Sandgate Community Garden

Sandgate Community Garden: Update 23 May 2021

Now the weather has gone beyond a joke and even we have stopped saying how we really do need the rain!  The wind that rip roared through on Friday has done much damage to the garden and it is interesting to see what has been affected where other plants not so much.  Looking back at the archive of our newsletter on the Parish Council website of a year ago, we were having the very same issues with stormy and cold weather but the plants were much further along than they are now. 

Enough moaning and let us concentrate on the positives.  The filming for our guru of ‘no dig’ organic gardening, Charles Dowding, got done before the garden got a blasting, and it was looking good.  We had up until August to submit our film, however the bare bones and structure are clearer now, and shows how much we have done to improve the soil, and all the pathways that also contribute to the organic matter.  There is no guarantee that our film will be used but Mr Dowding it seems was most impressed with the look of the garden and that is good enough praise indeed for us!  In fact we have had a few messages from friends of the garden to say how well things were growing, so many thanks for all those kind words as it makes a difference. 

Talking of the soil and organic matter, the compost heaps got turned at last which uses much muscle power, and frees up more space.  The compost in bin three looked good enough to eat as it got barrowed to our holding pen, reminiscent of crumbly fruit cake.  The brandling worms had finished their job as the compost was clear of them and this tells you it is ready to use.  The other two bins got turned too, leaving bin one as good as empty to begin the process all over again. 

We are delighted to announce that we have been given a massive £1,500 grant from the Martello fund, to be used to ‘maintain the existing gardens we look after in Sandgate as well as to explore new ones’.  £500 of this money can be put towards a water supply for the garden at Enbrook, which is certainly something we are hoping, might be a possibility for us one day.  This fund means we are on the road to expanding our horizons, and makes things seem all that more likely to actually happen.  If only it could be arranged for there to be more hours in the day…..

The Hythe hops are busy doing their thing climbing up the hairy twine, and we are removing any new shoots to concentrate on a maximum of four shoots per plant now we are in our second year of growing.  We have been given some posh new signs to display with our hops at Enbrook Park and at Fremantle Park so that anybody interested in joining the scheme can easily find the information required.

So it seems there is plenty to celebrate after all, and even when the weather prevents you from getting on with those jobs outside, you can be inspired to write poetry influenced by favourite flavours of Swiss chard and kale, which Alice has shared with us in a picture below.  Alice has made some truly amazing dishes to share with her family over the year; we get to drool over them as they are posted onto the group WhatsApp.  Mmmmmm, now there is another interesting subject – seasonal recipes from the garden.

Regardless of the weather – the Sandgate Society needs us all to get out there on 6th June for the Safari so make sure that one is in the diary – more information below.

What’s next?

  • Must weed the outside wall
  • Cut grass edge against fence and hoe
  • Continue to remove wind burnt damage from plants
  • Maybe plant the sweetcorn and squashes
  • Keep picking what needs picking
  • Maybe sow the beans at last
Posted by Tim Prater in Sandgate Community Garden

Sandgate Community Garden: Update 16 May 2021

We have started to catch up with ourselves this week and it was touch and go if the Saturday session would happen due to heavy rain, but several gardeners put on a brave face and got on with it.  We got wet, but there were a couple of breaks in the cloud and the garden is looking so green and lush, with plenty of new growth, that it made it all worthwhile.  We took off the fleece covers this week as the night time temperatures have improved but have had to replace some of them with netting or enviromesh to protect them from either flea beetles, pigeons, squirrels, foxes or maybe even badgers, depending on what they are currently looking for to eat.

A strange start to the growing season, where the planting of tender annuals, tomatoes, courgettes and squashes have been delayed, however we did decide to be bold and plant out the tomatoes, mostly up against the wall which will give a little extra protection – let us hope it was the right decision.  This rain has been just perfect for the garden, prolonged and heavy enough to penetrate right down into the soil.  All too often it can just wet the surface and run off; not reaching those roots at all.  With all the beds given a good mulch of compost, we are more confident that it will retain more moisture which we have definitely noticed this year after the long dry spell in April. 

It was mentioned last week about the 14 week wait for our new tool box – it suddenly arrived Tuesday evening and the next day was assembled and put into place.  It is a smart green metal box, large enough to accommodate our longer hoes and rakes which we had to leave out before.  We are now just waiting on two more cold frames to be finished and delivered and then we will be up to date with new purchases from our Community Grant with the Kent County Council. 

