Sunday, March 21, 2021

Garden Harvest


Garden Harvest. 

With it now being Autumn the garden is starting to move from summer production mode to Winter Production. Hopefully the Greenhouse will allow us to continue to have some summer crops (especially tomatoes, peppers etc) in the colder months.

We have already (since December) been eating our homegrown potatoes and have now started harvesting pumpkins etc so are eating around 50 to 60% home grown produce reducing our shopping bill significantly.

Of course there have been some disappointing yields as well as some very satisfying yields but this is agriculture and I suspect that our ancestors understood the risks far better than we do (with us having the supermarkets just around the corner). One way of mitigating against the risk is to plant a wide range of produce. We do this in a very limited way by planting potatoes, corn, sweet potatoes (not so much this year) and pumpkins. Corn might have produced slightly disappointing results this year (I didn't plant enough) but the potatoes have done very well.

Below are a couple of photos of our home grown produce.

One of our bigger Broccolis. We produce a few Broccolis each year which we add to stir fries, soups etc.

The potatoes have done very well this year with several varieties (Ilam Hardy, Rocket, Nadine and Maris Anchor) all doing well. However the start was rocky with our early potatoes being hit by a late season frost which really knocked them back but fortunately they recovered and gave a reasonable yield. Currently we still have the Nadine potatoes in the ground so should have potatoes for a couple more months.

We produce a range of different pumpkins, (just in case one doesn't do too well) and they have to date yielded very reliably although the Delica appears to be far more vulnerable to powdery mildew than the other varieties. Perhaps unfortunately, the Delica is also our favorite pumpkin as it is very dry and great baked, so we think it is worth the risk:>)



3 comments:

  1. Being more sustainable is a proper good mission eh
    Winter production must be challenging but good fun innit

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  2. wow . what a vast arrangement of produce. The pumpkin range- wow. this is living the dream. real food, real living. There is no end finish. Enjoy the journey and inspiration and advice.

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  3. So impressive and yes it can be done. Reducing the visits to the supermarkets as our previous generations have done. The more we try hopefully less crop losses. Would love some of your pumpkin seeds when you use.

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