The potager vegetables in spring

Things are starting to hum along nicely now. All I need to do is get my cucumbers in the ground and the aubergines (eggplants) and tomatoes and I should be set.

I buy these two last veg from a local plant nursery as I find I cannot get the eggplant to ripen before September if I don’t get a grafted head start.

And now that I have the cabbages in, there is not a bare bed.

The dwarf French beans are up; and fighting it out among the self sown nasturtiums and lettuce and coriander.

The broad beans are flowering in the top bed and are fruiting in a lower bed.  There is lettuce everywhere. The courgettes went in yesterday.  I have self sown swiss chard and some of last year’s crops are still going well. They tried to bolt and flower; but I just cut out the leader stalk and the leaves are bulking up again.

I’m still picking cabbage from last year’s crop. But I’m really picking more bugs off the plants than leaves.

Rocket is roaring away and the new dragon’s tongue rocket have gone in.

I have my first little bunch of sweet peas from last year’s self sown crop.

We are eating radish every day. And Artur is doing a good job of guarding them. He’s hunting the mole that lives under the peas.  Note all the lovely self seeded violas through the bed. Just gorgeous.

The raspberries have yet to flower, but underneath all the strawberries are in flower. I must remember to harvest a rogue swiss chard which has grown up in the middle of the raspberries.

It has become the potager I love most. Every time you walk past there is something to munch. Tops of broad beans, salad leaves, rocket.

And I come in each night with a handful of fresh herbs. And if my dinner guests are lucky I will have washed my hands after squishing bugs and before I wade into the marjoram and parsley patch.

And in case you have been asking – did she sort out the nets for the cabbage up the top potager?  The answer is yes. But possibly the bigger question might be did you really remember?

The nets were battered by the heavy snow in February, but they reassembled and turned back into butterfly deflectors in no time. I took ages to plant out the cabbage of course.

I need to soak each plant for ages, drench the planting hole, and then water again.  And the water pressure is not high up here, so it trickles somewhat.

Just heaving the hose from the courtyard is the sporting big. Marvellous exercise.

But all for a good cause.  And I have tucked up the brassicas with an extra layer of enviromesh which looks unsightly, but it should keep the butterflies out.