The supermarket, Morrisons in Folkestone, very kindly gave us two dozen petunia plants which we have put into several planters in the Enbrook garden as well as two of the planters at Golden Valley.

A couple of us finally made it to visit another Community Garden based in East Malling, called Communigrow.  A trip we had been trying to make before the onset of Covid.  This garden is more than two acres, and has salaried full and part time members of staff, but it was interesting to see what they are doing, and they were interested in how we have spread out to other areas in our locality to reach out to different people.  Their head gardener was just starting an experiment with dig and no dig beds as they had a student keen to study the similarities and differences.  We are certainly happy with our no dig methods, and the guru Charles Dowding asked us to make a short video of our garden at Enbrook to show our progress so far and to perhaps be included in one of his YouTube videos.  He currently has 400,000 subscribers to his video channel, so no pressure there! 

Typically, the plentiful rain accelerated the growth of the weeds too, but they are quite easy to hoe and remove by hand, again because of the depth of compost.  Apart from looking neat and tidy for the filming, we are also expecting a visit from the RHS in June or July to give us advice on how we could improve and move forward.  Exciting times!

What’s next?

  • Put enviromesh over the carrot bed
  • Continue planting out the flowering annuals in the other Sandgate gardens and planters.
  • Weed the strip of ground along the outside wall
  • Start to turn the compost bins at Enbrook
  • More potting up of seedlings
  • Sow more spring onions and celery
  • Weed Fremantle areas
  • Keep picking the salads, herbs and spinach,
  • Plant out the kale
Posted by Tim Prater in Sandgate Community Garden

Sandgate Community Garden: Update 9 May 2021

This week we have had high winds through to hail, thunder and lightning, followed by torrential rain!

We did not manage to achieve all our tasks for the week as the Saturday session was cancelled due to rain, but all the squashes and courgettes did get potted on and at least we did not have to do much watering.  The high winds at the start of the week flattened the broad beans and rhubarb in particular, as well as battered many other things where the fleece covers got pulled off and blown about.  Two of us went to Enbrook Park once the winds had died down and replaced all the covers, and by Wednesday the broad beans were looking perky and standing up again.  The temperatures are still low for this time of year and it is good that we have not planted the tender tomatoes, courgettes and flowering annuals just yet.

In February we were given a Community Grant from Kent County Council for us to buy some cold frames and a new tool box for the garden at Enbrook.  The tool box was ordered online, and although the web site had shown the item was in stock, by the press of the button to complete the order, there was something like a 14 week wait before it would be in stock again and we are still waiting with a promise of it appearing sometime in May.  From the writing of the grant before Christmas 2020 to it being awarded, the cold frames had increased in price by nearly a third and we had to find another source.  We commissioned the maker of the planters at Fremantle Park and Cheriton High Street to make the cold frames for us instead(when he could fit it into his order book), and the first two were delivered this week, with another two due soon.  In a picture below, you can see that they are very solid and have a Perspex lid as a safety feature.  They have already been put to good use sheltering many newly potted seedlings.

On Tuesday a couple of us made a visit to Godinton House at the invite of the head gardener Viv Hunt. We were shown around the beautiful gardens, and given some seedlings and rooted cuttings of several flowering shrubs and plants.  We were most taken with their beautiful bug hotel and aspire to make something similar at some point.  We hope to remain in contact with the staff, and have invited one of their apprentices to visit our garden as he is studying how to set up a community garden in his home town.  What a privilege it was to see the hub of where all the magic of plant propagation happens, their beautiful greenhouses and potting sheds.

This coming week we have another visit planned to another Kent Community Garden in East Malling called Communigrow.  This is a garden which is ‘focused on reconnecting people to freshly grown food, the outdoor environment it comes from and the soil it grows in’, which is pretty much our ethos too. This trip has been in the pipeline for over a year now but because of ‘you know what’, has been postponed and put back until finally we think it will actually happen.  It may not be possible to compare our gardens as there are many different circumstances, but there is always something to take away from such visits and to consider as a possibility.

What’s next?

