Time to clear the garden and order seeds

It is raining here in Caversham at the moment but last weekend we had a couple of hours of sunshine - enough time to clear most of the debris from the garden. There was a lot that was not suitable for the compost heap - thick branches from the bushes for example - so they went into the green waste bag.  It is now full but our next collection date is February 1st. So, if there is any more garden waste for recycling over the next few weeks it will have to sit in a refuse sack and then transferred to the green bag once it has been emptied.



There is not much left in the ground now: swiss chard, spinach, parsnips, scorzenera and jerusalem artichokes in one of the bags at the back.  The other two bags will be planted with early potatoes and once they have been harvested  courgette plants will take their place.

It's also time to finish ordering seeds for the coming year. I usually order tomato and chilli seeds from Simpson's Seeds. Simpson's started out as the Tomato Club and specialised in unusual tomato varieties. They now sell a wide variety of vegetable and flower seeds, and in recent years have expanded their hot chilli collection. There are no pretty pictures in the printed catalogue but the web site more than makes up for that.  The other companies I use are Marshalls, Mr Fothergill's and Thompson and Morgan.


My next task will be to draw up a schedule for sowing seeds  both indoors and  outdoors.