Rogue potatoes
Well what an exciting day I’ve had. Firstly, when I got back from the school run this morning my onions had arrived from Dobies. I’ve ordered Sturton this year, and 2 packets rather than 1, so hopefully they’ll last a bit longer. Secondly I went down the allotment this afternoon to plant my Broad beans, which I’ve done, so I’m very pleased that they’re finally in. As I was planting them, I found last years parsnips, so I decided to dig them up. That was a feat in itself! Goodness me, some of them are huge!! I managed to get them all up (at least I think I have) and they’re now drying on the outside table along with a few rogue potatoes that I found. I’ll put them in the greenhouse to dry further so I can get the earth off. Now I’ve written this, I’m going to have a well deserved cup of tea and a sit down.
Look at my parsnips!
Clairesallotment's Blog 
Hi Claire! I am Irene from Pireaus again. i read in today’s post, that you are planting onion seeds (if I am not wrong). My brother and his wife, who are both agriculturalists, say that we can have better crops of spring or dry onions, if we plant small onions from the varieties we prefer, instead of seeds. I used to do this too. About my terrace garden, things are doing well, apart from a large pot with carrots. Waiting for a new video, thank you.
Irene.
They weren’t on seeds, but onion sets, which are basically small onions. If you’re going to sow onion seeds, then we tend to do that in autumn. I’ve never grown them from seed as it takes so long, and the result aren’t as good. The sets are heat treated so they don’t bolt in the summer. It’s great to know that you know about both, many people don’t.
All the best,
Claire
Hi Claire, which variety of Broad Bean did you sow today. I pulled half of my Aquadulce up last weekend as the wind had killed them. But i got some more this week from DT Brown. I will sow them this weekend if i find the time.
Sorry it’s taken me a while to get back to you the packet was down the allotment and I hadn’t gone down for a while. I also planted Aquadulce. They seem to be coming up well. The wind can be a cruel mistress. Our allotment site is very exposed to the elements, the strong wind ripped open a shed I once had.
Claire – you could always hose down the parsnips to clean them then leave them to dry out,
That’s an idea. I moved them into the greenhouse yesterday, as frost is forecast for the rest of the week.
Claire – leaving parsnips in the ground, so that they catch the frost, sweetens them up. I always leave them in the ground until March before pulling the remaining ones up and freezing them.
NICE PARSNIPS HARVEST
I was rather chuffed with them. They should keep us going for a while.
I tend to leave them in the ground until February usually, but my broad beans took up more room than I expected. The parsnips have had a few frosts anyway, so they’ll hopefully be quite sweet.
Claire, wow what a nice harvest, you are so lucky. O,K I have to confess, I tried planting parsnips this last year and it went horribly wrong, first not all the seed that I planted out sprouted, so just a few came out and after waiting forever my parsnips were tinny. I also tried planting Windsor broad beans this past year and the plants grew huge and beautiful and they had flowers but no beans at all, the flowers just dried out and nothing, it was quite disappointing, because I really love broad beans and I have a hard time finding them in the US and when I do they are very expensive.
Not all the seeds sprout of anything. Don’t worry about it. Parsnips do take ages to sprout, and then take ages to grow. Parsnips aren’t the vegetable to grow if you don’t have any patients. Mine are in the soil for at least 11 month! As for the broad beans, when the flowers come out, then spray them with a fine mist of water from the hose. This “sets” the flowers and stops them from going dry and falling off. We do the same to runner and french beans.
Thank you so much Claire I’ll have to try the mist with the hose for the broad beans. At first I thought the problem was pollination since in the winter we don’t get many bees but then I was told by the people that sold me the beans that the beans are self fertile and that they don’t need any bees to pollinate them.
As far as the parsnips go, unfortunately I don’t have tons of space in my raise beds so I decided to just grow veggies that have a quicker harvest time.
Lt me know how you get on with your broad beans. Maybe one day you’ll have a bit more space so you can grow just a few parsnips. After all they’re wonderful roasted with some maple syrup on them, yum yum!