It was such a beautiful day on the plot today, chilly, but glorious sunshine… it felt like Spring

And as it felt like Spring, we planted some daffodils next to the compost – they’ve been grown in pots but seem to be happy, they’re ‘Daffodil Sempre Avanti’…

Daffodil Sempre Avanti

We’d left the sprouts in the ground just to see what might happen as the first lot didn’t really do too well.  It seems we hadn’t left them long enough… the snow and frosts seem to have firmed them up quite nicely! They’re a little nibbled, but they’ll do

The last sprouts of the season

Day 1 of chitting!  We bought Swift and Home Guard seed potatoes today, from the plant man at the Victoria Hall in Oakham.  Egg boxes are perfect for chitting… just put the potatoes in with the end with eyes facing upwards – easy-peasy!

Swift and Home Guard potatoes ready to chit

Woohoo… after not planting any potatoes this year we dug up 8.5kg today!

Last year’s remnant decided to sprout up in our seedbed of leeks, so we have no leeks, just potatoes… can’t complain

Tomatoes are looking great, all green so far, but hopefully a bit of sunshine this week will have the glowing red!

Cauliflowers = disaster  Birds and bugs have got at them.

Lisa’s camping trip to North Yorkshire meant an opportunity to visit Helmsley and the stunning Walled Garden.

Helmsley Walled Garden is a charity, while it employs some staff much of the work is done by volunteers and all is funded by donations.

We were not really sure what to expect, but once we were through the gates – WOW! Really, it was that good!

There are wide borders, wildflower gardens, lawned areas, fruit trees, rose beds and a fantastic vegetable garden (dare I say much better than Barnsdale Gardens?)

At £5 per adult it is well worth its entrance fee.  Dogs on leads are more than welcome and there is also a small nursery, gift shop and vegetarian cafe.

Orchid House & Fabulous Borders

Allotment Garden

For more about Helmsley Walled Garden visit www.helmsleywalledgarden.org.uk

Finally planted out the Brussel Sprouts (‘Wellington’) that we bought from Barnsdale Gardens… they’re looking good so far, but they’ve a long way to go before they get onto our Christmas dinner plate!

Siobhan has promised to make Beef Wellington (geddit?!) once we harvest too, so the protection from pigeons begins now, with a bit of fun of course

We’ll have to resort to nets though given the advice from allotment neighbours, rather than our ‘oh, the pinwheels are so cute’ approach!

After our worries about the mildew we were delighted to see the roses blooming so beautifully…

A few weeks back we planted some artichoke tubers that we were given to us by our friend Katherine…

This is what’s coming up in the same spot, so we *think* it’s the artichokes!  We really have no idea!