A rocky start

The potatoes FINALLY made it into the ground last Sunday. They were EXTREMELY well-chitted!

Several seedlings had popped up their heads in my seedling tray. I promptly got overexcited and put the trays outside in the new greenhouse (three-tier, plastic-covered) for the day and cooked them. So I'll be starting again today. There was only one survivor, a Purple Calabash tomato that has subsequently popped up its head in the tray which I hadn't emptied!

New year, new plantings

I have been very neglectful of the garden lately - but in my defence it is winter! There's some broccoli and cauliflower slowly coming along (no sign of any heads forming as yet), four leeks down the end of the garden that appear to be thriving (comparatively speaking of course, my previous efforts being very dismal) a single lettuce to eat, and lemons ripening up. We're eating carrots and parsnips from time to time but it's fair to say they are definitely on the petite side! And the rhubarb has sadly passed away.

Looking forward to the new season, last week the garlic went in. This year I started fresh with new NZ-grown organic garlic from Ceres - one of these looked like it might be elephant garlic rather than ordinary (either that or I've just planted a very strange mutant), and I planted a total of 8 ordinary-looking cloves and 2 mutant ones. Time will tell!

I also visited the garden centre to check out seed potatoes. They had several different varieties, all first earlies, but no Jersey Bennes which I was hoping for. Instead I purchased a bag of Rocket variety and they are now chitting away. These seed potatoes are enormous compared to the Heather variety I had last year....

Carrots!

Well, not just yet. Can't quite remember when (the Monday before Christmas I think? so 21st December), but I did some direct sowing of beetroot, carrots (new!), parsnips (new!), peas, spring onions and red spring onions (new!), rocket, lettuce and mesclun. I've been having to hose the garden every other morning as it's been relatively dry, but there's germination now from everything with the stubborn exception of the Danyelle lettuce - this is the second sowing of this and absolutely nothing. The success of the Cos lettuce makes up for it though, these are lovely and crisp and look great in the ground as well on the plate.

I think next year I will ditch the mixed mesclun and just sow the few things we like within that mix - if only I can figure out what they are! Baby spinach is definitely one, and a buttercrunch-type. That, along with the cos and the rocket, should cover our lettuce needs.

I never got around to removing that first pea plant that died - and oddly enough, several days after my last post it suddenly decided to send up fresh new shoots from its base! I'm waiting until these new shoots are tall enough to reach my first "rung" of string before trimming off the old dead growth, and there's already a tiny pod in the new growth. There's also three new pea plants from the pre-Christmas sowing, so things are looking up on the pea front.

The potatoes taste awesome, by the way.

Delight or disappointment?

Feeling slightly neglectful of both the garden and the blog at the moment. In my defence, there's been a few disappoinments on the gardening front, so here's a roundup of delights vs disappointments for everything that's currently in the ground, in an entirely random order.

Strawberries - delight! The odd single strawberry last year has given way to a veritable bounty this year, I'm having a couple of strawberries each day on my cereal and there's plenty left for snacks and desserts. The garden bed where the one plant became dozens via the miracle of runners seems to be the right spot, and I'm getting better quantities and better sizes from the ones in the ground versus the ones in containers.

Leeks - delight! Well, sort of. The one in the ground has sprouted up and developed what must be a flower or seed head - the whole thing looks very elegant and swan-like but the leek itself has stopped fattening up. I think I'm just going to eat it. I also have four germinated leek seedlings.

Rosemary - disappointment. I think my enormous rosemary bush is on its last legs, it has dying spots all over the place

Tomatoes - delight! These seem to have gone from small seedlings to fully grown plants in no time and there's baby tomatoes on there now.

Cherry tomatoes - disappointment. I only have one successful seedling of the Mexican Midget cherry tomatoes, and one might-make-it-or-might-not seedling of the Henry's Dwarf tomatoes, and both have only been planted out today which is pretty late. Fingers crossed they'll perk up and give me a good late season crop though.

Potatoes - delight! The plant tops are horridly raggedy, with the plants in containers practically dying off. I thought this was a bad sign and there was something wrong with them, but perhaps not because there are actually potatoes under there! I've dug up half a dozen small and medium sized potatoes from under the mostly-all-dead plant and will be having them for dinner.

Catnip - delight! Assuming I needed commercial quantities of catnip, of course, which I don't. However I have successfully made a catnip toy for the cat which went down very well, and there's plenty more where that came from. It's trying to smother the lemon tree!

Capsicum - disappointment and delight. My Jingle Belles plant I'd had inside over winter didn't like the conditions outside and has died, I didn't have much luck germinating either more of these or any of the wonderful Burpees from two years ago, but I do have one Alma Paprika that's doing well and was planted out today.

Basil - disappointment. I only had three seedlings to plant out today, far from the border of nine around the tomatoes I had envisaged (although the tomatoes have grown so well there's no room for nine basil). There won't be much pesto for Tiny Tim next Christmas.

Garlic - disappointment. I think the overall quantity (8) is right but I'm afraid that it's not going to be good news under the ground when time comes to dig these up. One's died off (the black aphids swarmed the runt, even though it had been a wet couple of weeks and I though the aphids only showed up when the plant was stressed for water), and several of the others have two or three shoots rather than the one strong sturdy one they should have. I think next year I will buy fresh garlic to plant from, rather than using my own (this year's was 2nd generation).

Watermelon - disappointment, couldn't get any germination. I'll get some fresh seeds next year. I do have a seedling of rockmelon though, which I planted out today.

Pea - disappointment. It was growing, even had a few pods on it, but has suddenly died.

