This week in Stephanie’s Kitchen Garden we will be eagerly awaiting the arrival of our new heated propagator. I can’t wait to try it out and January is the perfect time to be sowing seeds such as celery, celeriac and chilli peppers. As the weather is so mild we may even start off some tomatoes, peppers and aubergines as well.  The propagator has a built in grow light which will give the seeds an ideal growing environment.   

We will also be arranging for a local farmer to deliver us a trailer load of lovely well rotted farmyard manure. This is an ideal time to begin adding it to the soil, which was dug over before Christmas in readiness.  Currently the kitchen garden is saturated from recent heavy rainfall so digging it now would be impossible.  However the wet weather has brought the worms to the surface so they can begin their work of incorporating the manure into the soil.

This week we will also be cleaning pots and seed trays.  We like to try and do this as we empty the pots to avoid a glut of pot washing, but there are always some that slip through and need a scrub.  It will be a nice job for a rainy day when we can’t work outside.

 Kitchen Garden January 16