Page 37 - Simply Veg 1 2024

March 2024
I asked you last month to finish your ground preparation and get your beds ready for sowing and planting. This is because there are several crops that can be sown or planted now. Rake some general fertiliser such a fish, blood and bone into the ground first and get the soil as fine as you can.
Many seeds are sown in drills, the length of the bed, made with your finger or a cane about a centimetre deep. Sow the seeds as thinly as you can and when they germinate, they are thinned in stages to their final spacings. Seeds that can be sown this way are radish, salad onions, salsify, scorzonera, carrots, parsnips, beetroot, lettuce, cabbages, cauliflowers, peas and broad beans. The seeds of broad beans and
peas are, of course, large enough to sow individually at their final positions and push them into the soil with your finger. Try to keep broad bean seeds upright rather than lying flat. For peas, choose a round seeded variety such as Douce Provence (most suppliers), and Meteor ( D.T.Browns and Fothergills) because they are hardier than wrinkled seeded varieties. Having just said that all these seeds can be sown in drills
I still prefer to sow lettuce and beetroot
in cell trays, three or four in each cell and thinned to one when they germinate and cabbage, cauliflower in small pots, three or four in each and peas singly in small pots in the greenhouse. They don’t need extra heat to germinate so just leave them on the staging or on a shelf.
I grow parsnips and long carrots in tubes made from builders damp proof material,
or large drums of compost. I grow short carrots in small drums or buckets or in bore holes in the ground filled with fine compost.
Shallots in frame
Subjects that do benefit from extra heat for germination are tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, aubergines, and celery. I described the sowing of all these last month and you can still sow them now if not done before.
I mentioned last month that there are a few half hardy annual flowers that benefit from being sown early. The vast majority, though, are sown this month. Some that
I sow in March every year are marigolds, cosmos, nicotiana, rudbeckia, stocks, and ageratum. They are all sown as I described last month.
Hardy annuals can be sown outside, direct in the beds where they are to grow. Just rake the soil as fine as you can and broadcast the seeds thinly and rake them in. Then thin them out in stages when they germinate to their final positions. However, I still sow mine in the greenhouse as
described for half hardy ones. One reason is that I don’t usually have my ground ready so early.
Sweet peas can be sown in October
and overwintered if you want early flowers, but I don’t sow mine till this month. They need some sort of support to grow on such as netting, trellis or canes. I dig trenches
for them as I described in January for runner beans. I now make a structure of
8 foot canes on these trenches tied to horizontal canes at the top with shorter canes between the two rows and diagonal ones to strengthen the structure. You can sow two seeds at the base of each cane and reduce them to one if both germinate. However, I sow mine in small pots (drinking cups) in the greenhouse as I do for peas and plant them out later after hardening off.
So much for sowing, so what can we plant? Whatever you plant, rake in some general fertiliser first. Onion sets can now be planted plant them 6 inches (15 cm.) apart with their tops just showing above the soil. I get them cropping earlier by starting them in pots in the greenhouse and planting them out later. The most popular varieties are Sturon ( D.T.Brown and Mr Fothergill), Stuttgart (same suppliers) and Centurion (most suppliers). Garlic also can be planted as I described in January and also rhubarb.
If you planted shallots in pots in December which is the traditional time, they can now be planted out in the beds. You could also pot them up into larger pots, as I do then they are larger plants when planted out.
Another crop that could also be planted now is asparagus. The crowns are planted in a shallow trench with a mound in the centre. The roots are spread over this mound about 15 inches (37cm.) apart. Also, Jerusalem artichokes can be planted at this time, the same distance apart. You can also start planting early potatoes now if you want an early crop, but I don’t plant
Tomato seedlings potted up
Simply Vegetables 37