16th September

As I was saying last week our cucumbers and courgettes are coming to an end.

We are still managing to harvest around a crate a day of cucumbers which is around 120.

And the courgettes that are in the big cosy tunnel are almost finished, we are only getting a little over a crate a day.

One thing that is quite strange is that the field courgettes are now looking far better than the tunnel courgettes.

The tunnel courgettes were planted around a month earlier than the field ones.

And we started harvesting them around a month and a half earlier, but their leaves are now really dying of.

Both the field courgettes and the tunnel ones are the same variety, so it is not the variety that has the tunnel ones finishing of earlier.

I can only assume that they have produced all they can and that is them done.

So, this week’s job, is to disc up the courgettes in the tunnel with the Fergie, then rotovate.

The Radicchio and Choy Choy are ready for planting, so this week we need to get them planted, a total of ten thousand, five thousand of each variety.

In a couple of weeks, we will need to plant the leafy cabbage which we have blocked, these will sit over the winter and be ready early next year.

We also have some Lambs lettuce seed; I have not used this before.

Lambs’ lettuce (corn salad), is supposed to like the cold and crops through the winter and seemingly has a sweet nutty flavour.

Quite an interesting one to try, we will direct sow these, along with more oriental mix.

One other veg we tried last year that grows well when it gets cooler is Mooli Minowase radish.

It is a long white radish around the same size as carrots, and has a spicy kick.

We have not grown them to put in everyone’s delivery as a standard veg, because we do not know if everyone would like them.

But they are on the web page to order as an extra.

We do have another batch almost ready.

This week was the first frost we have had this year.

So, it is time to get the tunnels filled with hardy veg that does not mind the cold.