8th September

I had a walk through the purple sprouting Broccoli and winter Cauliflower at the end of last week.

And it looks like the long warm very dry spell of weather might have played havoc with our purple sprouting Broccoli.

It is starting to be ready already, about two months too early.

This is due to too the long warm days the plants have had from the day they were planted.

But they have not had any rain.

Usually, purple sprouting grows to over two feet in hight before it starts producing broccoli,

Then we cut the main head, and we get a load of side shoot cuttings from then on.

But the plants are only about a foot in hight and are already producing the first main head, and they are small.

We have two batches planted, one variety should come before the second, but they are both coming at the same time.

Not the best, and I’m not alone, I have spoke to another couple of organic farmers that grow it too, and their crop is the same.

I had heard from local farmers that they had to start combining earlier than ever before this year as their barley crops were ready but not as big as they should be so their yields would be down.

Luckily for us this is the only crop that we have noticed any problems with this year.

So far, the Cauliflower looks like it is ok.

Crops the Beetroot and carrots are smaller than usual with the lack of rain, so is the turnip crop, but with the turnips that is not a huge problem, because they can grow too big.

The carrots are needing some rain before we start to lift them, and that is the same for everyone around us that grow them organically.

But our squash crops are all looking great and they have had zero rain just like the other crops, but they did get rain at the start, where the winter crops didn’t get hardly any as they are planted later, so they are just under stress.

I will keep you updated.