Sunday 28 April 2013

29/04/2013 Feeling Peachy

I was asked this week why apricots haven’t come into blossom. Fruit trees in general have suffered after last years’ poor summer. Pollinators failed to work in the cold wet weather, and any potential blossom was knocked off before any fruit could set. We had moderate success with our apples, but only because the allotment is in a sheltered pocket. There wasn’t a fruit to be seen at home.

As a consequence of this, the fruit trees put all their energy into leafy growth, and extra harsh pruning this winter.

I spoke to RV Rogers, and the Northern Fruit Group at the Harrogate Flower Show for possible reasons why apricots in particular would have suffered from the long harsh spring. The general consensus was that apricots flower early, and if they had put on a lot of whippy green growth last year, the wood wouldn’t be sufficiently ripe to support blossom. They could also be suffering from a lack of potassium in the soil, which would have been washed away with the heavy rains. If both leaf & flower buds have failed to grow, it may have succumbed to bacterial canker. Not so peachy after all...

28/04/2013 Harrogate Spring Flower Show

What a week... I have built my first two show gardens with my day job, which has been an utter baptism of fire. I had guessed at the long hours, non delivery of key kit, and general low level panic as plants struggled to shake off the harsh winter & flowers refused to bloom. I hadn’t anticipated the overwhelming sense of achievement as people pull together & the adrenaline rush of plunging plants into a frame and seeing a garden take shape. My muscles ache & my nose is scorched from the unforgiving winds that whipped across the site throughout the build. After the rush of the build, I made time to go back to the show on Friday as a visitor, to glory in the floral displays and elbow my way to favourite stands with the crowds. Do it again? In a heartbeat.

14/04/2013 Playing Chicken with Potatoes


Gardeners traditionally planted their potatoes on Good Friday. There appear to be two main reasons for this: one is that Good Friday was a public holiday when gardening could take place (not to be performed on a day of rest), and the second was to do with biodynamics, or planting by the phases of the moon.

Easter is the only Christian festival with a moveable date. Using the phase of the moon, the date is set as the first Sunday following the full moon after the Spring Equinox. Chucking your spuds in the ground then is supposed to give you a more successful crop.

I’m don’t know much about this school of planting, but I’m not sure that biodynamic theories could make allowances for the inches of snow covering the allotment on Good Friday this year. After tenderly nurturing the burgeoning sprouts on my chitting seed potatoes, I wasn’t prepared to lose the lot to a heavy frost (even if I could get down the slope into the site).

I chit my first earlies every year, by standing them in egg boxes on a shelf in the loft. They get some sun & a bit of warmth, but nothing to get them sprouting too soon. This spring, I have been picking off the new sprouts in an attempt to slow down their growth before the ground is warm enough to plant in. If I knock off too many eyes, the growing season (which is already a month behind) will be even more slowed. Playing chicken with potatoes...