Frost protection measures

Over the last couple of weeks I have been advised by various people to protect my seedlings during the frost season with hay.

Looking at the forecast for the next couple of days it looks like now is as good a time as any to implement this advice so this evening I went past a well known large shop and bought some hay bedding normally used by people with small animals as pets.

As it was dark, today presented the first opportunity for me to use the flood lights in the garden. They are so bright, and really were useful.

My hay. Hopefully it is multi-purpose and not only useful for rabbits and other small animals.

Slightly battered looking onions; I didn't cover these back up with their cloche after the weekend and unfortunately snow came back and before the snow, hail. Fingers crossed they haven't been bashed so hard they die :/

The broccoli, however, was covered with a cloche and therefore shows no ill effects of ice-beating from hail stones. The plants towards the bottom left of this picture have also had a bit of a growth spurt and are looking rather good :)

Starting to cover with hay; having never done this before I have no idea how much I should be putting over the top. My concern is that I may kill the plants by cutting off their sun (not that there is any sun at the moment but yeah).

The broccoli and onions covered in hay, and then the hay held down by the cloches.

Fingers crossed this doesn't back fire and I end up with lovely healthy plants after this period of cold has passed.

Either way, I'm learning.

If you have anything to add, please do shout and I will be very pleased of the advice.

Cheers

What a great idea...

This is just a quick update to link to a great idea I came across. I am definitely going to be trying this out with my tomatoes this year

http://skruben.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/how-to-self-watering-seed-starter-pots.html

Suffice to say I will be attempting to not grow more than 100 tomato seedlings this year either...

Anyway, I just wanted to share this.

Cheers

Close Up Progress plus Planting

Waking up this morning to bright sunshine (for what seems like the first time this year) I was filled with the feeling of twitchy fingers wanting to get out and do something in the garden.

I also noticed last night that the coriander is showing some corrugation on it's second growth which is great progress.

So today, I have some close up pictures of the progress my plants are making, now the snow has gone and spring feels like it is in the air *smiley face*

Coriander starting to show second growth, with the tell-tale corrugated leaves proving that yes, those tiny little specs which I planted all those weeks ago actually WERE coriander seeds. Soon I will be splitting these seedlings up into separate pots and will be able to give a few away to people (which I always like doing; sharing is caring as they say).

The mint has put up several new shoots, and this it the tip of one of them. The main growth that was there when I bought it is doing it's creeping-thing, leaning over and spreading across the windowsill. As soon as I am confident there will be no more frosts then this will be good to go outside.

A tiny lettuce seedling; however, the second growth is finally visible and from experience once you see that, it is about to go nuts and grow like the clappers. I'm so impressed this has survived all that snow, but I won't be planting that early again because there is just no point. I'm going to be checking this very regularly though as I reckon it will grow fast from now on.

The onions. There are a few clumps like this coming up, both from areas which were under the cloche and those which were not covered up. I hope that in the next month or two these are to a state where I can pull them as young onions and add them to a salad, maybe with the first of the lettuce leaves.

The broccoli, not really any different to what it was the week or two before the snow fell. Something looks like it is nibbling at the leaves too; it looks toothed rather than slug-shaped but I have no idea what could be doing that? Any ideas?

This is something I really cannot believe; all through the winter this plant has been producing beautiful looking oranges like these. And, as you've seen in previous blog posts, it has been putting height on in leaps and bounds over the last four weeks. I am really excited about how big it will get over the summer. Watch this space.

I also woke up with an urge to plant and so I have opened and set out the Basil and Oregano pot which was part of my Christmas present.

The unopened packet, with a very attractive wooden planter pair.

The package containing the Basil. Two bags of "planting material" (according to the packet) and a TINY packet of minuscule seeds.

The package containing the Oregano. A similar amount of "planting material" and a tiny packet containing slightly larger, but still little, seeds.

Planting material in the containers, "generously watered" and the seeds buried about 6mm under the surface. These are now sitting on our bedroom window, as this gets a lot of sun, and as per usual I am now waiting with great excitement to see the first green shoots. You can guarantee that I will be looking every single morning and you will be informed the minute something shows.

