The Veggie Grower’s Bible by Lorraine Burn: a review
One of the many pleasures of writing this blog is that sometimes I’m sent a cookery or gardening book to review. This feeds my reading habit and introduces me to masses of new ideas. I don’t review every book I am sent as I prefer to write about the books that I have particularly enjoyed. I was intrigued when Lorraine Burn emailed me about her book. I checked out her website. She writes “Borne of frustration, the many books I read all had lots and lots of beautiful pictures but never told me everything I needed for one particular...
read moreKitchen garden update February 2010
I’m so pleased that we have planted lots of Tuscany Kale as it has really come into it’s own after the frosty weather. The other kale Frosty – has toughened up a bit so next year we will harvest this first before the cold weather sets in. We are also still harvesting Brussels Sprouts, Swiss Chard, leeks, parsnips salad and stir fry leaves. Although the Savoy cabbages have headed up well they are disappointingly small but still taste very sweet. The early purple sprouting broccoli has just started to sprout and if we get a bit of sun...
read moreThe Cottage Smallholder’s Reader’s little book of Recycling tips and Pest defence tricks for the garden. Compiled beautifully by Ruthdigs
The February CS gardening competition was a great success and the entries provided an amazing amount of practical tips. Unlike forum comments these can be hard to find through a search engine. So Ruthdigs has compiled them all in a booklet that is beautifully laid out and the file can be printed on your own printer at home. She has mentioned this book briefly on the forum and in the comments section of the results post of the competition. Just in case you missed it we have uploaded the file to our server so you can download the PDF file...
read moreAlternative ways to heat a greenhouse
The windowsills in the cottage and the greenhouse are already packed with seedlings. I was determined to get everything off to an early start this year. The little electric propagator is working 24/7 and seeds are germinating really fast. Even though the greenhouse is lined with a thick layer of bubble wrap it needs a bit of extra heat to keep the temperature above freezing on really frosty nights. Do you remember that I bought an ancient Eltex greenhouse heater at the church fete last year? When the frosts hit I tried to light it with no...
read moreThe Cottage Smallholder February gardening competition. The winner is…
As expected we’ve had some great entries for our February gardening competition. It was really difficult to choose just one winner. As I mentioned previously Erika from Lunar Organics is sponsoring this competition. The prize is one of the beautiful moon gardening calendars and explanatory booklet plus three packets of biodynamic seeds that the winner can choose from the Lunar Organics catalogue. There were 26 entries for the February competition and Erika and I had a hard time selecting a winner as there were so many brilliant ideas. In...
read moreBiodynamic gardening update for January
It all started with The Gaia Book of Organic Gardening by Patrick Holden and Cindy Engel. The Chicken Lady gave me this book for Christmas. I absorbed every page. It’s packed with ideas on how to improve the soil in your garden without the need for chemical fertilisers and very useful information and pointers to make a garden more self sustainable. Exactly the book that I needed, as I’ve become obsessed with improving our kitchen garden soil. Then I started to read more widely and discovered that biodynamic gardening is like organic...
read moreSlug challenge 2010 and seedlings
Our basic electric propagator has been brought into service again as I’m really keen to get my tomatoes and peppers started early this year. Also I wanted to sow the Florian strawberry seeds to get a May/June crop. The propagator hasn’t got a thermostat but it is a real little cracker. Germinating seeds very quickly. This year they seem to have germinated even more rapidly – perhaps using rainwater to water them is helping? I’m also using biodynamic techniques and sowing, planting and tending by the moon this year – which is...
read moreThe Bloggies, biodynamic gardening and the latest Cottage Smallholder Competition
I spent a happy hour in bed this morning – nominating all my favourite blogs for the Bloggies 2010. This is the most prestigious annual blogging award in the world and it’s now in its tenth year. You need to nominate three blogs in each category that you choose so I made a list of the relevant URLs and pasted them in. Lots of fun and a good positive start to the day! Then the postman finally delivered my prize for the next Cottage Smallholder competition. As you know I’m using biodynamic techniques in the garden this year, and The...
read more
FD