The Edible Garden and seed sowing

There is a very interesting programme on the tv tonight (BBC2 at 8pm) called The Edible Garden. It seems just my sort of thing. As I may have said before, I love the idea of having edible gardens and landscapes, especially forest gardens. I'm hoping this programme will give give me some ideas and inspiration (and eye candy!).

It seems that the presenter, Alys Fowler (as seen on Gardener's World I think - didn't have tv on site so am out of the loop on such things) will attempt to live off home grown vegetables, without turning her garden into an allotment.

I must admit to secretly dreaming of living mainly off my own produce, but I think it will be a gradual process. For one thing, I'm vegetarian and have had a difficult time trying to get soya beans to germinate for me this year. I had planned to try some in the tunnel, but that is no longer an option. I think I'd starve if I had to rely on my own resources for soya. Mind you, I do have a plentiful supply of protein from eggs.

Anyway, I digress. I do love the idea of integrating vegetable growing into the garden as a whole, rather than in lines or rows - or even formal beds. Now, I haven't quite managed this in the tunnel last year. Yet, looking back, I did integrate some flowers in with the veg.

I had a herb and flower patch by my folding chair.

The flax had beautiful blue flowers (gone to seed in this photo) as well as giving me edible seeds.

I planted nasturtiums on the edges of the borders, but they are thugs and did take over in some places. The worked really well in with the leeks. Here they are at the base of some sunflowers.

Nasturtium and flax made a good combination.

Of course, some vegetables look very ornamental and pretty anyway. Climbing beans are an obvious example, but there are others, such as these onions below.

I do plan a mixed cottage garden / herb garden which should have some veggies dotted around the place, but I'm wondering now if there is a way to grow the majority of my veg 'in a garden setting'. Hmm. Since the tunnel came down, the beds there are looking VERY linear. Yes, lots to think about.

As well as such musings, we (well Sam actually) did some more 'weeding' of the drive at my aunts (after a couple of days where wind and rain stopped play).

I decided to tackle some more seed sowing. I'm not 100% of this years 'revised' plans yet, as we still can't be sure when we're back on site (so don't know when we can plant down there) but I can also give away any excess seedlings.

Inside, I have my 'pet' peanut - I grew it as a trial, from supermarket raw peanuts. I'll try it on a windowsill this year.

Here are some basil and celery that I started a while back.

Here we are today, in my aunts barn .. which is slowly being taken over by my plants and seeds - oops.

On the ground are some mini salad leaves I started in January (they were a bit sulky after spending too long indoors on the windowsill).

Here, left to right are my tomatoes and melons, onions and salad and todays mixed sowing of all sorts (marigolds, rocket, celery leaf etc)

Here is a cucumber (from an early test to see if the seed was still viable) and a tray with oriental leaves (up as seedlings) and some new sowings - leeks, lettuce and other goodies.

Here are some onions I started from seed earlier in the year. Even if they don't grow full size, I find them useful as small onions.

Here's a close up of the melons and tomatoes (from seed testing earlier in the year - I just can't bear to throw them out if they germinate - so I'll have to find some cover for them this summer).

Here, I've decided to test some potato planters and I have put 2 first earlies and 1 second early in today. It's a little late, but better late than never. I'm unsure if I'll get a good result - and generally find spuds good for breaking up new ground, but, this year planters are an easy was to get a taster of home grown spuds.

The browny orange bags are also 'planters' and, getting desperate to get planting I thought I could start some things off in them and they could later come down to site with us. Have to decide exactly what to put in them now.

My kind of gardening

Well, I've planned my vegetable beds, started off my broad beans and onion seeds. What now?

The site is still closed for the moment, so, I fall to dreaming about the garden and gardening.

The beauty of nature is a constant inspiration to me - from cloud patterns in the sky, to the feel of a breeze or the unfurling of a flower - I find it truly magical. The blending of individual plants to create a garden is true alchemy in my mind. I must admit that nature creates the finest gardens of all, but, isn't imitation the finest form of flattery?

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I've always been a fan of the cottage garden, not too formal and brimming with a colourful mix of flowering plants and vegetables. I love a garden that can be productive and beautiful all at once. I find myself increasingly interested in the productivity of my own garden, especially since starting to grow my own food and herbs. These days I like everything to earn its keep! Does it taste good, look good, attract beneficial insects?

(A good book for mixing vegetables and flowers in a potager style is Joy Larkcom's 'Creative Vegetable Gardening')

I've always practiced organic gardening, as I find chemicals (fertilizers, insecticides etc) unnecessary and prefer things as close to nature, the better. I'd rather put up with a few aphids than spray. I like tending to my plants anyway and that helps me catch any problems early on.

As I've become more interested in my garden being productive on many levels, I've also developed a keen interest in permaculture. Permaculture is, in essence, a design system modeled on natural ecosystems and the connections between the different elements within it.

(This book, 'permaculture In A Nutshell', is a great introduction to the subject.)

In terms of my garden I see it as a way of making my space as harmonious, productive and sustainable as possible. I'm really only at the start of that journey now. We haven't even been on the site for a year, so I'm still looking to see where is windy, where the frost pockets may be, where the sun falls over the seasons. I have placed the polytunnel as close to the house as is feasible, as I know from my last garden that I need to be able to SEE my vegetables in order to tend to them well.

As the old saying goes ' the gardener's shadow is the best fertilizer'. Hence, the kitchen garden will be as close to the back door as possible, with pots of herbs right outside the back door.

