This week in Stephanie’s Kitchen Garden, we are going to be installing a new raised bed in our greenhouse border. Over the past couple of years our tomatoes, grown in the border, have not performed as well as we would like. The border is dug over every year before planting, with lots of compost added. However, the hedges surrounding the greenhouse send roots into the border stealing all the goodness and moisture from our crops.
Raised beds are a perfect solution to problems spaces such as this. Placing a raised bed onto the space will give more soil for our tomatoes to send their roots into without sharing it with the hedge. An added bonus is that it will look amazing too!
Our overwintering broad bean plants are looking a little sorry for themselves. We always make a second sowing in late winter and this week will be the perfect time to start them off in rootrainers in the greenhouse. They will be grown on to a good size, transferred to the cold frame to be hardened off and then used to fill any spaces in the current crop.
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n other parts of the garden, it is time to prune the wisteria. We have a lot of it growing here, so it is always a big job. We will prune the side shoots to 3 buds, which will tidy the plants up and encourage them to flower. It will mean a whole day up a ladder, but it’s a satisfying job that will be rewarded by fabulous blooms in the summer.
