Spuds I like

This weekend was about getting as many things in the ground as possible. According to the Synodic way of doing things with the moon (considering the phases of the moon: waxing, waning, full and new), now is apparently a good time to sow/plant root crops as there was a full moon on Wednesday and we are now in a waning moon situation. Come Tuesday though, we will be into the last quarter and it is recommended that nothing is sown/planted then. This covers next weekend. According to the Sidereal way, the Moon is in Libra so it is not a good time for roots. Hmmmm. The Synodic way is probably the only one I am going to pay any attention to as it is simple and, as I have the Moon phases in my Filofax, it is most accessible for me. After all, it is just a way of helping choose what to do on the plot at any given time.

Below is a piccie of the root crops I wanted to get started this weekend.



Yesterday was not a bad day - a bit cloudy at times with bright spells. Once digging over on the plot, it was quite warm but when I stopped, I felt the chilly breeze. I dug over the remainder of Bed 8. I wanted to sow some root crops in Bed 1, according to my plan (made back in August), but that bed needs some prep. I used a section of Bed 2 instead - the spot that had been dug over by the Bramble Man. It was a tad rough but a bit of raking and watering helped. I sowed the following:

- carrot (came free with a magazine along with some lettuce and have lost the original packet so I am not sure of its exact variety);
- spring onions (Ishikuro);
- beetroot (Bolthardy);
- radish (Rainbow Mixed).

I covered the carrot over with a mesh tunnel to stop the nasty carrot fly.

Today was a lovely sunny day reaching the heady heights of 15-16 degrees. It was t-shirt weather and warm enough to put washing on the line. I started by sowing some celeric (Monarch) and leeks (Musselburgh and Lyon 2 - Prizetaker). The celeriac puzzles me. Is it a root or leaf crop? According to the rules of crop rotation, it is a root. However, according to Moon Calendar, it is a leafy crop. For today's purposes, it was a root crop.

See piccie below to see the leeks. Like last year, I sowed these in some deep pots that came with some fruit canes, to give them room to grow downwards.



There seem to be some mushrooms growing in one of the pots on the patio. I am guessing they aren't edible but I'd be interested to know what they are.



So, I collected up my chitted spuds and headed over to the plot. I needed to finish off Bed 8 by cutting around the edge and then arranged the 48 (16 of each of the three varieties) seed spuds over the bed (see piccie below).



I used a trowel to put these in. I reckon this got them in deeper than the bulb planter did last year. Talk around the site suggests that using a trowel is the most popular method (as opposed to digging trenches). I'll earth them up once they appear.

I then hurriedly dug over part of Bed 5 in order to put some garlic and shallots (seed in). Some of the garlic had shrivelled away to nothing but there were some usable cloves. Fingers crossed that these prove viable.