucket, bottle, and loads of stones, all obviously burried in a deep hole. One of the stones is massive, probably originally ornamental, and there were several housebricks and a breezeblock. Oh, and several hundred weight of sharp sand. All this made digging really hard going, requiring constant hard levering and pulling to dislodge the bigger pieces, and loads of bending to remove all the stone. All because some nerk builder couldnt be bothered to pay for a skip. Some of the plastic was so deeply burried that ive had to leave it in.

Tomorrow, hopefully, i will crack on, get the last of the digging finished, level the soil, build the new bigger polytunnel for the beans, and start painting the framework of the chicken run, ready for the wire to be attached.

Chicken Run

The recent strong winds we've had didnt do much damage to the plot, just the usual bit of fence repair, and straightening the fleece over the cabbages and carrots. Shops are now finally clearing away the christmas stuff and getting the garden stock in. I got a pack of polythene from wilkos that will form a large polytunnel for the beans (which are already too big for the small one), ive cut and shaped wire supports and so now just need to set it up over the beans. The small tunnel will move to the empty bed next to them to warm the ground ready for the onion setts to go in.

After the ravages of caterpillers, the broccoli is now putting on nice bright green leaves and starting to get ready to sprout nice purple heads


Ive planted the three blueberry varieties in a huge plastic tub filled with ericaceous compost and soil, remembering to put the labels in with them. Hopefully with three different varieties we should get a good crop from them. Im pretty sure the old one is dead, but will wait until spring to make certain.

The bulbs are coming up in the flowerbeds as well, including the tulips i planted out the front for Julie



Part two of the chicken house is underway - building a run. I went to the small timber yard in Selby and bought 160ft of 2x2 timber and a big bag of 2" nails. The wood was in 16ft lengths for £3 each, but the chap lent me a saw, tape and pencil so i could cut it up to make it fit on the roofrack better, he even gave me the nails half price because the bag was pierced and some of them had rusted, about four out of a hundred!

The run is being made 8ft x 4ft, and 5ft tall, with a roof panel and a door. The roof will be covered in normal chicken wire, simply because i have a roll and i dont expect much to try and get in through the roof. The sides will be covered with 1" weldmesh wire, including an anti-dig skirt. The whole thing is made of modular panels, which will fit together with coach bolts, so it can be dismantled to be moved.

The picture above is of the frame for the panel with the door. The construction is just like making window frames, with the corners cut at 45 degrees to butt against each other. The stretchers add a massive amount of extra strength, making the panel rigid along its length.

This is the panel for the other side. All the panel frames are now built, they need treating with wood preservative and then the wire can be attached. They also need to be mocked up so that the holes for the coach bolts can be drilled.

Blueberries

Just planted three blueberry bushes in a huge plastic pot from wilkos, varieties Septa, Augusta and Julia. Loads of ericacious compost in there as well. The old blueberry, a bluecrop variety, i think is probably dead. These cost £15 as a set from Wyevale's, but will allow the cross pollination they need (something i wasnt aware of until i read it in my magazine), and each is a different fruiting time, so i should have plenty of blueberries through the season.

All the other fruit bushes are in now, and all the trees are staked and teathered properly, even the cherry out the front, which was a nightmare as a few inches under the soil is concrete, seems the tree took hold in a crack, so getting a stake in was difficult.

The potato patch is almost done. Only a small pile of earth now needs moving from the surface, leaving about 4ft of 'bench' to dig and then the last of the double digging, before backfilling the end trench and leveling the surface. Ive run out of leaves though, so the last part of the bed will be without any additional organic material, and will just have to take its chances.

Thanks to Charlie

Charlie, a colleague from work, has had a bit of a clear out and donated some 1kg bags of green manure seed to me,

2x winter grazing rye 'motto'
2x winter field beans 'clipper'
common vetch

and an opened but big bag of Alsike clover 'ermo otofte'

should last me quite a while, and be a good boost to the plot, so, thanks charlie!

The Garden So Far...

As intended, this post will be an update of how the plot is doing. Peppa guinea pig is becoming very mischeivous, but George still likes to keep out of the way


Two of the fruit bushes are in, and their bit of ground mulched with bark chips. There not too easy to see in the photo, as they are quite small


It took three big fellas (alright, two big fellas, Barry and Chris, plus me and Julie with the flashlight) to move the chicken house down the garden, which we did in the dark when i got in from work. For some reason the door has warped and wont shut properly, so thats something else to sort out


Freddy is getting to be quite a big bunny now, still very soft and cuddly, i managed to get him to stay still for a photo by bribing him with sprouts



This is the sleigh that came round. Not the lions one i dont think, not sure which charity it was actually


The bean plants and a few of the spring onions are here under cover. It seems the beans under their polytunnel, and the carrots and cabbages under their fleece, have been taking advantage of the improved environment and shooting up like triffids


here they are under the fleece, held down using all the big rocks that have come out of the new patch



The new potato patch, half dug, showing the remarkably industrial layout. So much so ive taken to using drift mining terminology to describe it, so here you can see a bund, first bench, cutting face and backfill areas


And finally, a quick peek under the polytunnel at the beans

Still loads to do, and time for a bit of weeding and hoeing. Theres even still some sprouts left, and we've had quite a few with our dinners over the last couple of weeks. Im going to pull one of the swedes soon and see if theres anything salvagable with them