Spring wild greens

I spent the last couple of days photographing some of the wild edible plants around in April and May on the farm and here are some of them.

They are, in the order I post them,
garlic mustard,
bracken fiddleheads (bracken is only edible whilst in the fiddlehead stage, it becomes carcinogenic later),
hawthorn (all parts of the hawthorn plant are edible, leaves, flowers and fruit),
dandelion (edible as a salad green before it flowers, the root can be roasted as a form of coffee substitute), 
herb bennet,
Violet,
Burdock,
Wild Garlic (make sure it smells garlicky you don't want to mix it up with the poisonous lily of the valley)
Nettle (I've mentioned nettles before. They're only really good to eat before the flower in the spring.)
Common purple spotted orchid (edible but best not pick it for food due to it's rarity despite the name),
Good King Henry (this is one of the plants I introduced to the farm. It's thought the Romans first brought it to the UK),
Wood Sorrel (best to eat in small amounts due to oxalic acid),
Gorse (the flowers are edible and make a tonic tea),
Cleavers or Goose Grass (good for a tonic tea),
Horseradish (the root can be used as a condiment and the leaves as a potherb),
Fat Hen,
Angelica

These were all found in profusion in one short walk around the farm. There are many other edible plants around but this is the spring selection of pot herbs. This post was sent from my tablet. I'll tidy it up on the laptop later and add some more detail about the plants including medical properties. The next post
Will be about the poultry.

Restarting the blog.

We're well into spring a year and a half since my last post here and as I now have a tutor from the Permaculture Association I decided it's time to get busy with the blog again.

This blog will now become my main documentation for my diploma in applied permaculture and I hope that it will prove of some use to others as well.

Good progress has been made since my last post and my next few posts will be a catch up on what's been happening.

Time to get gardening :)

Big cats?

TThat's Henry. I named him because I don't intend to eat him. I got the chickens a couple of weeks ago and I'm collecting five Indian Runner ducks next week. Unfortunately two of my Light Sussex pullets got taken by a predator last week in broad daylight with me about a hundred feet away.

Matt and Julia have had attacks on their pigs and there are rumours of a big cat in the area. Above are Matt and Julia with a load of water melons for the pigs that were over ripe and rejected by a supermarket. The chickens love watermelon too.

Nearly Solstice and mixed results

As you can see the cucurbit beds are doing quite nicely. They needed a dressing with bonemeal (£27 for 25kg I was shocked) and wood ash because some off the courgettes looked a bit off color but everything looks pretty good now.

















Here's one of the watermelons

Unfortunately it seems the mulch beds have been a complete failure as compared with the dug beds 

I've started digging all the mulch beds. I can't afford to take years to get these productive. I'm planting marigolds, sage, russian tarragon, japanese catmint, catmint, thyme, coriander, basil and other things like chives and garlic chives throughout the beds. Legumes are coplanted with everything but alliums.

As so many of the things in the mulch beds have failed I've scrapped the documentation I was going to do on the vegetables I'm growing. 

Once I have the problems ironed out I'll keep track of that again.

The herb garden has gone berserk and I think it's a wonderful jungle, that's the milk thistle


I thought I'd say a little bit about the forest garden. I've been planting cider apples, a couple of pears (One of which was killed by the deer. I had to bridge graft one of the apples as it was completely ring barked. I took of a couple of twigs from the tree long enough to cover the gap and got to it with my grafting tape.)

The tree dosn't look too bad.)

There are a couple of Albizia julibrissin , three Honey locusts Gleditsia triacanthos a load of gooseberries and some named cobs. There are also a few cherry plums.

For later addition I'm growing a lot of the other plants for the forest garden in the polytunnel garden. The above is the American ground nut Apios Americana I'll have enough of them this year to risk putting some into the garden. They fix nitrogen as well as being a useful food.

Watering is the main chore at the moment but it looks like it might rain today.

