A vegetable plot for pets - Spring update!

So - the enticing sunshine is back and some welcome dryness, but a tough start to spring with these cold winds. It has slowed things in the vegetable garden a little.

One of the raised beds has been planted up with fresh compost from our heaps with a dash of manure and is fully devoted to potatoes this year - an organic seed variety called Sunset. We planted on an east-west axis so don’t be surprised by the odd lines. Due to the variable weather and threat of frost we have put back our plastic cover for now.

Another of our raised beds has been turned over to a new venture this year - a pet salad bar. We are growing seeds specifically and scientifically designed for certain pets [in a nutritional sense]. We have rows for Tortoises, Hamsters, Cats, Dogs and Rabbits. If they grow well we are hoping to offer a pick your own salad bar for children to take home to their pets. Watch this space.  We are looking for a portrait of a Hamster to make up the visual signs for this bed. Please send a good headshot to Sarah. Sorry - all other portraits are already filled.

 Meanwhile onions and garlic are growing happily in a third bed, enjoying the frosts it would seem.

We have fully planted up the broad beans on the orchard side of the pergola tunnel (pictured) and some peas on the path side. They should give us some early crops and put nitrogen into the soil for us, a double bonus.

A blueberry has made it to the garden- sourced from a blueberry farm in Dorset who are among the first to grow blueberries in the UK commercially so we have high hopes. It certainly looks like a fine specimen and has been given a royal bed in between the apricots [both looking very fine too]. Ideally we need more than one. Although this variety is better at being self fertile, they are better with more than one so maybe we can spot places elsewhere that could receive one next year. This spot is actually quite mossy underfoot as well as sunny, so we are hoping it will appreciate the damp.

 The final bed will be sown this week with salad and maybe a few early carrots and beetroot, yum. We will of course sow some more landcress to replace the very popular and enduring row we had until last week [it had finally decided to run to seed having seemed indestructible].

 I am investigating the idea of having a wormery to complete our compost production area and generate some valuable worm casts for the potting up department. The Compost area has really gotten into its stride this last year under the careful eye of Geoff and we are creating a good temperature in the beds and, as a consequence, a healthy amount of good quality dark compost from our garden waste - locking in carbon and saving on trips to the tip. From our trial last year using it in the dahlia bed, no weed seeds emerged. A triumph!

It begins to become the heart and engine house of the garden. A way for us to feed the soil and add valuable structure.