April

April

After Kerala everything appears to be so cold and barren back at home. I looked at my broad beans and took them to the Leisure Garden.

2nd April

Put the broad beans into bed two. They were planted in pots in the cold frame in January and now are hardy enough to go out into the soil.

3rd April

Potatoes had begun to sprout at home. Decided to put them straight into a bed at the LG. if they work, fine: if not, no loss.

March is still cold and not much to do at the LG at the moment apart from getting the beds ready and tidy up.

 Getting the frame ready for the raspberries

 Dwarf pear tree just coming into bud

Bed ready for planting

Lovely blue March sky

5th April

I had decided not to put potatoes in this year, then could not resist them. I love potatoes cooked in any form.

Bed two is the only bed where the ground is very hard unlike the other beds. Decided to use this bed for the potatoes as the potatoes will break up the soil.

Preparing the bed for the potatoes

Ready for planting

Friendly visitor

17th April 

The weather has  not been too good to spend time at the LG. Today was a good day, so decided to put some purple sprouting broccoli and brussel sprouts that I had propagated in the conservatory and butternut squash.

Brussels and broccoli planting

butternut squash

The strawberries in the strawberry tower did not work well last year. Decided to move the strawberry towers to the back of the garden and planted some more plants in them.

Strawberry towers

25th April 

Dave moved some pallets that we had collected to the LG and together with Mr S, erected one compost box. Need few more pallets to create three compost boxes.

Fixing the pallets

  

and here we have one complete compost pallet box.

Looking good, just need to have some panels of wood to enclose the gaps.

Come to watch

Raspberries looking good.

30th April

Time to tidy up the beds.

Replacing old rotten wooden panels.

March In Kerala

We were on holiday in Kerala during March. Kerala is also called God's own country. We now know why.

The climate makes it ideal for growing spices, tea, coffee, cocoa, banana, mango jackfruit, papaya, pineapple, coconut, rice and lots more...

March is the hottest month with an average temperature of 29 degrees and the coldest is June 27 degrees, June is also the month of monsoon, when there is an an average of 341mm of rain.

So this really goes to show why Kerala can succeed in growing virtually anything.

We were in Kerala during second week of March to end of March, each day got hotter and hotter, for me unbearable at times, even the evenings after beautiful sunsets was not much of a relief from the heat.

I was not aware that Kerala had huge tea plantations.

Tea

The tea growing area is in the Munnar hills. We stayed a couple of days in Munnar region. It is beautiful, green, lush and hilly with tea plantations as far as the eye can see in some areas. It is one of the largest tea centres in India. Before 1790 the whole area was just a huge forest.

I had no idea that so much tea was grown in this Kerala region. The weather at the beginning of March in Munnar was 25 degrees, and we had lot of rain over our two nights' stay. By end of March the temperature is around 30 plus degrees, far too hot for me. 

So the climate for any growth in Kerala is just right. 

Tea Plantation

Spices

I was not really aware of the spices from Kerala, nor its history.
Kerala was a major spice exporter as early as 3000 BC, according to ancient records. Around the 15th Century, the portuguese dominated the eastern shipping trade and the spice trade in particular.

During the 18th century, French, Dutch and British all had a monopoly over the spice trade of India.

Did you know that India produces 75% of the world's spices ?

Much of the spice plantations are in the Thekkady region. We visited Thekkady and I was awe-stuck by the spices grown there.

We were amazed to see spice plantations in the Thekkady region of Kerala and so many spices also just growing on the road sides and spices like pepper and cloves spread out on roof tops left to dry in the sun. 

Kerala grows 70% of India's cardamom and the majority of India's black pepper. Black pepper is known as the king of spices.

What did we see in the Thekkady spice growing region ? We saw

• black Pepper
• cardamom green and black (black cardamom are much larger than green and are smoked to give the brown woody colour and smoky taste)
• cloves
• nutmeg
• cinnamon
• star anis
• turmeric
• ginger
• curry leaves
• bay leaves

Some of the spices and other food we saw at the beginning of March.

Green cardamom, grows at the base of a tall plant

Large cardamom - brown after smoking






Pepper is harvested as it begins to turn red on the plant, it is then dried out in the sun and goes black.

Nutmeg is a really fascinating spice.  When it ready to harvest the outer layer splits and ripen the nut that is encased in it.

The nut is surrounded by a membrane and when dry it turns orangey/brownish red in colour, and that is mace. The nut has another layer, which is hard and once cracked it has the nutmeg inside.

The outer greenish flesh is pickled, the reddish membrane is mace and the nutmeg is the hard brown nut inside the shiny brown casing. All parts of this spice are used.

Cloves, not ready for harvest yet. Once picked they too are dried in the sun.

Spices ready and dry for sale

So much is grown in the Kerala state.

Coffee

.

Cocoa

Coconut

Sold for drink.

Papaya

Jackfruit

 Rice harvested, being weighed bagged and ready for transportation.

Rice transported by boats to main roads where it is loaded on trucks.

Bananas

Bay leaf

I feel I learnt a great deal about the spices in Kerala and was just amazed. So, what is a spice ? Well, it is a fruit, a seed, a root, bark, a plant used to flavour food as well as having properties that helps to digest the food.

Spices have hot and cold properties. Some spices are used in the cold weather to provide the body system with internal heat, some are used in the heat to cool the body system.

Some spices are used whole, some are ground and also used whole, a selection of spices are also used together whole and or ground.

Some spices are used in medicine and in cosmetics and perfumes. In Kerala in particular, spices are used in herbal and ayurvedic medicines far more than in the west.

Herbs are stems from plants, leaves or flowers and mainly used for flavouring and garnishing.

February garlic

Heard about Elephant garlic on Gardeners' world, and managed to get some from Wilkos.

Planted three large elephant garlic cloves and some ordinary garlic.

Elephant garlic

February 2017

One nice sunny Saturday afternoon we decided to pay the LG a visit.

Did a spot of tidying up ready for planting.

Apple tree given to us by a LG friend seems to have taken root.

Tidying the strawberry bed....

Winter onions planted during November are coming through nicely

January 2017

Broad beans

Just looking at packets of seeds in a store, a gentleman came up to me and said, "Wrong time to be buying seeds." Well, it was October. I smiled and said, "Looking for next year."

This kind gentleman gave me some useful advice. He told me that he planted broad bean seeds on boxing day.

He put them in small trays and placed a toilet roll holder as a surround. This apparently shelters the seeds and they can be kept in a conservatory or a cold frame.

So, I purchased a packet of broad beans and not quite on boxing day, but one day in January, did as he suggested  and put the tray in a cold frame.

In the middle of February I noticed  shoots had come up.

These are ready to be planted in pots, before putting them into the ground.