  • Pot up the cucumbers and tree spinach
  • Spread compost on small bed at Enbrook and Wilberforce Green
  • Move wood chips
  • Start work on turning the compost
  • First pick of new spinach beds
  • Salad pick
  • Any radishes to pick still?
  • Weed alley way
Posted by Tim Prater in Sandgate Community Garden

Sandgate Community Garden: Update 2 May 2021

The great thing about writing a weekly newsletter is that we can look back at what was happening this time last year and begin to make comparisons.  Last year we were contemplating removing the fleece covers, but this year there is no plan to do so just yet, with further cold nights on the horizon.  The promises of rain in the weather reports fizzle away and deliver nothing – the rainfall for April was 10.8mm which is a surprise as there is no recollection as to when that small amount happened as it must have sneaked in when nobody was paying attention.  We continue to water all the new plantings until they are established, or unless the rain does it for us.

All the jobs on the list for this week got tackled, from persuading the hops to climb in an orderly fashion up the hairy twine, to recovering rogue potatoes sprouting in the potato patch from last year, sowing chard, re-potting the squash and courgette plants and celebrating the first pick of the lettuces.  Just one small patch gave us 3.06kg of lettuce and the plants should keep producing more leaves for the next ten weeks until the next sowings are mature enough to take over the supply.  The first pick takes the longest as we are encouraging the lettuce plants to give up their eldest leaves and produce lots of new leaves on a central long stem which will proceed to grow upwards.  There is a knack to picking the leaves properly to discourage slugs and keep the plants clean and fresh.

As always when we ask for a little help, Sandgate comes to our assistance, either donating cash in exchange for plants or some of our produce, to bringing plants for us to use or exchange.   Richard came up to the garden with rooted cuttings of his grape vine, and Jill brought two boxes of hostas and house plants – thank you!  Really exciting is an invite from the Head gardener of Godinton House, (an amazing stately house and gardens near Ashford) to come and see the gardens next week with a hint that we might be taking home some plants and seeds too!  Just the chance to see the gardens in such good company and with any luck, the hub of the garden where the propagation takes place will be beyond comparison for a gardening anorak – deep joy!  

What’s next?

  • Next lettuce picking Wednesday session
  • Finish repotting the squashes and courgettes
  • Pot up the cucumbers and tree spinach
  • Continue to move the woodchips from the far end
  • Continue to monitor the water situation and rainfall
  • Differentiate between unwanted and wanted weeds
  • Spread compost on small empty bed

Posted by Tim Prater in Sandgate Community Garden

Sandgate Community Garden: Update 25 April 2021

It is difficult to believe that it will be May next week, so many of the plants are behind, all those we are bringing on and tender,  are bursting out of their pots but no way will they get planted until it warms up and that cold wind has gone, the fleeces are staying on!  More sessions spent peeling back the covers, watering and rolling them back on again – it will be worth it.  We read about the French government pledging 1 billion euros of aid to their farmers because of damage to crops from frosts, it has been the same here.  Now the lack of rain is adding to the situation, and we spend most of the time watering when it used to be the April showers doing that job.

The bee keepers seem to have been particularly busy of late and having to choose an appropriate time when the temperature is warm enough to be able to open the hives and have a look inside.  Below is a picture of one of our beekeepers, Ray, doing just that and wearing all his protective clothing.

It was sunny enough for many of you to visit us at Enbrook Park and take home some of our spare tomato plants for a small donation.  We managed to raise £94.05 which is brilliant for just a few tomato plants, and enough to buy more seeds for next year.  The squashes and courgettes are now starting to romp away and we are bound to have too many for us to keep so drop us a message via email or through our Instagram or Facebook page if you are interested in taking some of them home too.

There was a little spare time between the watering to plant more spring onions, the Charlotte potatoes, and sow the cucumbers as well as the sunflower seeds given to us by Morrison’s as part of their ‘Seeds of Hope’  campaign to ‘plant hope for a brighter future as lockdown restrictions start to ease’.  Our contribution of 120 sunflower plants in and around Sandgate is a small part of the 25 million seeds being distributed, but they will be most welcome, and supplement the flowers we are growing for Kent’s Plan Bee.  These are dwarf varieties which is just as well considering our giant sunflowers last year and the year before got blasted when a couple of summer storms charged through!

If you want to help make a difference in your community and would like to support the Community Gardens and Incredible Edible, we are looking for volunteers to help water the planters and small garden spaces, but if you cannot spare the time or would find the activity of watering too strenuous, we depend on donations to be able to buy more planters and all the things it takes to fill them with everything edible for humans as well as bees.  Come up to the Enbrook garden Wednesday or Saturday morning, or message us via our Instagram or Facebook page.  If everybody did just a little bit our neighbourhood could be more than simply fabulous.

