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such a busy weekend in the garden and the allotment, it all began with these fellas, it's camellia sineses, aka Tea. leaves taken direct from the plant and steamed = green tea folks ! the seeds are enormous, like malteasers, and there were careful instructions to follow before planting. these have had their outer shells chipped, been soaked for 2 days and then been in the fridge for 2 weeks. i know it could be a while before i'm sipping a homegrown brew but i think the journey there could be really interesting. i found them on the good old interwebs from Chiltern Seeds if you fancy getting some of your own. there is a tea plantation in cornwall and i hear that they should be pretty hardy.
i'll start them off at home and some of them might graduate to the greenhouse at the allotment.then i set about some spring cleaning in my garden, transforming this:
into this:
and these old sunflower stalks:
into bug hotels:
ashley is going to see if he can fix these old chairs so that we have something to sit on at the allotment
then i emptied my compost bin, bursting with pride, and found reminders of all the beetroot that we ate last summer, it was growing in there, little pink leaves in the dark.
on sunday we spent a few hours at the allotment, kim and ashley moved the rhubard to a more suitable location, it put up quite a fight.tim and i got busy on our beautiful new potting table with some celeriac, onion, mulberry, leek and mallow seeds.
then we all went home with glowy cheeks and party bags
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this is a photo of the purple sprouting broccoli in my garden, it was planted at the same time as the patch at the allotment so we'll be keeping an eye out for it to be ready soonish.jo has very generously offered to help us transform an area of the plot into a forest / forage garden, using mainly perennial plants. i think this was something that we all liked the idea of but were a bit sketchy on the details. we're aiming to incorporate it with some manner of demonstration so that folks can recreate something similar at home, it'll probably be around the end of march.
Excitingly, 'A Transition Guide to Food' is in the making in the form of a book due out in the summer. we have participated in the questionnaire and supplied some photographs so if we're lucky we might get a mention.Ashley has been promoted and is now in charge of planting / what goes where, and when. please have a chat with him if you want to donate or plant anything specific or unusual.
isobel is planning a seed swap afternoon at the good food cafe, jewry lane. she has contacted several seed suppliers to request a few packets to get us going and was very pleasantly surprised by the avalanche of seed packets that arrived on her doorstep over the following days. happily, this means that even if you don't have any seeds to swap you will certainly be able to leave with some and clear instructions as to how to grow them. more details soon.
i was lucky enough to get some really great books for christmas:if you would like to read any of these i'm very happy to share.
lastly, if the weather is fine and the ground has warmed up a bit we shall endeavour to dig a pond this sunday morning, about 11ish get in touch if you'd like to help, or just show up.
