Stephanie's Garden Blog

This week we will be earthing up our potatoes for the final time. They are a really good size now and looking very lush and healthy. Hopefully the tubers are growing just as fast. We will be incorporating some potato fertiliser as we earth them up to give them a good feed at the same time.

What a change in the weather this last week - from lots of much needed rain last week to beautiful sunshine this week, the Kitchen Garden has really burst into life!

Last week we finally saw some heavy rainfall in the Kitchen Garden and all around the garden, plants seem to have put on inches of growth overnight. This week we will be exchanging the watering cans for soft-tie and scissors to stake the plants that have had a growth spurt.

It is certainly becoming an unusual growing season this year, with the serious lack of spring rain and the late cold temperatures. Mother Nature is challenging the Kitchen Gardener and it will be interesting to see what effect it has on our harvests.

Now that we are well into May, we will be starting the Big Plant Out in Stephanie's Kitchen Garden. Our greenhouse and cold frame are crammed with tender crops such as runner beans, courgettes, squash, climbing french beans, sweetcorn, celery and celeriac all waiting to spread their roots into deep fertile soil.

As we head into May, in our part of the world we would normally expect to be planting out some of our tender crops such as beans, courgettes and squash plants. However we are in the middle of a very cold snap and planting out now would be a disaster for these tender plants.

We've finally treated to some significant rainfall in our part of the world. This was a big relief for us gardeners, giving us some respite from the watering can; albeit for only a few days. The garden seemed to sigh with relief too and plants in every part of the garden seemed to shoot up overnight after their welcome drink.

The long Easter weekend has given us plenty of opportunity to tend to the maintenance of the garden and we have been busy jet washing paving and oiling decking. The grime and algae of the winter has been washed away. Necessary and satisfying work, but time spent away from the main task of growing.

A great guest blog from Elementa Design using a 5 step guide to prepare your garden for Summer. Nick Dickinson, a much sought after plantsman and garden designer and offers some great advice in the article.