19th April

Last week was a week of freezing temperatures. In the mornings it was -5 some mornings then rising to above 15 some days, in the small tunnel and greenhouse, the temperature rose to a boiling 30 degrees.

This has caused lots of extra work in the wee tunnel.

In here we now have all the courgettes and all of the squash seeds sown in trays. Around seven thousand seeds.

These plants hate the cold temperatures, and we could lose the lot, but the tunnel is small, its only 12 foot wide, by 50 foot long, and heats up really quick, and does hold the heat.

In here we only use it for bringing plants on that can’t take the cold.

We have six one tonne potato boxes, turned upside down running down one side, and another six down the other side.

With them turned upside down its almost like having two 50-foot-long tables running down each side of the tunnel, and each box has a nett that we can pull over to help keep any seeds extra cosy at night.

But last week with the temperatures being so cold, over the netting we were also pulling over fleece, and it has worked well, the plants look good.

Most of the courgettes have four leaves on them now, and when I’m sure the weather has turned for the better, we will take them out and put them in the large tunnel.

Then we need to block off the two thousand Pumpkin seeds, and with the courgettes out, we will have room for the Pumpkins.

In the large tunnels we have them almost full, and these plants have survived pretty good, and don’t seem to have been frosted atoll.

All the leeks, onions and brassicas plants that are sitting in trays, have also faired really well, which is just as well because that’s the whole years plants for the field.

The only crop that’s still hiding from us, is the broad beans that we direct sowed a couple of weeks ago in the field and the early beetroot, but hopefully they are just sitting below the soil, waiting for things to heat up just a wee bit.