More planting

While I was tempted to push on with the brassicas, especially the seedlings, we need a balanced selection of vegetables to become available throughout the growing season, which meant turning my attention elsewhere. I sowed an entire small bed with beetroot, putting in four different varieties to get a variety of harvest dates, flavours and uses. Cylindra is my preferred variety for pickling (long, thin and cylindrical), Golden is a heritage variety with a sweet, sunny flavour and no red stains, Early Wonder grows quickly and its greens as well as its roots are delicious, and Red Ace F1 is a strong, reliable main crop hybrid that’s good in soups and stews.

Planting brassicas

I pushed on with the planting today, but only after doing the chores, cycling to nursery and back, digging another bed, cycling to nursery and back again, having lunch and playing a game of Ludo with the Wee ‘Un. I had several trays of cabbages sitting in the sun porch that were ready to plant out, so I decided to focus on brassicas. The first to go in were kale and kohl rabi seeds, the former to finish a line of transplanted kale and the latter to provide an early crop of globes. The seeds for both are sown in drills, spaced 12 inches apart with 10 inches between each side.

Fork off!

I’ve had a long spell of hard days so when I cycled home from the Wee ‘Un’s nursery after dropping him off this morning I was already tired and definitely not in the mood for diplomacy or tactful conversation.

It’s not normally a problem as I have almost three hours to myself while the Wee ‘Un is being edjumacated, but as I rode up the final stretch of road I spotted a red Toyota Hilux parked on the verge next to one of our gates.

I parked the bike inside the steading, then went out to the field to have a look see.