10th June

At the end of last week’s newsletter, I was on about trying to get the mulch film put down so we could get started planting the squash plants.

I had been waiting from Wednesday that week for the ground to dry up.

I had tried on Friday afternoon still to wet, again on Saturday after the farmers market again still too wet.

So, I left it until Sunday evening, thinking four days of roasting hot weather now it will be dry.

I did eventually get ten rows of two hundred and fifty meters down, but the first four rows which are at the bottom of the field wre still a wee bit too wet, but I had got it all down.

There will be no worries this year of the squash plants getting planted then dying because of the heat and zero rain.

Monday morning brought wind and drizzle, no good for planting.

And it stayed the same every day until Thursday.

And to make matters worse, the four rows at the bottom of the field that were still a bit to wet, had almost all been ripped in the wind and blown off.

But there were still six rows ready to go.

So, we loaded up with two thousand squash plants, and started planting.

By 12 o clock we had them planted and fleeced.

And by the end of the day, we had the ripped mulch film lifted and re bed formed the ground.

Over the weekend I will re lay more mulch film, and fingers crossed get all the rest planted at the start of the week.

But the poor squash plants that like the heat, and we have been having nice warm weather although a bit wet, are now sitting in the field in 10 degrees and rain, with snow on the hills.

That is one of the reasons for fleecing them.

They hate cold and wind, plus worse, the hoodie crows will go in right behind us and pull all the squash plants out that we have just planted.

We have experienced in the past, when we have not fleece them over night because we were not finished, to coming in the next morning with thousand of plants sitting on top of the mulch film, all pulled out by the crows.

So we now always fleece the squash plants before we finish of.

Potatoes

Our potatoes are coming to an end now, and the new ones are a few weeks away, so we may have a couple of weeks without potatoes, we will maybe try to go with sweet potatoes until they are ready.