“With rushing winds and gloomy skies, the dark and stubborn winter dies” -Bayard Taylor
This is a very appropriate quote for march, it has been a very windy month and left a lot of debris in the garden so lots of cleaning required, but now as we come to the end of the month, we are having sunny skies and warmer temperatures.
As the ground is starting to warm up, we have been able to prepare it for the coming season. which I have to say is my favourite, spring always bursts in with lots of new life both in the garden and in farms surrounding us, always so welcome after the cold grey days of winter.
This means lots of work to do in the garden this month, making sure the ground is ready for planting by giving it a light dig and sowing the seeds for this year’s vegetable crop. We have planted some carrots (Bambini) that should give us an early crop, the soil for the carrots was a little bit to heavy so I added some horticultural sand which has lighten it and the carrots are thriving they are still covered by mini cloche tunnels for now as there is still a chance of frost and a cold snap. keeping an eye on the local weather reports with fingers crossed for warmer forecasts.
I have had to start giving the newly planted carrots, onions, broad beans and garlic some water we haven’t had much rain here for the last couple of weeks and with the high winds the ground has dried out, that is really a thing to watch for this time of year. Older more established plants can tolerant a dry spell but anything that has been newly planted cannot and watering is extremely important now even if we haven’t got soaring temperatures.
I would like to give some attention to the tools we use in the garden the most useful and undoubtable the least glamorous is the humble spade, this is the tool that all us gardeners couldn’t live without we use it for everything not only digging, we measure with it, break roots up with it and lean on it after a long day. So, the importance of a good spade cannot be understated I have to say I have been using the Burgon and Ball digging spade and its fantastic really strong but not too heavy the last thing you need is a heavy spade when digging as it makes the job twice as hard.
