Springtime growth
Liz Charnell
Since the last newsletter so much has changed. You would expect as much in spring, but I suppose the rate of change is the part that takes my breath away, especially as we are all still struggling with the mud, the rain and the grey skies (it is meant to be better this week!).
As I write this I know that there is only one more lamb to be born. I could give you loads more detail but I will let Gala fill you in on that one. I also know that Lou has managed to put some of the pigs out into the big, wide and (currently) very wet world. The biggest news is that the ‘bird lockdown’ is at an end finally, which for Lou and Rhys must feel like a release of the huge emotional burden of ‘this is not right’ in the day-to day-reality of the very wet and muddy conditions in the hen houses. The cows remain inside and as I walk the fields with my new dog, Raif, it will take some kind of drying miracle to see that change anytime soon.
From a gardening perspective it is the amount of growth that happens at this time of year that is staggering. Seedlings that usually take eight weeks to get to a ‘going out’ stage seem to get there overnight, leaving us searching for inside space to plant them out, clearing the over wintered crops to make space for the new. But it is the tomatoes and cucumbers which grow like brambles that are the most impressive.
There are only 12 days between the below two photos of cucumber seedlings. There has been so little sunlight, even less warmth and yet in less than two weeks they have transformed. It is hard to imagine cucumber and tomatoes vines at the moment. I am even struggling to think of bean and pea harvests, so entrenched are we still in winter.
However, the salad bags are now made up of all 2023 grown leaves and even some of the first salad brassicas are going to flower. It is still chilly in the mornings; thermals are required until coffee time and gloves for washing leaves in cold water. We are imagining that one day it really will be true spring.
As it is so wet, we have not yet been able to get on the land to cultivate and so we are at least a month behind on planting onion sets. Last year the potatoes were planted out at the beginning of April, this year they are stored safely away until the land is ready. So what can you do? Well not much really, except to marvel at the growth that goes on irrespective of grey skies, take a peek out of the tunnels to look at all those new lambs and then why not make a rhubarb crumble – definite signs of spring, just not yet all of them!
