Ready, steady...

Ready, steady...

We’re quick off the block in the Genus vegetable garden this year.  We planted our first-early potatoes (Epicure) in a nice deep trench and covered them with our homemade compost topped off with the excavated soil.  It’s a small bed with only 9 plants so despite our early start it will be a simple matter to protect them from any late or unexpected frosts once they’re up and above ground.  Luckily ‘Epicure’ is well known for its frost tolerance.

In another bed we raked the surface preparing it for a number of brassica varieties that we wanted to sow.  After last year's dearth of winter veg we needed to make amends and find room for five different options to include Kale ‘Emerald Ice’, Romanesco Cauliflower, purple sprouting  ‘Rudolph’, Cavalo nero, and Cabbage ‘January King’.  A row of ‘Musselburgh’ Leeks were added followed by a couple of rows of early radish to fill the bed.  They were all covered with a fine horticultural mesh to prevent predation by pigeons or flea beetle.  Apart from the radishes everything else will be transplanted into its own dedicated bed in a few months time. 

In other parts of the garden, Brunnera and primrose are in flower, the snakeshead fritillaries in the meadow are coming into bud and an observant eye will notice ‘sticky buds’ on the horse chestnut just starting to expand.  It seems that each trip into the garden reveals something new at every turn.


Exceptional trees - Savernake Forest's Big Belly Oak

Located in Wiltshire’s Savernake Forest, The Big Belly Oak, a millennium-old giant, really is a living witness to English history.  This sessile oak, Quercus petraea, was named among 50 Great...
Read More

The plants around us - bamboo

From fishing rods, to cooking utensils, sunglasses to flooring, bamboo has a multitude of uses.  In recent years bamboo products have been appearing in shops offering a sustainable alternative to...
Read More

Modern heroes of horticulture - Harriet Rycroft

Harriet Rycroft is best known for being the Queen of Pots.  Her position as head gardener at the Warwickshire based Whichford pottery gave her the chance to hone her skills...
Read More