Finally this week I ordered the flower seeds to encourage pollinators to come to my garden. They are supposed to arrive this week so next weekend I could be quite busy (and my girlfriend quite annoyed as the house turns into a garden nursery).

I hope you are all out there starting to get busy in your gardens and getting ready for an exciting year or growing and producing food so you don't have to buy low quality low taste low fun supermarket junk.

Enjoy :)

After the snow has melted....

When I went to bed last night the snow was still several inches thick everywhere but, as was forecast, over night the rain came down and this morning all the snow was melted.

Including most of my snow man:

This is all that is left of my gardening snow man; oh well.

Anyway, the exciting part is that I have been out to check on my little seedlings and they (appear) to have survived that icy blast just fine.

The lettuce is looking the worst of the lot; I appear to have lost a couple of the seedlings which had originally sprouted, but I still have 4 little green things sticking out so fingers crossed they will now flourish and I can start eating freshly picked lettuce again - god I miss that taste!

The onions look a little sickly but I am most impressed to see that it seems like one of the plants which missed out on protection from the cloche even survived!!! wow!

The broccoli is the most healthy looking, but it hasn't really changed much in the last 3 weeks. I suppose that is hardly surprising though, considering it has been buried under several inches of snow all that time.

So there you have it, the cloches seem to have done their job (and one seedling survived even without a cloche).  I think I may start another set of each of these off in the next month or so, just see about timings. My feeling at the moment is yes, they have survived, but no they are not far enough along to have justified the expense of cloching them over.

To round this update off, I have pictures of my inside plants.

The Coriander. I have now moved this from the front room up onto the windowsill next to the Citrus tree. I like this picture because it shows how the slightly wonky growth is attempting to grow back towards the light. Incredible.

Citrus tree, complete with very nice looking oranges. I really must try eating them one of these days :) The new growth is really obvious in this picture too. I just hope we can manage to pack this and transport it successfully when we finally emigrate.

Last but not least, the mint. We normally have the blinds drawn behind this and you can again see the imperative that a plant has for the light, as the growth is extending so it can reach the gap between the blinds. This will have to put situated outside as soon as the weather improves. It smells amazing when you just brush a leaf too.

So there you are, the snow does not appear to have killed my outdoor plants, and my indoor ones are going very well indeed.

I hope you enjoyed my update.

Snowy snow man

I built myself a snow man!!!

As you can see it's a gardening snow man, with handy tools for hands. He also supports the Sale Sharks and is wear a communist fur hat because he can tell the direction this country is going on (hehe < /politics>)

Me with my snow man!

I had a lot of fun building this, but I struggled with making the head cos the snow kept sticking to my gloves, and I couldn't really roll the head into a nice round shape.

Oh well.

Anyway, remembering this is a gardening blog, I also took some pictures of the outside plants again.

Oooops I think the cloche isn't really meant to be under THIS much snow (the lettuces are probably growing under there somewhere)

More snow on cloches...

I am glad that I repositioned this cloche over the onions. There is a chance the plants (about 5 or 6) which managed to hide under the cloche will be ok. I very much doubt the seedlings which are now totally covered with snow will survive.

Anyway, that was my attempt to pretend this update is about gardening, and nothing to do with my SNOW MAN!

Icy Update

As we withstand this icy blast I figured I'd pop outside and see how my little plants are doing.

Today is snowy, but it's not as cold as before but everything is still frozen, including the soil which the seedlings are attempting to thrive in. It was so frozen that I could not even put the tent pegs back in to hold down the cloches, so I'll have to hope there is no high winds before the thaw.

Anyway, let's get to the pictures.

The lettuce cloche, doing it's job and keeping the snow and cold off the seedlings.

Little lettuce seedlings; these are struggling particularly if you consider that we would have been eating these by this stage, if they had been planted in summer. They are still going though, bless them.

