A bit of No Dig

The excitement of last week’s manure find as bought to conclusion today with actually using it on the plot.  We collected it in the dark last week so this was the first time we had inspected it during the day and it all looked like pretty good well rotted manure.

Around the current bushes are lots of weeds and it has been hard to get rid of them all because of the roots of the bushes not being that deep, I can’t hoe around them and pulling them out by hand seems a constant task.   So I thought I would follow a bit of of the no dig way of thinking and cover the area with cardboard and then five bags of manure on top.   Hopefully this will keep it a bit more under control while also mulching the area.   At some point I want to put/move a forth current bush to make a complete row here.

No dig has gone well with the turnips, to the extent that I’m a bit worried about what to do with them, how to eat them!   Looking on BBC Good Food for recipes…   Our first lot of turnips earlier on in the year were a bit mixed, mostly small strange shapes or nothing at all.   This time, sowed direct and then transplanted into a no dig bed, they have all turned into perfect flattish round shapes, looking very much turnip like.

While we were there, I pulled up some of the calabrese which has now seen it’s best – mostly the ones planted within the sprouts.  The sprout plants still suffering from aphids, I need to remember to keep spraying them each week.   Hopefully the air flow is a bit better now the large calabrese plants have gone.    I inspected the other calabrese and it took had either gone to seed in places or there were very small bits growing but nothing worth picking anymore.

We were able to take home:

  • small and last bit of calabrese
  • our first leek
  • a turnip – once we have worked out what to do with it
  • carrots
  • last lot of main crop beetroot
  • salad leafs  (have been pulling a lot of rocket that has now gone to seed)
  • runner beans – was going to pull these up but suddenly a whole load of beans
  • french beans – not sure if these plants are every going to stop producing beans!

 

sunny autumn day

 

harvest with autumn leafs background…

 

checking the turnips

 

turnips looking good, with a small beetroot that has got in there somehow

 

a new no dig bed – with a Christmas potato background…

 

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