Armchair gardening

Posted By: 23/02/2011 08:40:00

With the ground still too wet or to cold to even walk on, all I can do at the moment is look at the allotments and visualise my plans for this year.

So while I wait to get on with the sowing and growing I can focus more of my energy on planning for the year ahead. Last year I employed a simple approach to monthly planning which was to take packets of seeds to be sown and place them into one of twelve envelopes labeled with the relevant month names. These envelopes then sit in a small metal tin on my table in the shed. Previous years I have kept the tin in a draw, and I always end up missing a pack. So the key is to keep them out in the open.

Also this year I'm going to try a new approach to the planting of alliums and brassicas. I was reading about the methods used on a commercial farm for preparing the ground in long rows and covering with black polythene, then plant Onions through the sheet into the earth. The benefits are the weeds are kept to a minimum and the watering is reduced too. I may also try this method with potatoes as I will be growing main crop this year and it would help with the reduction of weeding.

If anyone has tried this method before let me know how you got on.

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