Lettuce - disappointment (Danyelle - no germination at all) and delight (Cos - looking really good although not quite ready to sample yet)

Rhubarb - delight - growing strongly. I also have a second seedling in a pot that looks really good but I can't justify more than one plant with the space we have available.

Eggplant - disappointment. All my egpplant luck was obviously used up on the germination front this year, I had the seedlings ready and planted out much earlier than last year but one's died, another's on its way and the last one is still hanging in there but has a definite failure to thrive.

Potato go nuts

The potatoes are growing fast! The ones planted in the ground have been earthed up a couple of times and I've now filled in the trench they were planted in. The ones in tubs also need covering up and I'll get around to doing that tomorrow.

The seedlings have been outside in the mini greenhouse for a week and are doing well. The courgettes need planting out already, but we haven't had much good weather on weekends lately to be able to do that. Regardless of the weather, this weekend I'll be able to do the second spring sowing - this will be of capsicums and herbs since I didn't have any much germination luck on the first round of sowing, plus whatever else I had put aside till it was slightly warmer.

The great race

And the winner is....... indoor courgette! It hasn't quite poked its head above the soil yet but a big mound of disturbed soil has appeared on the surface. Outdoor courgette - in the greenhouse - had dried out (mental note, must remember to check daily), so I imagine the soaking of water it just got will help it germinate.

Also on stage accepting their germination medals are: dali tomato, watermouth tomato, green zebra tomato, tigerella tomato, rhubarb and basil.

I'm hoping the others haven't withdrawn from competition altogether. It has only been a week though....

In other news, I have planted the remaining few seed potatoes in tubs - the old recycle bins now have a new use!

Potato

Solanum tuberosum, variety "Heather" from Burnets, purchased at Kings Plant Barn.

Store the seed potatoes in the dark until you need them, then place in the light to chit. Varieties can be categorised as early (plant in early spring, ready for eating by Christmas!), second-early, and main (plant by early summer) - apparently in Auckland they will grow year-round though unless you happen to get frost at your house. Once the seed potatoes are well sprouted - ie have taken on an alien-like appearance, which takes up to a month - plant 5-10cm deep, 30-40 cm apart with 60cm between the rows. Recently composted or manured soil will give the best results.

Every couple of weeks as they grow you need to keep covering up the lower leaves and shoots with soil - it's these shoots that produce potatoes and the potatoes themselves can't be exposed to the light. Water regularly, particularly as the plants flower. After flowering the plants will die back, and the potatoes are then ready to be dug up. If dug up while still flowering the potatoes should be eaten immediately, but for optimal storage you should wait until the plant has completely died down. The early varieties will take around 12 weeks, and the main varieties 16 to 20 weeks. Let freshly-dug potatoes dry on the ground for a few hours before storing in the dark.

Today I planted a row along the back fence, tucked behind the orange tree where only the cat goes. Turns out there wasn't much space there at all - only 7 seed potatoes. Others will be going in our now-superceded recycling bins - recycling the recycling bins! These might be easier as I can half-fill the containers, plant the potatoes, then add more garden mix to earth them up as they grow - hopefully they'll be flowering before I run out of height! I need to trot down to the garden centre to get some garden mix though.

Progess

A photographic update - first is the sage. I discovered today while weeding that my three sage plants, previously looking very bedraggled and sorry for themselves, have sprung to life, all lush and bushy.

Next up is a chitting potato - I wish I had a macro lens!

And lastly, my single solitary leek is now as thick as my finger - a little too soon to hope that one day I'll be able to eat my nemesis, but noticeable progress over the last couple of weeks.

Snails

It's a full moon tonight which means I shouldn't sow the seed trays this weekend. Next Wednesday is an excellent time to sow root crops though, so I will wait until Wednesday evening to plant out the potatoes, and get the seeds underway then as well.

That leaves this weekend free to do some more weeding and tidying up in preparation. My gardening by the moon calendar tells me that the spring full moon is the prime time for snails - this explains why I keep finding so many in the strawberry planters! Daily checks, and possibly some beer baits, are called for to keep them under control. I wonder if that's what's been nibbling on the two pea seedlings? (now down to one, thanks to the nibbling)

Sneaky Spring

It's definitely an early spring here. This weekend I hope to start the first batch of seed trays for the season - around three weeks earlier than originally planned but given how warm it is there's no time like the present.

Another thing I'll need to do this weekend is plant out the potatoes. They've been chitting for a month, and aren't as impressive as I'd hoped but I'm sure they'll do fine. On Saturday I'll need to weed the patch of garden that half of them are going into, and go and buy some garden mix for the pots for the other half. Apparently potting mix is too "loose" for potatoes and a stodgy mix is required for the best results.

Potato chitting

Rumour has it that you can just chuck a potato in the ground, forget about it, then accidentally discover lots more potatoes several months later when you're digging around for some other reason. I've never grown potatoes, and while it seems that it's not quite that easy, it also can't be too hard.....

Yesterday I purchased some seed potatoes from the garden centre (Heather, a second-early good allrounder apparently - not much choice as I left it too late, next year I will get organised and order some interesting varieties from Koanga instead). The ever-reliable Royal Horticultural Society's Vegetables in a Small Garden tells me I should be storing them indoors, exposed to light, with the eyes face up, so that they can sprout, or "chit", before planting them out.

In Auckland you can apparently grow potatoes all year round so I'm not that fussed about when they make it into the ground or when they come out! I've added a reminder to my new Google Calendar widget (you can see that in the right-hand bar of the blog) to check on them for planting out in a month's time.