Flea beetles

The picture is of the beginnings of a nettle and comfrey tea. The picture was taken about 3 weeks ago and now it's a brown stinking mess bt it's really good plant food.

I haven't posted for a while because there have been some problems and I wanted to wait ntil I knew what was going on before posting about it.

It mostly boils down to a lack of water. I was hoping that the mulch beds would retain water well and for large plants it does but it's not terribly good for seedlings. Because the plants were water stressed we've had an invasion of flea beetles. Once the garden gets going a bit more and the herbs I've been planting arond the edges of the beds get going things will improve and I decided to dig the beds in the polytunnel garden where I had the strawberries for brassicas and I think that's far enough from the beetles to avoid the problem. There's also a water supply nearby so I can water them more frequently. I planted Jerusalem artichoke Helianthus tuberosus
some Taro Colocasia esculenta This is a tropical plant but if we have a decent summer we may get something. I have a plant in my bender that I've kept going for 3 years. I also planted a few sweet potatoes Ipomoea batatas

In any case, the flea beetles mean all the brassicas have been hammered. Everything else is getting big and growing well but I've decided to dig in the mulch in all the beds for next year. The dug beds have been the most successful.

I need to have a long think about water. Wish I had the money to get a trickle watering system. 

No sign of tutors or tutorials yet so no progress on the diploma front.


I've been feeding all the beds with wood ash and bonemeal. Several thjings were looking a bit deficient but they're looking better now. I've also been using rock dust and mycorrhyzal fungi (They work together although the rock dust people talk about worms on their packaging it's mycorrhyzal fungi that pass the minerals to the plants.


Six Bay trees were planted arond the edges of the main garden Laurus nobilis 


All the strawberries were moved into the fenced garden as the rabbits were killing them all by digging them up. They have a bad habit of digging round the roots ot my perennials and damaging them Fortnately Star killed his first rabbit yesterday so maybe he can help scare them off. I portioned it and fried it up for him.

Compost problems

W

Well I'm back  and it turns out that there's a bit of a problem. Although it looked reasonably good wet, it's a bit coarse and has a bit too much woodchip in it and some things aren't doing very well, specifically the brassicas and the carrots. Things are doing a lot better where the beds were dug and the soil mixed in with the compost. I'll be making some finer stuff over the next few days by collecting nettles before they flower and comfrey and building a compost heap with that. If I get it before the seeds set it should be ok and I'll top dress the beds with it once it's well rotted down. Although I don't like digging as it destroys the existing soil ecosystem I may have to do some digging at some stage but for now I'll see what can be done with top dressing.

I moved what strawberries survived the deer into the new garden and we made some more beds in there. That bed is about 10m long by 2.5m wide and about a foot deep. Another 48 strawberry plants were planted in there. 

I've completely lost track of what's planted in that garden as I've misplaced my notes. Most of it was listed in the seed order I listed earlier in the year. In this garden things are planted in overlapping clumps and swathes in an attempt no create something that looks a little more natural than straight lines. Edible herbs and flowers are also scattered around. The herbs in the hotbeds and some of those from the herb garden will also be planted in when they get a bit larger, I suspect postings will get a bit more regular here when I start my diploma.

I'll be planting butternut squash tomorrow and starting my tea and compost making, weed control and watering is a daily task although Anne got the stuff to extend the drip irrigation system in the polytunnel extended to almost all the rest of the tunnel.

All the large seeded things seem to be doing well.

It's early days, the beds will improve with mulching and that takes time.

Back soon.

Under the weather

I'll be back posting next week. I have a painful abcess so I'm taking time off till it clears up.

Busy times and a dauntingly large list of things to record

Sorry I haven't been keeping up with the docmentation but I had a massive planting and I'm looking at a daunting list of things to docment which will take me a little while to transfer from paper to here.

After a couple of dry weeks we finally had some rain yesterday so everything should germinate soon. I've used up all the compost in the immediate vicinity so the next big job is shifting quite a few tons of compost from the other side of the farm to the new gardens.

