It’s all growing well in our raised bed experiment. Except the leeks, which are spindly little pencils so far.
I will be patient.
I’m mainly delighted and surprised by the profusion. It seems to have come all of a sudden. We’re cropping lettuces, potatoes, kale, sorrel, purple sprouting brocolli, chives, parsley, dill, mint, and rocket.
The beets, shallots and onions look nearly ready. The garlic is coming along, and the mammoth red cabbage leaves are starting to turn in. The parsnips are growing, as are the carrots.
It’s the rain, long hours of daylight and mild temperatures. Suddenly everything is leaping up as if wanting to make up for the slow, cold start of our late spring.
First crop of potatoesKale, beetroots, red-veined sorrel, onionsPeasParsnipsEndive and carrotsUncle Bert’s kalePurple sprouting broccoli
Another significant milestone. Our first salad from the croft!
For you rampant food producers out there with your polytunnels, greenhouses and fertile growing beds this is going to seem a bit of a damp squib, but we’ve just cropped our first bowl of salad from the croft and I’m doing my happy dance!
Salad leaves
It’s a mix of endive, red lettuce, red veined sorrel, Uncle Bert’s kale, mint and beetroot leaves. All grown organically outdoors from seed here on the croft.
Other things are growing too in these long, light filled days of summer. I can see a few purple heads of sprouting broccoli emerging, and the potatoes will be ready in the next few weeks.
Parsley grown from seed
The leeks have been a big fail – they’re still tiny and very slow growing. Kales, cabbage, garlic, beetroot, potatoes, herbs, and salad leaves have all grown well. The carrots and parsnips are small yet but time will tell. The globe artichokes are tiny plants, a few leaves apiece, but they seem to be surviving. I’m hoping that they’ll muscle-up and come into their own next year. The berry bushes are establishing. The borage and comfrey are flowering.
Wonderful comfrey
I’m just relieved that it hasn’t all been some monstrous failure. We’ve had one meal from the croft at least!
The key learning so far is exposure. We knew it, but just didn’t have the time to do it. We need to get windbreaks up and hedging in this autumn before the main growing season next year.
Small milestones on our journey. Forgive a woman’s unseemly crowing.
We use lots of fresh herbs in our home cooking and they’re relatively expensive to buy from the small supermarket locally here , IF you can get them. Anything beyond parsley, mint and floppy-leaved basil doesn’t seem to make an appearance.
Tashkent mint
We use tons of mint, dill, parsley, chives, thyme, rosemary and coriander, so it makes sense to grow it on the croft if we can.
Flat-leaved parsley grown from seed
Mine has definitely been the innocence of the novice. I germinated flat-leaved parsley and mint from seed here in the caravan spare room in March.
Each is an incredibly slow process at 57 degrees north, and it was only after struggling for months did I read that almost nobody grows mint from seed as it’s so much easier to propogate from cuttings…ah well. We live and learn.
Peppermint seedlings after three months of snails pace growth. The spearmint is even tinier..
I’m hoping it will all be easier once we have the polycrub in place. Next season. Meanwhile, we’ve had some other successes – the lemon thyme and dill have grown well.
Dill the Dog
Onwards and upwards! At last I’m going to plant out the mint, borage, rosemary and dill. The last frost date has passed and as soon as the rain stops, they’re going out.
Borage
I’ve been hardening them off, of course. I’m not going to throw them to the wolves like Spartan Mothers leaving their babies on the hillside overnight to see if they can survive on their own. Not quite. But it’s time that they manned up. Or womanned up. Whatever.
Ravencroft Skye 