The slightly warmer weather has started to move some of the plants this week.  There was kale, purple sprouting, chard and spinach to pick, there is also wild garlic (popular for making into pesto), coriander, and a few mustard leaves which are now mature enough to make your eyes water they are that hot!  The broad beans were flowering underneath the fleece covers so we took them off or the pollinators will not be able to find them.  The fleece had been protecting the beans as well as the weeds so there was plenty to sort out.  As fast as we weed the sycamore seedlings all over the plot, they pop up again to make it look like nothing has been cleared.

There is a photo below showing the purple shoots of the Hythe Hops just poking through, totally surrounded by sycamore seedlings, and that is just in one small space!  So all the hops have survived their first winter and are all showing.  The hairy twine which the hops use to climb up has been fixed or replaced ready for them to romp away bigger and hopefully better than last year.

It seems that most of the plants have survived, and although we lost the annual flowers that seemed to come through the previous winter, they had time to seed, and we can see nasturtiums, violas and pot marigolds popping up making the weeding more challenging to identify what to keep and what to hoe.   The welsh onions are just starting to flower, which will be appreciated by the insects, and with any luck provide us with more seeds.  Welsh onions are a perennial which just keep dividing and making more onions.  We are still using the seeds from our chives to grow lots of new plants. 

We are all very excited that from next week we will be able to have six of us at a time back in the garden, no more shifts of working in ones and twos for just an hour at a time.  We welcomed back one of our gardeners who has been away for months recovering from Covid and the after symptoms.  Once she had managed to stagger up the hill to the garden, she could at least sit in the sunshine and sow some seeds and gather some energy to walk home again, armed with some spinach and kale to make a smoothie to help on the road to recovery.   In celebration we think that next week we should certainly indulge in some cake sharing to mark the start of spring, the chance to work together again and look forward to better times to come (like planting tomatoes perhaps!)

Reminder –From Wednesday 21^st April – Tomato plants are available

Last but not least a big THANK YOU to the supermarket Morrison’s for very kindly donating 10 plants, a mix of perennial flowering plants, herbs and a gooseberry bush.  Some of them are to be planted at Enbrook Park, whilst others will go to the garden at Fremantle Park.  We have an invitation to come back again for more plants when they have more stock with particular plants we have on our wish list.

What’s next?

• Stake the broad beans and run twine around

• Stake the edges of the raspberry patch

• Can the pond be put back together yet?

• Sow fancy nasturtiums, leeks and celeriac

• Plant gaps in onion beds

• Have the new rhubarb plants arrived?

• Plant more perennials in the flower garden area

• Keep pot plants watered and newly planted seedlings

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It is now officially spring with the arrival of the equinox, and we finished the week having caught up a little with ourselves after the lousy week before.   The current priority is to get plants that are ready into the ground as quickly as possible, releasing the sowing trays for more seeds and seedlings to be grown on.   We planted out the peas for shoots, spring onions, cabbages and broccoli, and two rows of parsnips got sown in-between the rows of radishes.  Radishes are a quick crop which will not be in the ground for many weeks whereas the parsnips are slow growers and will just be starting to do something when the radishes are being pulled up. 

We think that we may have fixed the pond.  We found that we had a small leak where the repair patches were overlapped.  Chris and Alistair, two of our able volunteers, worked out what the problem was.  Chris is the only one who comes prepared with a pair of wellies so more often than not ends up in the pond checking it out, that is dedication for you. 

We took some veg plants and compost to the nursery at the Saga Pavilion for the children to help plant in their playground planters.  We were sad not to be able to work with the children last year, and hope that we will get the opportunity to do so this year if the pandemic allows it.  In the meantime we will be forwarding plants so that they can at least grow something alongside their usual herbs and flowers.

We had a visit on Saturday from Dennis, who came all the way up to the garden bearing gifts.  There were seeds, new dibbers, irrigation timers (if only we had a mains water supply), a garden sign, and most touching were two clocks which apparently Dennis had put together himself and were community garden themed.  Just amazing and most kind!

Mid-week the planter outside the Ship got a good top mulch of compost, it is looking a little empty and sad at the moment but tidy, and it will not be too long before we can start filling it up again.  Opposite at the planters outside the Riviera Court, the phormiums were stripped of dead leaves and topped with a good few handfuls of pelleted chicken manure to give them a boost.  Permanent potted plants need a feed at least once a year, depending on what they are, how big and how much they grow.

Tomato plant news

Make a note in your diaries that it is hoped that our own grown tomato plants will start to become available from Wednesday 21^st April.  Be warned that this is too early to safely plant out tomatoes and they will still need protection for a while depending on the weather.  Last year we lost some seedlings to a storm that came through whilst under protection, and we had to make new sowings.  We have seven varieties, Tumbling Tom and Minibel (Cherry bush varieties) Moneymaker, Marmande, Crimson Crush, Tigerella and Yellow Delight.  We will make a further sowing just in case! 

News of the Incredible Edibles

Our sister group have started work on a new herb and vegetable garden in Cheriton outside the All Souls Church Hall.  The traditional design will also include a cherry tree and a lavender/pollinator border.  Like our planter outside the Ship in Sandgate, the containers in Cheriton High Street will gradually be filled with plants over the spring.  A new planter has been taken on at the Three Hills Sports Centre, and of course, there are lots of plans for more projects in the pipeline.

What’s next?

• There are a few new raspberry canes to plant

• Plant the artichoke plants

• Plant the lettuces and sugar snap peas

• Plant up plot 1 at Fremantle Park with available vegetables

• Check the Golden Valley for spaces to plant veg, check for weeds and if new trees need watering

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• Sow more seeds!