Broccoli cloche, less snowed on after I moved it to attempt to hang the thai boxing bag.

The Broccoli seems to be doing OK so far; the cloche is perfectly sized for the pot and has really sealed well to keep cold away.

Unfortunately you cannot say the same for the smaller cloche on the Onions, in the triangular pot. This picture was taken after I poured a little bit of water over the frozen soil to try and loosen it a bit.

The Broccoli on the left, and Onion on the right. You can see how the cloche on the onions is too small for the planter. One lesson learned there.

My watering can, totally frozen solid.

The nozzle of the watering can frozen right to the very end. Suffice to say I had to use a receptacle from inside for pouring water on my onions.

Just in case this update has left you feeling cold and icy, I have also seen that the Citrus tree has had a sudden spurt of growth.

Top left is a large amount of new growth from the Citrus Tree. It also has three oranges on it, which I will probably eat this weekend and report back on next time.

So there you have it, the seedlings are not dead (yet) and the cloches appear to be doing their jobs.

Keep growing.

Whisky Part 3 - Ardbeg and others

Seeing as the weather (snowy) is not conducive really to gardening, and I have a free weekday night, AND finally tomorrow is my next whisky night I decided to do another blog this evening with some more of my bottles of whisky.

I know how fascinated you all are about this part of my life.

As you will know if you are a regular reader, I am a massive fan of Islay whiskies. Today I am focusing on Ardbeg, probably my favourite of all the Islays to drink. I am also introducing a couple of bottles bought very cheap from Lidl or some such shop. Finally I have a collectors bottle, and the crown in my collection, which will be opened on the day my emigration plans come to full fruition.

So, without any further ado, here is the whisky.

 Ardbeg Almost There. Part of the brilliant concept Ardbeg came up with to build towards the first release of their new 10 year spirit. Ardbeg had been shut down for a long time before the distillery was brought back to life and these new expressions were started. This bottle was bought me by my best mate many years ago, and is so close to being finished. I can't bring myself to bottom it out though.

Ardbeg We've Arrived "Renaissance". This is the final part of the series mentioned above. This was also bought me by my best mate, and is lovely. I should drink this more but I have too many and forget about it. I will put that mistake right though soon.

Ardbeg Corryvreckan. This is the most recent Ardbeg that I have bought, picked up at a Whisky Lounge event a few months ago. This is an excellent dram and I would highly recommend it to any and all of you. If you are not aware, Ardbeg is one of the most heavily peated of all whiskies (ignoring crazy/special expressions produced by Port Charlotte and Bruichladdich like Octamore) but they manage to bring the peat, while retaining complexity and interest. This is not a harshly peated aggressive drink. It is wonderfully tasty.

Glen Marnoch 18 year. This was a bargain picked up purely down to price. Sadly (in my opinion at least) it lives up to that price and is a very disappointing drink. I like a whisky which I can savor, which when I drink has a start, a middle and (possibly 2-3 mins after the first taste) a satisfying and long end. This has a relatively promising start, but just disappears and never comes back. Oh well, one for the shelf and to give to people I don't like very much.

Glen Marnoch 24 year. This was bought with the previous bottle, but I have not tried it yet. Again, it was bought purely on price (£24 for a 24 year malt is not to be ignored) but I have very low hopes. Suppose that just means I won't be disappointed (I hope).

Clynelish Cask Strength. This is one of my "never to be drunk" bottles as this is signed by everyone who worked at the distillery at the time I visited. Clynelish is built on the same location as the legendary Brora distillery and what I wouldn't give for a bottle of Brora 25. Oh well, one can dream :)

Royal Lochnagar Special Reserve. This is the cherry on top of my whisky collection cake. When we visited the distillery we tried each of their bottles and this, by far the most expensive, was so outstanding and tasty we both bought a bottle. I am quite excited about tasting it again and hope my plans to get the f*ck out of this horrible country comes together very soon so I can.

There you are, another brief foray into my whisky collection.

I hope you enjoyed it, and I promise I'll be back to gardening updates next time.

Cheers