Saturday 23 February 2013

In the greenhouse today...


 
 
... a couple of weeks ago I started some seeds indoors and today I took them out to the greenhouse to transplant them.
 
 
 
 
The artichokes and...
 
 
...the leggy leeks.  I've always sown my leeks directly in the ground and the results have not been consistant; last year we had a cold wet spring and my leeks didn t amount to much.  I inherited my love of gardening from my grandfather and I remembered he started his leeks indoors (much to to the protests of my grandmother) then transplanted them out.  I was quite young when we left Scotland so my memory of his gardening tips are somewhat faded.  I do believe he dipped the seedlings in water  before transplanting...
 
 
 
 
 ...the theory is this minimizes the soil that gets trapped inside the leeks.
 
 
 
 Next I poked a small opening in the soil, put in the leek...
 
 
...then poured water in the hole instead of pushing the dirt into the leek.  We'll see if this method makes a difference (to be honest, after a while I became cold and bored so only half my leeks were transplanted like this).  The seedlings are now in the polytunnel under some growing fabric waiting for spring.


 


 



4 comments:

  1. Hi Sharon,
    Your farm sounds wonderful. And isn't this the best time of year? It's lovely to be able to start sowing seeds again. In the UK the winter has seemed endless, following on from a very wet & miserable summer and autumn. Spring just can't come soon enough!

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    1. We too had a miserable spring and early summer last year. Worst year in the veg garden I can remember...I know you had a miserable summer last year so hoping for better this year

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  2. I do my leeks much the same but then don't listen to me, mine have been rubish the last couple of years due to the leek moth. I was going to put some articokes in but just keep forgetting!

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    1. Given the lack of success I too have had with leeks in the past couple of years I felt a bit cheeky posting this but fingers crossed for this year.

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