Not being a spreadsheet minded
person I can’t give the full, in depth, results of the garden, but I
can report that although the carrots came out interesting shapes and
most of the Kohlrabi turned out like cannonballs in taste and texture,
we won’t ever be short of aubergines this winter. The potatoes did
pretty well too: Being of a lazy disposition, I’d planted them in the
‘no dig’ beds in the hope that they would break the soil down nicely and
for once my cunning plan worked. The resulting spuddies tasted good as
well, so next year I’ll be getting a few more kilos*, and use them to
break down the beds where the courgettes and pumpkins clobbered the
weeds this year. Collecting the order from the farmers shop will involve
climbing up the Hill of Doom with bike full of seed potatoes, which I
suspect will generate a blog entry in itself.
The other goal of the year was to start
collecting seeds, so to this end I deliberately avoided F1 varieties
(cross bred plants which are meant to combine the best properties of
both previous plants) as apparently the advantages don’t last to the
next generation, and last week I started drying out the seeds while I
still can and getting them ready to store for next year. This is my
excuse for why several lettuces and most of the spinach have bolted:
it’s so I can collect the seeds, honest, not because I was in the UK and
then too sloppy to harvest the things.
The flip side of this cunning plan is of
course that I can only collect seeds from what grew well, so if I want
any French beans, basil, or tomatoes, I’ll have to order them, whereas I
have enough seeds to grow more yellow courgettes than any right
thinking person would ever want…
*Obviously I can’t remember what variety they are. What do you take me for, a proper gardener?
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