4/1/25 - More Prep and Parsnip Harvest

While the country seems to be battening down ready for snowmageddon and temperatures struggle to get above 1 degree, I took the chance to take up a car load of stuff to kit out the polytunnel, ready for spring planting. So armed with trays, modules, bags of compost and whatever else I could find that I thought wouldn't look out of place in the tunnel, I loaded up the car.

The polytunnel will go through different phases of use ranging from sowing and nurturing, potting and growing on and then the main growing season. So, I've prepared it for the first wave of use, sowing and nurturing. Over the last couple of years, I've collected old trays from a skip and bought a good collection of reusable modules from containerwise and now I've set all these up on the shelves ready for it all to go on. In addition, I've also bought a collapsible table which fits nicely at the end of the tunnel and that I can use as a potting bench. Once I'm done with it, it can be collapsed and stored away for the summer until I need the workspace again. Plus, in preparation for tomato growing outdoors, I've also taken delivery of some tomato planters (which I have never used before) and stashed those in the tunnel, ready for mid spring.

The tunnel is now almost ready to go. I'm just waiting for the final delivery of more quad grows for the right hand bed.  When I finished the tunnel last week, I put a max/min thermometer in there too. Temperatures have dropped a lot in recent days, but equally, when the sun has been out, the tunnel has warmed up nicely. With overnight snow forecast, I'd like to see what the temperature does over the next 24 hours.

There were a couple more jobs on the list and some parsnips to harvest, so next thing, I started looking at the hooped bed.  We put this bed together last year and it was our first undercover growing space which we ended up using to grow chillies. Now that we have more indoor growing space in the form of the tunnel, I've been thinking about how we can use the hooped bed for this season. I've decided to grow direct in the ground rather in pots this year.  The soil in the bed has been fallow for at least 2 years as we have never grown anything direct in it, but it does have a bit of bindweed that we will need to keep on top of. For the time being though, I've added some organic matter in the form of digestate to half the bed.  When I've found somewhere to store the other bits and bobs in the other half of the bed, I'll add more to the other half too. Then, it's just a matter of leaving it rot down and allow the worms to do their thing.

The last job for this visit was on the carrot bed. We harvested the last of the carrots last week, and I've already mulched the bath with a bag of compost. All that remained was to remove the carrotfly netting and fit the perspex covering over the top. This means that when the temperature starts to warm up at the start of spring, the plastic will help warm the soil, ready for sowing the 2025 crop.

There are always jobs to do on the plot, but it was only a quick visit for today. Depending on if we have snow or not will depend what or if I do anything tomorrow. In the meantime, thanks for reading 😁