Leo's giant spuds

 

Loe planted one potato out of the tesco bag earlier in the year, (see this post) and it grew and grew. With the bad weather, even though it was really strong, finally it started to succumb to blight. So we harvested it. I have never seen such a great crop from one potato - a yield of 3kg, and lots of huge delicious ones. We have saved seeds - this gene pool is definitely worth saving - and we ate the rest with great delight and praise for Leo.

Leo gives credit for the great growth to his friends, the worms, Don-don, James, and Bendy.

The Giant Potato plant

As I mentioned before, I gave the boys a bed to plant some things in. They each planted a potato which had sprouted in the kitchen (not a special seed potato). Initially Dara's was doing well, but the slugs got it, and then it started to turn yellow, so we dug it up and ate the spuds.

Leo's - after a slow start - really took off, and now it's a good size (see above - as big as he is) - and still no flowers - so we're in no hurry to harvest it. We think it's down to a combination of chicken manure, worm castings and worm tea - and maybe Leo's green fingers. Growing beside it is a very healthy yelly ildi cheery tomato - which promises to have a great crop also.
Everyone who visits gets a tour of the garden (conducted by Dara and Leo), featuring these magnificent specimens!

Here's what this plot looked like before (from above)

And here's what it looks like now (Giant spud plant from above)

Purple Carrot peeled and sliced

 

Here's what a purple carrot looks like when it's been peeled and cut.

Garden map

 

I entered our garden in the Corrin Hill biodiversity competition.
We had to create a map of our garden for it - here it is. It's hard to read here, but you can click on it and see a bigger version.
The veg section is mostly raised beds, and some tractor tyres. And the lazy potatoes, which really are not doing well, other than preparing the space for next year.

Summer planting

Was going to title this post - 'Preparing for Winter', but that seemed a bit chilly in August. July has seen me doing a lot of seed planting in preparation for the next growing season. So while the the Runner beans are not yet producing, we are planning for crops for the Nov-March 09 period - hopefully!

What we have planted:
Purple sprouting Brocolli
Cauliflower
Cabbage - Savoy and Holland
Ragged Jack Kale
Rainbow Chard
Mizuna
Mispoona
Weiner Runder Kohlschwarzer (from realseeds.co.uk)http://realseeds.co.uk/radish.html
Salsola (as above)
Orach (as above)
Spinach
Corn salad
Carrots
Borage
Onion seeds (Winterhecke)
Daikon


Since growth won't be as prolific, it seems to make sense to plant more, in the hopes of having something to eat from the garden later in the year. Last year leeks did great, but we only had 8, so this year I have 50 or so fattening nicely. Which will make up for the lack of onions and garlic this year.