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| PSB plant with last few tiny spears on it |
There was one spear that I had missed, which I will use to demonstrate what happens when you leave the spears to mature. They go long and straggly like this, prior to opening their bright yellow flowers. They are far too stringy to eat when they get to this stage.
If you are not in a hurry to remove the plants, it is quite nice to let a few of them flower. The bees will certainly be grateful if you do.
So this is the bed where the PSB used to be.
I have dug it over and prepared it for hosting the beans. I found that the roots from my neighbour's Leylandii tree (just the other side of the fence, behind the compost bins in the photo above) had reached as far as this bed, so I had to spend some time removing them. I then added some Growmore general-purpose fertiliser and some of that composted stable manure that I wrote about yesterday, and watered the bed very thoroughly. The Leylandii had sucked out all the moisture from the soil, making it so dry it was almost dusty. I'm sure this is one of the reasons why the PSB did not do so well, and I will have to take the necessary measures to avoid this happening again.
Elsewhere in the garden I have been planting out more lettuces. These are four each of "Devin" and "Cervanek", grown from seeds sent to me by Dominika in the Czech Republic. My successional sowing plan is already looking shaky because these enthusiastic new immigrants are rapidly overtaking their earlier-sown indigenous counterparts!
Finally for today, a picture of a small but very significant Asparagus spear.
This tiny shoot serves to demonstrate that the replacement plant I put in last year is not actually dead, as I feared it was. Hopefully it will build up some strength this year and produce some bigger (edible) spears next year or the year after.
I'm trying to maintain my lettuce successions too. I keep having to restrain myself from planting more lettuce. I know I need more time between the successions. It is hard to restrain myself at this time of the year though.
ReplyDeleteLeylandii are a menace - is it a very tall specimen
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately it is. I reckon it's about 25 feet tall. Fortunately it is in a position that has very little effect on the light in my garden - and it serves to screen us from the neighbour's house - but I suspect that its roots are doing my plot a lot of damage.
DeleteI'm not very good at successional sowing, I start off with good intentions and then they go to pot.
ReplyDeleteSuch a shame about your PSB, I love the names of the Lettuce seedlings. I must admit to being swayed by the names. I've planted out my Flashy Troutback & Tango lettuce seedlings.
ReplyDeleteOh my...." I will have to take the necessary measures to avoid this happening again." What is the plan?
ReplyDeleteYour beds are really looking great. Mine are getting tidied up, and under hoops all seeded. Lots germinating as we have had some great days. Look forward to your progress Mark.
I'm tempted to "accidentally" spill a few gallons of weed-killer over its roots, but... Seriously, I think I will just dig down a spade's depth or so in the gap between the fence and my raised beds, chopping off any root incursions before they can do any damage.
DeleteMy grandfather had a tree in the lawn between the sidewalk and the road that he HATED because it dripped sap all over in the spring. The city wouldn't remove it because it was large and pretty. So every few months, he'd go out into his yard with an old hand-crank drill and bore down until he hit a root. He'd pour in some weed killer and within a few weeks a branch of the tree would be dead. He'd call the city to remove the dead branch and repeat the process. Eventually, the city people figured that the tree must be diseased and they finally cut it down and planted something new. Thanks for reminding me of that story!
DeleteI had the same problem with a large black cherry tree about 20 feet from the nearest bed. Even though the tree was about 3/4's dead it still sent roots into the nearest bed and nothing grew well in that bed. It even sent roots to the compost bin which was a good distance away, anything for a free meal. I cut it down three years ago and the plants do much better now. You'll have to keep after those roots or they will take all the nutrients!
ReplyDelete