First homegrown salads of the year

[Garden Manager]

I have just started eating my first homegrown salad of 2006 (well since last friday in fact). Just a couple of different lettuces and some rocket, grown in plugs and planted out inside an old coldframe for protection. Not much I know but its great to be eating tasty home grown for the first time rather than the bland supermarket stuff.

Its amazing though what a bit of protection can do. I put the old coldframe on the end of one of my veg beds and planted a short row of each of the salad crops I had grown. I planted the remaining plants in the open next to the frame. For the first week or so i kept the lids of the frame on but have since removed them as the weather has warmed up. As aresult i a now picking the (cut and come again) salads in the frame whils the rest of the plants are a couple of weeks (at least) off cropping.

Good eh?

[Garden Manager]

[jennym]

Ditto - done the same (properly) for the first time this year, just kept trays on the patio in the back garden though - it is good :)

[supersprout]

Its amazing though what a bit of protection can do.

Well done GC, I'm only just starting to appreciate what even a mesh cover can do. Watch this space for winter salads from the greenhouse when I get as organised as you 8)

[Mrs Ava]

And it is amazing how just a little protection can make weeks of difference!  Some of my cut and come again is protected by the globe artichokes, and I am harvesting - same salad in a more exposed patch is ages away!

[Garden Manager]

pretty soon I shall be using the same system to start of my courgettes. One plant should fit nicely inside the old coldframeand get off to a good start in the same way. Hopefully then I can get some earlier courgettes (thats if the slugs and snails dont get the plant first!)

Good way to make use of an old coldframe thats past its best eh?

[katynewbie]

 ;D

I AM SOOO HAPPY!! Because:

a) I am back on A4A (thanks Lishka)
b) On Sunday i had my first salad of leafy oriental stuff from the plot!

Conclusion? Does not take much to make me happy! Lack of A4A can seriously damage my well being!!

;)

[saddad]

We have had over wintered salads in the greenhouse, and frame, if things get desperate there is always Sorrel (Docks) and Land cress, first salad leaf in Ea April, sown in a window box and left in the greenhouse, unheated, all eaten now but second sowing and second cutting nearly there, and all this Oop North (Derby)! ;D

[Hyacinth]

GC I used one of my old coldframes last year for 2 cucumbers, to great success. Doing the same this year, too :)

[Garden Manager]

Here we go, heres a picture of what i've got:

[Zoglet]

I'v been getting the same salads from my window box, and raddish too - yummy!!

[bison1947]

Hi All

Like the rest i have been enjoying early Radish and cut & come
Lettuce for about 2 weeks now.
Lettuce at the back of the greenhouse


Bill

[Gadfium]

Sowed a pot of long-rooted radishes in March; the first one got nibbled today.

A little skinny, but it had the right taste!

[Debs]

Yup its a fabby feeling ;D

ran out of bagged supermarket lettuce, so went into g'house and found some reasonable lolla rosso and little gem for salad.

Yum.

Debs

[sussexcliff]

I can recommend Winter Delight (a Cos type lettuce from Tuckers) sown 25th September last year and grown in the open. I have been picking leaves since March and complete lettuces since early April.  Also eating the thinnings from the over-wintered onions.

But everything else is late, out of sequence or hasn't germinated. So I'm just grateful for what is working.
Cheers
Cliff

[saddad]

Being a great fan of the HDRA seed library I can recommend Stoke , Bath Cos, and Loos tennis Ball as excellent cold frame winter Lettuce and if you want colour Bronze Arrow, but I am far too idle to save seed from lettuce...
;D

[supersprout]

Thanks saddad, noted for autumn! ;D

[Garden Manager]

I've virtualy been living off the stuff for the past week. Cant get enough of it.  Salad with every meal virtualy.(sad or what?). Its a pity I dont have any homegrowm toatoes to go with it instead of the rather bland supermarket ones.

The plants are now though looking a little worse for wear , but as they are cut and come again types they will soon bounce back I am sure. ;D

[alit]

i have grown cut and come again salad leaves for the first time this year and am really pleased.  am saving a fortune not buying those supermarket expensive salad leaves.

How long should a "sowing" last before i need to sow another lot to take over.

Alit

[Garden Manager]

Longer than a crop of hearting varieties I would think. Not sure depends on how much of it you use and the weather but i guess when cropping is in full swing you should think about sowing some more.  You could wait until the plants start to decline, but you might end up with a gap if the old ones go over quickly ant the others arent ready yet.

I hope this helps.