The gardening week (March - Week 5, 2025)

So much planting

Mar 29, 2025

Not just gardening

It’s not been a good week for non-gardening related activities, but on the bright side that means that the garden’s have had a lot of TLC. The minor hip sprain that I was complaining about last week has actully gotten worse, partly because of my need to compensate - or more accurately over-compensate - for it and maybe a bit too much grit (ie stupidly pushing on). The result has been more widespread aches and pain that have kept me from hiking complely and reduced my cycling a lot. Walking has been restricted to the allotment and the promenade.

I should have slowed down and done more writing and swimming, but I didn’t, I pushed on with the gardening. I’m always keen to get all of the outdoor beds planted up by early April and that’s coming up fast. What does planting involve, endless squats and lunges and which set of muscles are most involved, those around the hip. The result, not good!

Anyway enough moaning about my inability to be sensible, when it comes of physical activity, lets get on with the gardening. Thankfully we are now on holiday for a few days, so I will be on forced car rest.

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Gardening problems this week

I’d hoped to be eating lambs lettuce for a couple more weeks based on last week’s harvesting, which was great. Unfortunately when I cleared the oldest bed yesterday I noticed it rising to seed, this always happens so shockingly quickly that even though I’ve seen it hundreds of times, it still takes me by surpise. Lambs lettuce that’s seeding is’t great in salads, so it all had to come out.

Many other things are also going to seed right now, the oldest of the winter spinach - of course - the kale and kalettes and what’s left of the red cabbages. These are as much benefit as probem though, especially the brassicas, because it means lots of florrets in my diet.

What do I eat?

By far the most common comment on videos is a request for a “what do I eat” video. I’ve always resisted because my diet is extremely simple and to most, it would be very boring, not to me of course, but it would also make a boring video. Debbie’s diet by contrast is extremely varied and hard to document. So I did my best to make a video about mine.

Naturally I didn’t prepare for it, because in real life I’m not very organised, so I didn’t have monthly sample meals to illustrate the video with, all I had were a few random photos from the last week. Even so it provided a reasonable idea of what I ate on a typical day last week in March.

The key word being March, because although my eating pattern is the same all year round: 80% fresh fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, dark chocolate, dried fruit, cheese, milk, chicken, beef and lamb and 20% what fits best into whatever activities I have on. The actual mix of fruit and vegetables varies a lot. Here’s the list for that week in March:

Carrot
Radish
Baby leaf kale
Lettuce
Spinach
Salad rocket
Chard
Beet leaf greens
Claytonia
Lambs lettuce
Salad onions
Red stem Pac choi
Tatsoi
Tomatoes
Grapes
Pear
Blueberries
Strawberries
Raspberries
Cherries
Apple
Nectarine
Green curly kale
Red cabbage
Kalettes
Brussels
Onions
Shallots
Garlic
Elephant garlic
Leek
Yacon
Artichoke
Purple sprouting broccoli
Red beetroot
Golden beetroot
Apple sauce
Pistachio nuts
Almond nuts
Walnut
Brazil nut
Sunflower seeds
Pumpkin seeds
Linseed seeds
Oats
Dried apricots
Dried pear
Dried apple
Banana chips (dried banana)

Items in bold are not home grown, at this time of year. This list is drawn from a much longer list of everything that we grow in a year, there’s currently 233 varieties on that list.

First flowers of 2025

I’m now tracking flowering to harvest timescales for each succession of fruit/legumes that I grow. This is a great metric for impatient enthusiasts like me.

This week the second succession of the early greenhouse peas started to flower. The peppers have been flowering for a while now, but I don’t count those as I’m not letting the fruit set.

For main crop sowings flowering to harvest dates are fairly well documented, but for early successions this data seems to be impossible to find … until now!

First harvests of 2025

This year’s spinach arrived this week and what a joy it is to have true baby leaf spinach again, also the PSB arrived on my plot, the earlier sowing that was planted on Debbie’s plot was only a week earlier. Lots of new lettuces arriving now, too many to list.

Last harvests

I took out the last of the September sown Grenoble Red in the polytunnel, this leaves just six Roxy lettuces, still growing very well, in the polytunnel. They will soon be replaced by celery. Then the last hold out from last year is the claytonia.

I’ve also started to take out some of last year’s spinach beds and get those replanted, but none are finished compleyely yet.

Sowings for the week

I wasn’t planning to sow anything this week, but in the end I decided on French beans and then I just got in the mood so I sowed a few Brussels and salad rocket. I’d not planned to sow Brussels until later on this year but I like the leaves so much I decided not to deprive myself.

Here’s everything sown to date, in more detail.

Not germinated yet

Everything that should be, is up now apart from the rapsberries an the Midnight courgettes, which failed but - as you will see soon - I have alternatives.

Germinated this week

Just the leeks and potatoes this week.

Pricked out

It’s been a great week, if you like pricking out, which I do! It’s also a good way to take some pressure off my hip.

Potted on this week

Lots of potting on this week, including more than enough early courgettes and my second succession of cucumbers and the last of my peppers.

Conservatory progress

It’s all change in the conservatory now! The early tomatoes and peppers are now in the greenhouse. This created space for the main crop peppers and the courgettes and cucumbers that I potted on. The first succession of cucumbers now have their first baby fruits and the plants doubled in height this week!