I found that the deer had ripped off the tube and ring barked one of the cider apples I planted last autumn so I took some cuttings and made a bridge graft on it and grafted a few scions to other apple trees to try and save the variety. It was done a bit late so I may lose it but we have some 10 year old root stock that I'll be layering in the autumn and then we'll get serious with the fruit trees.

We have a new Wwoofer called Nicholas who's been a great help. 

I will try and get this huge planting post out of the way in the next couple of days but for now I'm having a day off.

The rest of that planting

My email program blew up this week and I lost a few emails one of them was from a potential Wwoofer I wanted to answer and now I have no means of contecting them. If you see this could the potential volunteer in Sussex (Or was it Surrey) please email me again.

A huge amount has been planted in the last week Matt gave me Toby's old garden to work with and it was already mulched in many places with cardboard and a foot of compost.

I decided to turn it into a wilderness of veg. Things are in clumps or in edges. I've tried to make as many edges as possible. I've sown many more than will eventally grow there as I'll be using it as a source of baby veg and will thin it down to it's evental state.


Planting.

Melon bed 2 
Lemon coriander Coriandrum sativum throughout bed

South to north
Watermelon black montain Citrullus lanatus
Collective farm woman Cucumis melo inodorus 
Melon Tigger Cucumis melo 
Cucumber Gherkin National Cucumis sativus

Melon bed 3

Coriander  Coriandrum sativum throughout bed

Watermelon black montain Citrullus lanatus

Pumpkin Full Moon Cucurbita maxima

Cucumber long green ridge Cucumis sativus

Pumpkin Atlantic Giant Cucurbita maxima

Cucumber Gherkin National Cucumis sativus

Melon bed 4

Lemon coriander Coriandrum sativum throughout bed
Watermelon black montain Citrullus lanatus 
Cucumber long green ridge Cucumis sativus
Collective farm woman Cucumis melo inodorus
Cucumber Gherkin National Cucumis sativus

Melon Minnesota Midget Cucumis melo 

I still have pages of planting to transcribe so I'll do it when it cools down later. 

A very busy week and a lot of planting

W

We had an extremely busy week last week, with the help of two Wwoofers, Leia and Noah and Jose and Matt who live here we've made a good deal of progress. There are now four melon beds and five vegetable beds and bean trenches dug all around the perimeter fence.

 A bean trench is just a spade depth trench alongside a support like a fence that you fill with compost.

Melon bed 1 is the covered one melon bed 2 is the one directly South of it melon bed 3 is next to melon bed 1 and 4 is South of that.

From South to North

Melon bed 1 

Courgette De Nice A Fruit Rond Cucurbita pepo
Winter squash Burgess Buttercup Cucurbita maxima (Plants for a future is down at the time of writing)
Cousa Courgette Trieste half long Cucurbita pepo
Winter squash Blue Banana  Cucurbita maxima 

Winter squash Anna Schwartz Hubbard  Cucurbita maxima 
Courgette Nero di Milano Cucurbita pepo
Pumpkin Jack O'Lantern Cucurbita pepo (I think)
Courgette Green bush Cucurbita pepo

These were planted a few days ago and all have germinated now.

Melon bed 2

Short season Water Melon Blacktail mountain
Short season Canteloupe Collective farm woman
Melon Tigger
Cucumber Gherkin National


Blacktail Mountain was also planted in the polytunnel with the ginger.


A lot more to follow too tired to write more.

Update on the gardens.

T

This amazing fungus is growing in hotbed 1. Haven't identified it yet but I've been a bit busy.