What’s next?

  • Start re-potting the squash and courgette plants
  • Keep on watering – no rain in sight
  • Make sure we are not watering the weeds
  • Sow chard
  • Pull up rogue potatoes from last year!
  • First picking of lettuces?
  • Encourage the hops to wind clockwise around the twine
Posted by Tim Prater in Sandgate Community Garden

Sandgate Community Garden: Update 18 April 2021

There were some lovely episodes of sunshine during this week and a very gradual rise in temperature.  The main preoccupation of the week was to water, water and water, with no rain, and none on the horizon.  The raspberry patch got staked, the sweet peas planted, along with more lettuces to fill any gaps.  Celery, celeriac, sweet corn and all the courgettes and squashes got sown.  Dozens of tomato plants have been handed out to our volunteer gardeners to grow at home, and lots of coriander and parsley got potted up to donate to the Incredible Edible seed swap and plant sale.

The sale held on Saturday was a resounding success, raising an amazing £302.17, all of which will go towards more plantings of fruit, vegetables and herbs in the locality.  Whilst contemplating raising funds, we are getting ready to release all our spare tomato plants on Wednesday 21st April, this coming Wednesday, at the garden in Enbrook Park; we also have pots of mint, as well as some young plants of coriander and Parsley.  Please come along and support us if you can – any plants not taken on Wednesday will be available next Saturday, also at the garden.  All proceeds will go towards the various projects we have around Sandgate, with a ‘BIG plant up’ of all the areas we look after being planned for the first week or two in May IF the weather continues to improve.

Although it has been so cold, we did manage to pick our first radishes which were very welcome, and although the frost and snow finished off many of the flowering tender plants from last year, we can see evidence of their scattered seeds starting to come through; some of us are getting very good at identifying weeds to pull and what to leave.  In particular the self-sown violas are looking quite spectacular.

For some time now we have been in contact with the Romney Hythe and Dymchurch railway to get ourselves onto their list of causes to benefit from access to used railway sleepers at a much reduced rate.  Their yard has been closed during the Covid lockdown, but this week they have opened the yard, and we collected 100 of their small scale used railway sleepers which will be just perfect to edge paths and keep piles of compost and woodchip tidy.  It seemed that 100 sleepers would go a long way but we have already used over 50 at Fremantle Park without even trying! 

What’s next?

  • Pot up all the tomato plants for the Enbrook garden
  • Pot up plants for the sale
  • Continue to water new seedlings
  • Plant the potatoes
  • Sow the cucumbers and chard
  • Edge the compost and woodchip piles with sleepers!
  • Make new bed at Fremantle for flowering annuals
Posted by Tim Prater in Sandgate Community Garden

Sandgate Community Garden: Update 11 April 2021

Great news!  The rhubarb eventually turned up in the post at the end of the week and was immediately planted, and we have had some substantial rain at last.  The start of the week was taken up with watering the plots, and planting out more lettuces, spring onions, coriander, dill, parsley and chervil.  The herbs make a great addition to the lettuce leaves when they are picked and add some great flavours and textures.  The radishes sown in mid-February are starting to swell and should be ready to start to pick in the next week or two – such an amazing quick crop which copes well with the cold and can be eaten within nine weeks from being sown.  Not all of the jobs on the list got done as it is still quite cold and it takes time to remove fleece covers to water, and then replace them.

The garden will take some years to mature, and for the small shrubs and trees to become established but we can already see changes to some of the fruit bushes with promises of actually bearing some fruit.  The Honey Berry is a relative of the Honeysuckle, and is currently in flower.  The berries are very similar to blueberries without half the fuss, and can be eaten raw, or made into jams and jellies.  There is a picture of the flowers below.  The Goji berries are putting on some lush growth and should produce some fruit later this year – time will tell.  The autumn raspberries also planted last year are appearing thick and fast so there should be much more to pick with any luck.   In the meantime we have been tantalised with a picture on our WhatsApp group of Rosie’s parsnip pie!  There were many offers to help with the eating as it apparently tastes similar to apple pie; however it was already too late, and the pie had not surprisingly, been quickly consumed by the family.

