Self-Sufficiency in Style
january 2002 diary
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Self-Sufficiency in Style january 2002 diary
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The weather controls what we can do in January. It is mostly a time of waiting and planning. |
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The citrus trees in the conservatory are doing well. We are getting
regular oranges, which taste fine and now a small supply of lemons from a
Meyer lemon tree.
The mandarins look good, but have yet to ripen. We had a disaster when we left a window open on the coldest night and lost our ginger plant, but the citrus all seem fine. |
First lemons |
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The South facing wall |
The big garden wall that shelters us from the North winds is now complete.
We have big plans for trees on this prime position. It is eight feet high and 25 yards long. The other walls are being completed in the next week or so. |
| Tayberries and Blackberries
are waiting for a small corner of the wall to be completed and ready for
planting.
It takes time to visit all the plant suppliers and select good plants of the right varieties. |
Awaiting completion |
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Free plants |
The Black Currants planted last month have been pruned and the prunings
used as cuttings.
Each pot labelled with the variety. In a year or so, these can be used to increase the supply or will be welcome gifts for family or friends. |
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The first of two onion beds is now full.
Some Garlic and onion sets were planted earlier. Now we have added four different types of shallot (Garden Gourmet, Pikant, Sante and Red Sun) and another variety of Garlic (Fokhagyma). We want to find out which do best on this kind of land. Where we have the odd few over, these have been placed in the polytunnel for an early crop. If the labelling looks a little excessive, this comes from long experience of losing labels to a series of small dogs and house cats. Everything is labelled twice and recorded in a book indoors. |
The onion bed in winter gloom |
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Equally in the dark - Autumn fruiting raspberries. |
We thought we would try Autumn fruiting raspberries rather than the summer
varieties which have been suffering from virus diseases in this particular
area recently.
The varieties, John Squire Fall, Gold and Autumn Bliss are already planted with more to come. |
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We have just erected a second greenhouse - this time aluminium with glass
to the ground.
This is suited for plants like tomatoes that require extra light. This gives us a good range of under-cover growing space: |
A new Aluminium Greenhouse being completed |
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Waiting the winter out the chillingly named Hangman's Cottage, just to the south of Misery Corner. |
