Weird Garlic

I've been harvesting the Early Purple Wright Garlic this weekend and I may have left them a little too long in the ground or maybe done something wrong along the way. On realising a lot of other people have been harvesting these, I decided to pull them up and found that most of them were slightly deformed.

                                         Photo: Laura Lunt  Date: July 2012

When I say deformed, I mean even though they have grown to a reasonable size, they don't seem to have fully formed into bulbs, as a lot of the cloves are sticking off the outside of the main bulb, but the cloves have fully formed so I'm sure they will be fine to use.

                                                   Photo: Laura Lunt  Date: July 2012

I've left the bulbs to dry out over the mini-greenhouse, these will be plaited and hung in the kitchen for when I need to use them, I may even try and see if I can save a couple of bulbs to keep for planting for next years harvest.

Harvested: Garlic & Onions

Over the last few weeks I've been harvesting the Radar Onions I've been growing since October last year. I started with pulling up around six for my first batch, then nine in my second batch and the rest I picked today.

                                                   Photo: Laura  Lunt  Date: July 2012

At the same time as planting the Radar Onions, I also planted some Early Purple Wright Garlic and as with the onions, I've been busy harvesting the rest of these today, and hanging them for drying out.

                                         Photo: Laura Lunt  Date: July 2012

The mini-greenhouse has been very handy to use as a dryer, but this wasn't big enough for all of them, so I had to use a metal hanger to hold a few of the smaller onions. Hopefully I can leave all of  these for a week or two and then plait up to keep and save for when I need to use them.

From what I've read Garlic is fine to leave in the house after plaited at room temperature, but Onions are meant to be left in a shed or garage at a cooler temperature which I don't have, so I may have to find an alternative way to keep them.

Courgettes Two Types

It didn't take long for the Courgettes to start growing, once sown. Within a week two of these were popping out of the propagator soil, I have one Courgette 'Tondo di Piacenza' which is a round variety and one Courgette 'All Green Bush', which is a normal long variety.

                                         Photo: Laura Lunt  Date: June 2012

These have now been planted outside, as I lost a couple of the Strawberry plants, I've placed the round Courgette variety in here and potted another one up in another individual pot.

                                                    Photo: Laura Lunt  Date: June 2012

Brussels Sprouts Not Lost

For a while I thought I'd lost the Brussels Sprout plants I've been growing, they seemed to have suffered a lot while I was away on holiday for a week, but it looks like I may have actually had a few survive, which I re-planted up a few weeks ago.

I originally grow so many that I gave a pot full to my mum.

                                                                                  Photo: Laura Lunt  Date: June 2012

In total I managed to save four of the plants, one I've planted on its own and the other three in a long pot, they are very small at the moment, but hopefully they'll grow and I'll have some sprouts ready to eat at Christmas.

                                                                  Photo: Laura Lunt  Date: June 2012

First Strawberries of the Year

Last year I created some Runners from the 'Alice' Strawberry plants I got from Thompson & Morgan, see blog Strawberry Runners for Beginners. The new Runners were left in my mini-greenhouse to over winter and around April they were planted up into hanging baskets.

                                            Photo: Laura Lunt  Date: June 2012

Unfortunately I started with four plants and lost two while I was a way on holiday at the end of May. But within a few weeks the others started to show some Strawberries coming through and this week I managed to pick the first four which were ripe to eat... delicious.

                                                   Photo: Laura Lunt  Date: July 2012