By the pond we have some Pulmonaria or Lungwort in full flower which has certainly been attracting the bees in the few times that the sun has come out enough for them to venture out.  Other wildlife noticed this week has been many ground beetles.  It seems they are mostly active from March until October and as part of a well-balanced garden ecosystem, they will be helping out by feeding on any slugs or other insects they can find.   Every now and then we come across random small rodent sized holes, going deep underground; always interesting to consider all the life that is going on under our feet, and perhaps it was about time we got the wildlife camera out again to get some insight as to what goes on when nobody is around.

This coming Saturday, 17th April from 10 am to 12.30 pm, there is to be a plant sale and seed swap at the front of the Community Network in Cheriton High Street.  We are donating seeds and plants for this and all proceeds will go to our sister group Incredible Edible to support more planting and growing of fruit and vegetables in the community

Reminder – tomato plants will be available up at the garden from Wednesday 21st April.  Courgette plants to follow from mid-May.

What’s next?

Get to grips with unfinished jobs from last week:

  • Stake the raspberry patch
  • Plant the sweet peas
  • Continue the war on sycamore seedlings
  • Fill any lettuce gaps
  • Sow more celeriac and celery, plus start the sweet corn and courgettes
  • Keep watering carrot and parsnip beds plus pot plants and new plantings
  • Pot up herbs for the Incredible Edible sale
  • Start to pot up the tomato plants
Posted by Tim Prater in Sandgate Community Garden

Sandgate Community Garden: Update 4 April 2021

Happy Easter!

It was great to be able to work on the plot with more people this week due to the relaxing of the Covid rules.  We had cake on both garden sessions in celebration which went down very well, particularly Theresa’s carrot cake on the Saturday morning as it was freezing cold out there.  We had a couple of beautiful warm days at the start of the week, and since then it has gradually become colder again with the threat of frost and possible snow to come in the next few days. 

We really could now do with a good amount of rain to finally fill that pond to enable us to finish tidying the edges.  We have only had 51.3mm of rain in March, and with all the new sowings and plantings, we have managed to empty our water bowser already.   We have sown leeks, carrots, parsnips, celeriac and nasturtiums, plus some tree spinach and a few more flowering annuals such as cosmos and French marigolds.  We checked the new plantings for any casualties due to damage and replaced them with spare plants, and planted the perennials given to us by Morrison’s last week. 

Two spinach beds got planted up, and three with lettuce.  We have a few different lettuce varieties in shape and colour to make that salad bowl as interesting as possible.  The broad beans got staked, and time will tell if there are enough bees around willing enough to visit their flowers.   Some blossom is out on the old plum trees, and the maiden pear trees are trying hard to flower but it would be better if they remained closed for just a few more days until the cold snap has gone.

The kale has gone to flower and so they have been stripped and pulled up, the purple sprouting should be carrying on for a few more weeks as should the spinach from last year and the remains of the chard. 

We are waiting on several things to arrive in the post, which does not seem to have been very reliable of late.  Our new rhubarb plants have gone astray and we are told they could take up to a couple of weeks to arrive – always a worry when you have live plants in the postal system!  We are also waiting for our new tool box which has been on order for weeks!

The situation with the continual bombardment of sycamore seedlings continues.  Fortunately a few of our gardeners find pulling them out quite therapeutic and we probably have at least another couple of weeks of attacking them before the plague begins to subside.  Happily they make good compost but what a shame they are not edible too.

Incredible Edible news

The Incredible Edible team have been busy filling Cheriton High Street planters with new plants, and continuing work on the new herb garden.  The addition of a lovely new cherry tree to the garden is a reminder of the cherry tree orchards that apparently used to flourish in the area.

What’s next?

  • Any sign of the missing rhubarb?
  • Stake the raspberry patch
  • Possible planting of the sweet peas if they are ready
  • Continue the war on sycamore seedlings
  • Fill any lettuce gaps
  • Sow more celeriac and celery
  • Keep watering carrot and parsnip beds plus pot plants and new plantings
Posted by Tim Prater in Sandgate Community Garden

Sandgate Community Garden: Update 28 March 2021

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 21st 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
Posted by Tim Prater in Sandgate Community Garden

Sandgate Community Garden: Update 21 March 2021

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 21st 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
  • Sow more seeds!
Posted by Tim Prater in Sandgate Community Garden