My love of vegetables doesn't mean that you won't be seeing any flowers in my garden. There's always room for a few flowers in the raised beds and the tunnel, and they can be valuable for attracting pollinating insects, as well as looking great (and being edible if you use nasturtium or calendula) and sometimes being good companions for certain veg e.g. basil and tomatoes.

Last year I loved the flowers of the flax and how their petals fell like confetti onto the squash leaves below.

I also couldn't be without my sunflowers (or their tasty seeds), and the marigolds always make me smile.

One of the most exciting types of garden, for me, is the forest garden. This really is aiming to mimic nature by adopting the layered structure of the forest edge - the most productive part of a forest (here I am back to productivity again - I sound like a businessman preaching to his workforce .. yet, why not, it's just getting the most out of a space and doesn't detract from the beauty or vitality). The canopy can be fruit trees, then a lower layer of nut bushes and fruit trees (on smaller rootstocks), followed by soft fruit and then a ground cover of perennial herbs and vegetables. The late Robert Hart's garden in Shropshire is said to be a great example of this.

I can hardly wait to have a go myself, but I imagine I'll have to wait a year or so before I'm really ready to do it. Priorities are to keep the polytunnel going well and to get the kitchen garden started. Mind you, there's no harm in getting an area ready - I can always start it off with a few potatoes to get it up and running and clear the ground. Hmm, I'd better keep reminding myself that we do still have a house to build!

Rumor is that it shouldn't be too long before we can get back on track with the build, so I'll dust off that lovely hard hat and start crossing my fingers.

Growing our own and gardening over time

Now I'm away from site for a few days my mind turns to growing stuff. There is just so much that I want to grow. I relish the idea of eating our own home grown veg. It isn't just the taste factor, it is the thrill of seeing the plants grow from those first tiny sprouts into full grown beauties.
I get awestruck whenever I stop to think about the abundance of nature- how one plant, one fruit even, such as the tomato, provides us with so may seeds, so we can keep growing and always have some to spare. That image always helps me feel supported by nature.

The thing is - I want to grow EVERYTHING. I know that we'll be busy building and I keep saying that we'll start with a few things in pots around the house this first year, but I'm desperate to really get started. I'm not sure if we'll have time to make the raised beds this spring (and it is good to have time to really plan where they are to go) - but we could try a couple.
To ease my desperation to 'get started' I've decided that we'll get a polytunnel this spring. That means that we'll have somewhere to start plants off (Sam is very adamant that I won't be using the windowsills in the shell of the house for plant propagation - how well he knows me!). Actually, I think the polytunnel will be great here in Leitrim for keeping the rain off and giving shelter to the plants (and any washing - I've seen many a polytunnel with a line of drying clothes down the middle. I guess that is 'cos we get a lot of rain showers here - but sometimes sun inbetween them).

I haven't always been obsessed with growing veg. In our last home in Cambridgeshire, England, we had a sweet garden mainly full of shrubs and flowers.

We had a small potager, but never really used it enough. It was our first owned garden and I just loved pottering round it. I wasn't bothered if it got a bit wild and weedy, I just adored wathcing things grow, flower, self seed etc.

Since then, the obsession with growing our own has grown within me. It isn't in a 'lets reduce food miles' way, it is more a fascination that I CAN do this myself and that I'll know my food will be of good quality and well loved. It pleases me to be a part of the growing process - part of the natural cycle in a way.

I haven't grown much in the past two years since moving. I could have made an effort (we live with my aunt and she is happy with us doing some planting in her garden), but I feel like saving my energies for our own garden. That being said, I did try a few things last year, the most successful of which was our tomatoes (bought as plug plants), which despite the rain and lack of sun thrived in my aunt's glass roofed barn. I also tried sweetcorn and squash but they got washed out. I grew garlic in pots and the next generation of them were sown in December in pots, to take down to Leitrim. Some of them already have tips showing (see below - garlic and strawberries).

I have also started a few tomatoes from last years seed. This was by accident as I left the seeds to ferment for too long (you ferment the seed for a few days in the pulp to remove the inhibitor for sprouting) and a few had already started sprouting. I couldn't dry them so thought it best to plant them. I also started a batch of basil at the same time - both pots are on the windowsill (while I'm still allowed to have them there!) and I use an old cheeseboard with a clear plastic cover as a propagator.


I'm not sure how I'll whittle down my wishlist of veg to grow this year to a manageable size. I have visions of trying grains, such as quinoa and amaranth, as well as the staples like potatoes, onions, carrots, peas, cabbages, herbs etc. and I still need time to help build the house .. unless we go live in the polytunnel for the summer :-)

Over the past couple of days my love of growing flowers, shrubs etc for scent and wildlife has been re-kindled, so it will be interesting to see how I marry productivity and beauty. There will be flowers in the veg beds, but also wildlife areas. Eventually, I'll have have a wooded area - and a forest garden (with edible plants). That is one of the perks of having such a big plot that backs onto woodland .... I can give a sense of the woodland extending into the lower field and then, as we get nearer the house it becomes more intensely productive.

Permaculture books call this zoning - having the things that need most attention nearest the house, for example the veg beds, rather than having them tucked away at the end of the garden where they're easily out of sight and out of mind. I like that idea - and it makes it easy to use produce when it's ready - as you can see it out the window of the house!

Anyway, it's time to go buy some seeds before I'm sucked into the build again.