Tunnel Vision

More bamboo structures, this time for sweet peas.

It seems hard to believe,  but it’s a bit late for sowing some annual flower seeds.  I was at the garden centre at the weekend with most of the local population who wanted to get out of the rain and spent a happy half an hour looking at the sowing and planting times on the backs of the packets. Most of them had to be in pots by April so I think if we want a flush of colour in the garden it might have to be perennials this year. 

I did have a few trailing perennials in baskets last year, I’m not sure what they are, but I think they were blue. I have divided them up into 10 pots and they are doing well. It’s still early enough to plant most salad crops. I eventually bought a packet of radish and some very attractive pick and come again mixed mustard to add a bit of spice to the summer salads.

Inside or Out?

I’m finding it an enjoyable task deciding what to grow inside or outside of the tunnel. I am, as always, edging my bets by sowing leafy salad crops such as spinach both inside and out and I’ll probably do the same with courgettes. The sweetcorn is inside as will be the tomatoes when they are big enough to plant into the ground. 

Water Sparingly

I’m being very sparing with the water in the tunnel. I have the beds planted up in very neat and tidy rows, which is unusual for me as I usually just plant in clumps cramming everything into raised beds. I am giving the plants a bit more room and leaving enough space between the rows to get the Dutch hoe in to keep the weeds down. The same system has been applied to the peas and beans too. Planting the seeds in these tidy rows has made it easier to water and weed. I made small trenches (about 1”deep) then just poured water into the groove. I then lightly scattered the seeds in the row and covered up. The visible wet soil helps me to continue watering just where it’s needed, leaving the rest of the bed dry, which I am finding is keeping the weeds down. As the plants mature I will no doubt have to water the whole bed, but for now, in this damp weather, it’s keeping the tunnel far less humid. I have hoops at either end of the beds with string tied to each side to finish off. This tells me I have planted there and hopefully will keep the dogs off.

More Bamboo

My obsession of making structures from bamboo has continued this week. I had a few shorter pieces left over after the peas and beans went up so I have been making towers for the sweet peas to grow up. They only go up to about three feet but are reinforced with some green jute string. Things like this bring out the landscape designer in me as sometimes I prefer to just have the structures than have plants growing all over them and covering things up. Don’t tell anyone that though. 

 

U turn

Last weeks wet weather uncovered a bit of an issue with how the tunnel was set up.  When the plastic went over the structure I chose to dig it into the ground. I thought that would give it more strength. The plastic goes into a foot deep trench and then soil is backfilled into the hole on top of the plastic. To keep the plastic in place it was recommended that it be in a U shape and the soil filling the centre. This might work on an open space, but on my giant raised bed it looks like the water had nowhere to go and the area around the tunnel filled up like a swimming pool. I had a few floating nasturtiums. I did come up with a simple solution though. I went around the perimeter of the tunnel with a garden for and plunged it into the ground about 6” away from the tunnel making holes in the plastic underground so the water has somewhere to go. Like a very wise builder I worked with recently said. “Everything can be fixed” 

I can plant herbs around the tunnel now.