WEEK 1 WEEK 2 WEEK 3 WEEK 4 WEEK 5
Welcome to the sixth ‘Follow Us’ update of 2021, a space where we talk about how we’re growing in our own Ergrownomics raised planters this year, and walk you through how you can achieve the same results at home, yourself...Feel free to follow along, and be sure to follow us on Instagram & Facebook to never miss an update! As usual, key is at the bottom, so scroll down now!
Temperatures have remained unchanged this week with daytimes around a very pleasant 16OC - well above the seasonal average. However, overnight frosts have persisted with temperatures dipping below zero every night, albeit with the minimum temperature only reaching minus 20C (so they haven’t been particularly severe). There has been no significant rainfall for 2 weeks and in response we’ve now switched the irrigation system on to daily timed watering, for only 10 minutes each day which equates to approximately 1.5 litres water per planter.
This week has seen the ‘Misticanza di Lattughe’ in Planter 1 and Lettuce ‘Green Salad Bowl’, Lettuce ‘Red Salad Bowl’ and Lettuce ‘Oak Leaf Green’ in Planter 3 germinate, 10 days after sowing. The ‘Misticanza di Lattughe’ looks especially good with seedlings even distributed across the surface of the planter with no large gaps and few clusters. The germination rates of ‘Misticanza di Lattughe’ has been excellent at 100%.
Germination rates of Lettuce ‘Green Salad Bowl’ and Lettuce ‘Red Salad Bowl’ have been extremely high at 125% (sowing was overgenerous, but in our defence, lettuce is very fiddly to sow!), but that of ‘Green salad’ has been inconsistent at approximately 50%. The line of seedlings is incomplete as a result with large gaps at each end of the row and a dense cluster in the middle. There is an outlier of seedlings to the front of the planter which is due to operator error and a spilt seed packet. However, these will be translated into the gaps with the Lettuce ‘Green Salad Bowl’ in due course, so a happy accident, although they may well not actually be ‘Green Salad Bowl, itself!
Spring Onion ‘White Lisbon Winter Hardy’ in Planter 2 is continuing to grow well, though the plants are shorter and stockier than we’d expect. However, this might yet be advantageous in providing more white stem compared to green leaf when the plants are harvested.
Radish ‘Diana’, Radish ‘Hailstone’ and Radish ‘Scarlet Globe’ in Planter 4 have all now started to bulb up, with Radish ‘Scarlet Globe’ by far the most advanced of the three. None of the radishes have produce as large amount of leaf as we would have expected and that which has been produced is fairly thick and slightly tough, which may reflect the extent to which this has been frosted over the last three weeks. We have this week removed a small number of suppressed radishes that offered no prospect of ‘bulbing up’ in order to achieve the final required stocking of 15 per row.
We have started this week to harvest Spring Onion ‘White Lisbon Winter Hardy’ from our vented polytunnel. These are in excellent condition and have clearly benefitted from over winter protection. They taste as good as they look and are considerably better than shop-bought, having travelled less than 30 m into our kitchen. For the sake of comparison, Spring onions currently being supplied to Waitrose are sourced from Egypt and have travelled 3,000 km and will almost certainly have been transported as air freight. This is further proof, should it be needed, of the practicality of growing your own and the benefits of over-wintering hardy varieties in filling the hunger gap when little fresh produce is available, and the offset this provides in reducing your carbon footprint!