On to the update. Hotbed 1:

Garden Catmint Nepeta racemosa  Germinated well
English sage Salvia officinalis Germinated well
Anise Hyssop Agastache foeniculum A few germinated
Japanese catmint schizonepesa tenuifolia No sign of germination
Chinese liquorice Glycyrrhiza Uralensis (Gan Cao)  No sign of germination (I do have a few plants from last year though)
Feverfew Tanacetum parthenium   No sign of germination (But I have more and the ones in the herb garden seem to have germinated)
Russian Tarragon Artemisia dracunculoides Germinated well
Artichoke Imperial Star Cynara scolymus Germinated well Nearly time to put these out. I'll leave them a couple more weeks just in case of frost
Giant cape gooseberry Physalis peruviana Germinated well but most were eaten by a slug or snail
Dwarf cape gooseberry Physalis pruinosa Germinated well
Tomatillo Verde Physalis Ixocarpa A few germinated
Aubergine Snowy F1 (One that slipped through) Solanum melongena A few germinated
East Indian Lemongrass Cymbopogon flexuosus Germinated well but quite a few seem to have been eaten I really need to get some nematodes
West Indian Lemongrass Cymbopogon citratus Germinated well but quite a few seem to have been eaten
Chilli Numex bailey piquin Capsicum annuum A few germinated
Chilli Bhut Jolokia  A few germinated
Pepper Red Cheese  Capsicum annuum A few germinated 
Chinese milk vetch (Huang Qi) Astragalus membranaceus   Germinated well 
Asparagus Conover's collossal  Asparagus officinalis 
Shamanic tobacco Nicotiana Rustica Germinated very well
Tobacco Havana Nicotiana tabacum Germinated very well
Tobacco Virginia Germinated very well
Grain Amaranth No sign of germination.These seeds may have been collected too early I was in a rush to leave my last project. I reseeded with some of the original packet from last year
Quinoa Chenopodium quinoa No sign of germination.These seeds may have been collected too early I was in a rush to leave my last project. I reseeded with some of the original packet from last year

Water melon Blacktail mountain (Got the name wrong in the original post short season) Citrullus lanatus Germinated but got eaten replanted

Hotbed 2
Dyers  greenweed Genista Tinctoria No sign of this but then it was allowed to dry out completely just after planting. I'll try again.
 Peppermint Mentha Piperita  Germinated well
Celery tall Utah  Apium graveolens dulce Germinated well
Pepper Italian pepperoncini Capsicum annuum Germinated well
Tomato box car Willie Lycopersicon esculentum Germinated well
Chilli Navaho  
Chilli Serrano tampequino A few germinated
Aubergine Early long purple 2 Solanum melongena Germinated well
 Indian pot chilli A few germinated
Pepper Santa Fe Grande A few germinated
Tomato Ailsa Craig Germinated well
Chilli Numex Espanhola A few germinated
Chilli Delhi hot A few germinated
Pepper Anaheim A few germinated
Tomatillo purple Physalis ixocarpa  Germinated well
False Saffron Kinko (Safflower) Carthamnus tinctorius Germinated well
Tomato Black Russian  Germinated well
Pepper D-asti Giallo Germinated well

Echinacea angustifolia Germinated well

Cucumber Marketmore Cucumis sativus  Germinated well

Basil Holy, green Ocimum tenuiflorum  Germinated well

Celery Red Soup Germinated well

Lemon Coriander Coriandrum sativum Germinated well

Celery Green soup Germinated well

Okra Hill country heirloom red Abelmoschus esculentus Germinated well

Oysterleaf Mertensia maritima May have germinated (Might be a weed seed can't tell yet never seen this plant before)
passiflora edulis No sign yet

and in the top of the bed in 4 places Melon Collective farm woman  Cucumis melo inodorus Germinated well

None of the pots put outside to stratify have germinated yet. Nor the big pots on the floor in the bender (These may have been eaten by rats we're using eradibait to reduce their numbers. It's a substance made of corn cellulose wheat flower and molasses it coats their gut and prevents the signal that makes them drink from reaching their brain. They die of thirst horrible for the rat but safe for everything else. Unfortunately they are competing for our food and present a risk of disease so they have to go). 

All the plants in trays in the bender have germinated except the papaya but it hasn't been warm enough in here for that one. If I put it in the hotbed it may germinate.

