Out with the old, in with the new.

There is precious little left in my garden from last year - in the way of vegetables, I mean, because plenty of the shrubs and perennial flowers are still going strong.

The "old" is represented today by the few remaining chicories and radicchio. Their colours are still good, as long as you don't look too closely at the occasional brown edge of a leaf...

I think they will all need to be used soon, because I'll be needing the space they are in for sowing new crops (well, preparing the beds for sowing, anyway. It's still way too early to sow outdoor seeds.)

These are also in the "old" bracket - the last few Leeks. They are the second-batch ones, spares planted out only after the main crop had been harvested. I don't think these ones are going to get any bigger. They don't appear to have grown at all in the last two months, so I think I will just pull them up and use them as "Baby Leeks", eating them all in one go.

The "new" in the post-title is represented by Rhubarb, which is very eager to get started. This week a new leaf has pushed up through the surface:

In the Autumn I transferred my Rhubarb to a big bottomless pot (made from half an old water-butt), filled mostly with composted stable manure left over from growing potatoes. I'm very keen to see how it does in its new home, so I will be following its progress very closely. There are two crowns in that pot, but only one has shown signs of renewed life so far.

These are also new - some flowers on the Rosemary plants:

Not many of the flowers are open yet, but there are loads of buds forming.

It's far too early to think about Spring. We could still have another two months of Winter. But in the world of plants (as well as in the human world) there are always a few optimists!