Week 38 - Overview

The garden is unusually empty for this time of year. The potatoes finished early, the beans are sparse, the squash plants have been removed, and we have had a number of failures, all of which has left a lot of empty soil. Bed 5 was planted with winter greens a few weeks ago and a green manure was broadcast over beds 6, 7 and 10. Last week the empty part of bed 11 was planted with a winter crop of carrots and beetroot, which will be covered with a polytunnel. This week we sowed clover as a undercrop in beds 1, 3, 8 + 9, which will hopefully establish under the current plants and will continue to grow after they are harvested. In the spring, all of the green manures will be dug into the soil to add fertility for the plants next year. If things go well, all of the beds will have either an edible or a composting crop growing in them over the winter, and in some cases both.

Week 26 - Overview

Some of the plants are doing well, and others are struggling. After the drought of March and April, the garden is now saturated! There was no rain today, but in the past 7 days, we have had over 52mm of rain - as much as we would normally expect in the whole month - including a downpour of over 24mm last Tuesday when we aborted the class!

This map of Ireland from the Met Éireann web site shows the amount of rainfall for the past week as a percentage of what we would normally expect (the garden is located in Dublin at the middle of the east coast - close to the 416% figure). It has been a very rainy period with only 1/3 of the sunshine that we would normally expect.

This diagram show how much rainfall would be needed to provide the soil with as much water as it could hold (without draining excess away). With a figure of 2mm, any more rain will start to saturate the soil, affecting plant growth. Luckily there is better weather on the way - though not great for this time of year.

Week 25 - Overview

We only just got to the garden this week and barely started digging the last of the beds when it started to really rain, so we ended up leaving early. Although the garden needed the watering, it did prevent any planting or photographs.

Week 21 - General Photos

These photos were taken (by Bruce) at about 6pm before the class. Not everything is doing well, mainly because the conditions have been very dry lately, but some of the potatoes, peas and beans which were planted earlier in the season are doing well.

An overall photo of the garden looking towards the north, with the top end of beds 1-3 in the foreground. In the distance you can see the back wall and entrance of the garden which leads out onto the road and canal.

This photo is taken from the north-west corner of the garden looking back towards the terrace of houses. The garden is shaded by the trees in the neighboring garden - primarily to the east (left in the photo)- and especially by a 2 story mews house to the west, the shadow of which can be seen to the right of the photo.
A number of beds have not been dug and prepared yet. Beds 1, 2 and 3 will be planted with sweetcorn, squash (including courgettes) and climbing beans. Bed 4 will be planted with peas and dwarf beans. Bed 7 will be planted with swede and other winrter roots as well as some brassica transplants.