Forgot to say the passiflora caerulea germinated (Two of them)

Pretty much everything in vegetable beds one and two have germinated but in the polytunnel only the thyme, sage and radish have come up. Most of the beetroot seedlings were eaten so I replanted them.

I planted 19 pieces of ginger Zingiber officinale in three rows at the Eastern end of the polytunnel in between the rows of sage and thyme. (They'll be coming out before the ginger gets large)


That's it for the moment The herb beds are germinating but they're a bit small to see what's what yet.

The rest of bed three and a melon bed

This is a melon bed. It's good for growing the whole cucurbit family and it's bigger than it looks in this photo check out the relative size of the wheelbarrow to the right of it. I haven't put the polythene cover on it yet because I'm letting it settle for a day or two before planting it.

I'll describe the details below.

Planting was completed in bed 3 in the vegetable garden yesterday; to the north of the Arran pilot First Early potatoes  Solanum tuberosum I planted pink fir apple (A strange shaped long thin pink potato ) and to the North of that Kestrel second earlies. The potato is an incredibly useful plant. It has medicinal and other uses in addition to it's use as a staple food. The wikipedia article is also well worth reading.


At the northenmost end of beds 1 2 and 3 I planted about a half dozen seeds of artichoke  Cynara scolymus Violet de Provence (Has medicinal uses and is a curdling agent) These will be a permanent feature assuming they germinate and survive the rabbits (I will block their run in a day or two but I want to take a few for meat first to pay me for my lost beetroot seedlings and deter the others).

The potatoes didn't quite fill the bed so I did a block of Parsnip Pastinaca sativa  Gurnsey
and a block of Carrot Daucus carota sativus Cosmic purple (My favourite carrot it's purple outside and orange and yellow inside. Intense colours. Intense colours in vegetables indicates they contain a lot of flavinoids so a lot of the veg I grow is darkly coloured).

Another block of beetroot Beta vulgaris craca Boltardy and pea Pisum sativum
Oregon sugar pod all around the edges of the northern half of the bed.


On to the melon bed.

Y

You start by piling up about a metre's depth of unrotted horse manure and stable sweepings. (You can make it thinner if you just use horse dung without the straw but it makes much better compost with a decent amount of straw in it and you don't want it hot enough to burn your plants). You can make the bed as long as you like but 8 -10 metres is a good size. 


A melon bed can be used for melons, courgettes, pumpkings and squashes and cucumbers. For melons and cucumbers you leave the plastic on but you can take it off in mid june (In Southern England, cooler climates can leave the plastic on but it means more watering if you don't have drip feed) for the squashes and marrows.

This work really takes it out of you so if possible get help. You'll be moving several tons of horse manure. You often find that stables that keep their horses indoors are willing to give their manure away for nothing if you ask nicely. The more of this stuff you can get the better. This manure will be feeding the beds next year and will themselves become raised beds because they kill at the perennial weeds with their heat and the darkness under them. Hotbeds without manure have to be huge.

 You then put a layer of compost about 6cm thick on top of the manure. You can plant this quite densely because there is a lot of food in the hotbed below (Cucurbits love feeding they;ll get huge) This job could have been done a month or to ago to give the stuff an even earlier start but I'm a bit behind schedule in a few areas because of the sheer amount of barrowing to do. Once the main beds are made the pace will get easier.

 

 Use a pole digger to make holes about a metre apart for some hazel or willow poles, twist them together and tie them off.

 Tie in some cross bracing I just put in a horizontal pole here but I'll probably reinforce it with a latice of poles which is a must for windy areas. You leave it to settle a day or two before planting but it can be planted up even in frosty weather once covered. Not sure how far below zero though the other hotbeds have been fine down to about -5 so far but I'm not expecting too much more of that now although it's still possible.. I'll post another pic once it's covered.

I'm working on a big post as a status report on how things are growing and I've taken a lot of photos that need to be winnowed down so my next post should be soon. Not a lot you can say about barrowing manure hence my lack of posts recently.