Greenhouse progress

It’s also all change in the greenhouse. The early potatoes went to the polytunnel and after two frosty nights protected by fleece they are now enjoying the slightly warmer nights. This made space for the early peppers and tomatoes to move into the greenhouse, which meant I needed to heat it to 11c, not enough for fruit to set, but warm enough for the plants to be happy. I also moved the baby leaf beet/chard containers back into the greenhouse from the tunnel, these will soon go outside.

The challenge I have now is that it’s too warm for the alliums in the greenhouse, so I decided to get those planted, or at least most of them. This now means when we are on holiday, we can leave the greenhouse in it’s automated mode, heated at night and roof ventilation only during the day. It will be hot, but not too hot for the heat loving plants, provided they are well watered. The peas however need to be moved outside as it will be too warm for them, unless I decide to crack open the door. If I do that the plants will have to cope with maybe 6c at night for two days, which shouldn’t be an issue.

Polytunnel progress

The polytunnel got a swap around too, I freed up space by moving the baby leaf greens back home and filled that space with the early potatoes. I will soon move those potatoes outside, up against the outside of the tunnel, wrapped in fleece. That’s where they will live out the rest of their lives. This will make space for the next batch of potatoes.

I’ve also continued to clear out old lettuces and there were replaced by tatsoi and replacement lettuces, so the polytunnel is almost all new now.

I’ve restarted regular watering in the polytunnel now, as although it’s still slightly below zero at night, it can be above 30c during the day!

Allotment and garden progress

Having finished the infrastructure on Debbie’s plot and planted all of the under-cover beds on my plot, this week I started planting the empty outside beds. I put in a bed of early potatoes and another of main crop shallots. I cleared half a spinach bed and planted red stem pac choi. I had a few gaps, where I’d lost lettuces, so I filled those with new plants. It’s all going to plan so far.

In the kitchen garden I mulched the onion bed with farmyard manure and the rest with mushroom compost. I planted up the main crop onions, and the first outdoor lettuces, interplanted with salad onions.

Debbie planted baby savoy cabbages and shallots in the front garden.

Planted this week

It’s exciting to be on with outdoor plantings, all under fleece at the moment as we likely have a few frosts in our future and plenty of hungry birds and hedgehogs.

Here’s everything planted this year so far.

Waiting to be planted out

All of a sudden I have so much ready to plant out, although nothing is desperate. The peppers and tomatoes should be planted within a couple of weeks and the rest of this gallery shoud be in the ground by then too.

Sowing’s for next week

Lots do do next week. Maybe the first sweetcorn, although it’s a bit early, sometimes it’s worth the risk. Also the first of my main crop tomatoes, although I will also be growing side shoots from my early plants to compare.

Growing guides for April

This link takes you to all of my monthly guides, where you can find a lot more than just my sowing guides. I particularly like the list of videos produced in the relevant month in years gone by. Click here for April’s guides.

Because I’m always experimenting you might find me sowing a few things that are not on this list, but you can always look those up from the complete list of guides, which you can find here.

Sowing Guide for April

Here’s a link to the details.

Weekly Harvest

Harvests are great now and as we loose the lambs lettuce and soon the claytonia, it’s great to have so many baby asian greens, baby beet leaves, baby leaf spinach and new season lettuces arriving. Tomatoes still from the supermarket, but they have great taste and texture.

bUseful links

The most useful lower level links

The reference info section of my eBook, lists what I actually sowed, planted, harvested each month, plus all of the tours and guide videos for that month

Monthly growing guides (what to sow, harvest fresh and eat from the store room each month)

Comprehensive growing guides to every type of veg that I grow

The section of my eBook that covers the basic tools and techniques of gardening (sowing, planting, pests, weeds etc)

The section of my eBook that covers the more advanced tools and techniques of gardening ( extending the season, successional plantings, spacing)

Using grow lights and alternatives to extend the season

Introduction to growing under cover with fleece, low tunnels, polytunnels etc

The chapter of my eBook that covers conservatory gardening

The chapter of my eBook that covers greenhouse gardening

The chapter of my eBook that covers polytunnel gardening

The chapter of my eBook that covers cold frames and low tunnel gardening

The chapter of my eBook that covers extending the season with fleece

The chapter of my eBook that covers outdoor gardening

A guide to my database, how to use it and how to take a copy of it

Useful database links

The types of veg that I grow, roughly ranked in my order of priority

The varieties of herbs, fruit and veg that I’m growing this year

Overview of all of the successions for year round gardening (I don’t grow/recommend all of them) main crops successions are the most reliable

What I’ve sowed so far this year

How long each type of seed typically takes to germinate

What I’ve planted to far this year

What I’ve harvested so far this year

First harvest dates for key successions

The pots and trays that I use with my comments and ratings

The nets and other covers that I use with my comments and ratings

Information on root depth for each type of veg

Information on germination temperature for each type of veg

Information on pesticide use for each type of fruit and veg

List of fruits and veggies that benefit from Mycorrhizal associations

How long seeds last for each type of veg

Which types of veg are heavy, medium and light feeders