…I feel I should calm your nerves with an update on the vegetable growing situation. Yeah, I know, be still your beating heart. But it really is all go on the garden front, or at least the windowsill front:
(these pictures predate the french bean which has decided to come up upside down, seriously freaking out the other half. More on that as the story develops)
And I would be seriously remiss if I didn’t fill you in on interim results on my parsnips. Previously on TownMouse, last year’s parsnips did not come up at all, apart from one seedling which promptly disappeared. This year, I went for a belt and braces approach, both chitting and potting on some of my parsnips. I successfully raised twelve, which were planted out with great care and ceremony and coddled under bottle cloches through the spring frosts. I also planted out my curly wurly parsnips, and some that I’d just chitted in a spirit of experimentation to see which method brought the best results. And then, mostly for completeness’s sake, I planted some unchitted seed as well. More than a month later, the chitted-and-potted (and suited and booted) parsnips are doing quite well, although one has vanished:
The curly wurly parsnips are down to just two, but they’re the biggest of the lot:
And the chitted ones are coming up quite nicely, if patchily, as well:
As are, er, the unchitted ones:
So what does it all mean, apart from the fact that I have absolutely no idea how best to germinate my parsnips? I think I’ll have to wait and see what the yield is. Watch this space, there will be numbers.
Oh and I think I may owe an apology to my broccoli, which is sprouting everywhere now. Hurray! It’s helping the spreadsheet for last year’s season creep ever closer into profit.
I am in the process of trying to grow a Russian Giant sunflower. I have 12 seeds planted and hopefully at least one of these will grow so I can then pot it on to it’s final big pot where I can then tie it to various things on the side of the house as it gets too tall to support itself. So far I’ve not noticed any signs of growth 😦
They never come up until a few days after you’ve given up on them. That’s the rule…
Surely this is all far more exciting!
Happy gardening! xx
Does one need to lay off the fine words to make sure there are parsnips to be buttered?
Flighty – maybe, less stat-friendly though!
Autolycus – my understanding was that there was no significant correlation between fine words and parsnip buttering, but it may be that’s where I’ve been going wrong these past few years… it’s a tricky choice to have to make
Hi,
Is this phot yours? I’m a hobby painter and would like to get your permission for to paint this plant. I love the green and violet colours!
Thank you
Maria
Hi Maria – no problem at all. I’d be interested to see how it turns out
[…] having a broccoli-related disaster. Last year, the crop was slow to get going but once it started it did us proud. This year, well, I thought they had probably survived the frost but it turns out that all but two […]