National Beanpole Week - April 25-May 3

This is the second annual event to celebrate Britain's coppiced woodlands. With news and events from around the country and your chance to buy coppiced products from beanpoles, pea sticks, hurdles, baskets, walking sticks etc.

Find out more about bean poles and coppicing on their site.

http://www.beanpoles.org.uk/

Bean Poles

This year, as an alternative to bamboo poles to support your growing beans (of all varieties), why not use home grown bean poles and pea sticks. Cut from locally sourced coppice and available around the country. Do your bit and support coppiced woodlands which provide great sustainable products and are good for wildlife


You can find your nearest supplier:

http://www.coppice-products.co.uk/Directory/index.htm

http://www.allotmentforestry.com/direct.htm

I'm not yet at the stage of needing any support but I'll be looking out for real pea sticks to support my mangetout seedlings and a few hazel sticks for the runner beans to clamber up.

Early Veg

Noticed that the veg plants are already in the garden centres. Tomatoes, courgettes, salad plants and even runner beans. Seems a bit early as it's only March but if you've got a greenhouse. At least I might get the seeds planted up and see if I can germinate them successfully this year before resorting to buying plants.

Preparing Pots

Out clearing pots and generally doing a bit of tidying up and preparation as I think about what to plant and where.

Thinking about getting the Link-a-Bord kits to created or enlarge my existing raised bed, so I can grow a few more vegetables or trotting along to the local wood recycling store and see what they have going spare. The compost heap also needs repairing as it's started to disintegrate and rot away.

Lovely spring-like day today and plants are starting to burst into bud. Looks so tidy before the garden fills up with leaves.

Planning for 2009

It's time for the garden to get going again. Having been on Twitter today and had a few 'tweets' from other gardeners out there, I'm feeling inspired. The weather is most definitely getting warmer and things are springing back into life. I'm not usually one for planting seeds out, so unlike some who have planting since early in the year, I'm only now thinking of what to plant.

I've dug out my plans from last year and the planting guides and I'm making a list of what I'd like to grow this year. Again, I'll be using the square foot garden concept and perhaps extending it by a foot or two, so I've got a bit more space to play with. It will be the usual array of things that are quick and easy to grow and are suited to a small space - salad vegetables, beans and maybe a few exotics like peppers and squash.

Cats will still be a problem and no doubt I'll be waging war on the slugs and snails again but if we have a better summer perhaps they won't win this time. I read something today that if you water in the morning any slugs will be less inclined to come out than if you water in the evening and are more likely to get eaten by birds. I haven't yet cleared the SFG to save the unpleasant task of having to clear up every few days after the neighbourhood cats decide to use it as their toilet.

Right, ready to get planning and planting.

A Bean!

Finally, I have a runner bean!

After a pretty disappointing slug and snail laddened summer, my last remaining runner bean plant has finally managed to produce a couple of beans. The final sprig of flowers was far enough up the plant that the pesky little slimy critters having chomped their way through all the other foliage, probably didn't bother going any further so the plants that are left have a few leaves at the top.

Next year needs a concerted effort earlier in the year to stop them taking over.

Outdoor Cues

The cucumbers are again doing well although with what we had of summer pretty much at an end, I don't know how many of the small fruits are going to ripen up. They were worth the wait last year and there are more of them this year. Having prickly leaves they also manage to escape the rasping mouths of the slugs and snails even though they're going horizontal - much easier to let them hug the ground with all the wind we've had this year.