Dug and Dug

 Before (well, before it was finished)

and after (dug, cleared of wood, concrete, plastic, metal and a lot of weeds)

F operates a 6 bed crop rotation

- 1 alliums and beets.  That has been dressed with lots of wood ash (remember that bonfire I missed out on) and some very well rotted compost and dug over a second time.  Onion sets went in on Sunday.  Later they will be joined by leeks, beetroot and chard

- 2 Legumes and curcubits - which in our garden means runner beans, gigantes, borlotti beans and zucchinis.  My humans have scoured the second hand sales sites on the internet and found some cheap second hand Heras fencing (other brands might be available) locally, and purchased 6 panels to use as bean fences, so there will be an outing soon to collect that.  I wouldn't miss that for the world; I expect it to be interesting (small trailer, big fence panels).  That bed has been trenched and several trees worth of autumn leaves have been buried where the nitrogen from the bean roots will help them turn into compost.

-3 brassicas ('gross feeders' according to F's Dad - we think that means they demand, or can make use of, a lot of nitrogen.) In our garden that means kale (and more kale).  Their bed has been dressed with 6 inches of stables manure and they will also get a few handfuls of lime.  F does like to grow soup peas and sweet (edible) lupins, and isn't all that interested in cabbages so decided years ago to use half the brassica's bed for all the extra legumes that don't fit in with the beans in bed 2 (that bit doesn't get any poo, and it will likely get late sowings of turnips and winter radishes and mustard for next winter when the legumes have been harvested).

-4. This bed is mostly parsnips and celeriac in our garden (no carrots, that is a fight she has quit on) and a few metres square of different leafy green salad vegetables (lettuces, rocket, purslane, cress, spinach ...stuff like that).  This one will get seaweed and lawn clippings mulch once the plants 'get up a bit'.

-5. Sweet corn.  This is supposed to be fallow and in grass, but corn is a grass so we grow corn.  And we grow pumpkins (winter squash to some people) under the corn.  This bed also has a 6 inch blanket of stables manure because punkins are heavy feeders too.

-6. F added this one bed for all the oddball stuff - like Jerusalem artichokes, Yacon, tomatillos, New Zealand spinach, Oca, - all the stuff that didn't have a category in the book of gardening rotation that she uses as her 'bible'.  

The greenhouse will have tomatoes, okra, aubergines, sweet peppers, chillies and (possibly) a cucumber.  The strip of land behind the greenhouse (in front of it in sunlight terms) has been cleared of old carpet and weeds and dug and had some herb planters stationed along it for flat and curled parsley, dill, coriander, cutting celery, and an experiment in root parsley.  F has never had any success growing persillerod - root parsley - but tells herself she isn't a quitter.... except for carrots

We have edges and gaps allocated to flowers, and quite frankly we are all out of space.

What would we grow if we had more space? - well in the past we have grown quinoa, spelt, buckwheat, rhubarb, strawberries and fruit bushes (currants, gooseberries, raspberries, blackberries), lentils, chickpeas, marrowfat peas, and salsify.  We tried asparagus too but that was a big fat fail in our heavy soil.   We kind of knew it would be but Mr B did so want asparagus.... we also had a big patch of comfrey and had high hopes we might grow a kiwi berry and some gojiberries. The goji thing went mad but produced nothing, and the kiwiberry? Well we moved before we found out.  Our old plot is an overgrown mess now so we doubt it survived.

Mr B has been working on clearing the greenhouse.