Vegetable Growing Month by Month

The down-to-earth guide that takes you through the vegetable year by me, John Harrison - more info.

The Shed

Complete with pink door and smiley, but the shed is vaguely weatherproof. Bags of all purpose compost (4 for £10 from a local garden centre) help when planting into the clay.

Still got the barrel and the junk pile is fairly tidy!

The Bench Seat

A gift from another plotholder who makes them up from waste wood. Gave it a good couple of coats of cuprinol and it's great to have a seat to flop down on.

Brassica Cage

Those pesky pigeons haven't gone away so to try and save the brassicas I netted them using metal tube chair bases and bamboo poles,

In the background you can see the large polythene cloche purchased for £4 in France.. and worth about 2p as it turned out! The hoops just weren't up to the job.

The Broad Beans

Starting to really shoot up now, the broad beans turned out to be one of my best crops this year.

Better shot of the French cloche in the background.

Early Potatoes

Looking quite good - the first earlies did really well but the blight really hit the second earlies and maincrop.

Onions in the background. They weren't too bad either.

More under cloche

The spring planted onion sets are doing well under there, protected from pigeons and thinking the season is more advanced than the rest of the site.

The Comfrey Patch

Ground turned over and compost rotovated in the comfrey bed is prepared.

In the background the leaves are settling - all the excess has now been put in.

The green compost bin sits waiting for a proper home

The French Fork

I've not seen a fork like this available in the UK. It has wide tines which are great for shifting manure and for digging up potatoes.

The long handle gives a lot of leverage but it broke near the stem the second time I used it. Bit far to take it back to the shop but I got a replacement handle on our next trip over the channel.

You can see the shed is in full use.. I wonder how I managed without it.

Planting Comfrey

I took the root cuttings and planted them in pots until they popped their heads up. Then into the well manured and weeded bed. As the comfrey will be there a long time, I give it the best possible start surrounding it with all purpose compost.

It worked a treat!

Tomato Tents

I had some excess tomato plants so popped them in behind the shed - south facing so plenty of sun. These cheap plastic tents, from Asda, should get them off to a good start.

Well - they did well until the blight hit.

Late May

The broad beans have fairly jumped up.. magic beans!

Actually the plot is looking pretty good now. I think we had some decent weather as well.