Pot Plants are officially a go! Ours are all locally grown at Kindling Market Garden in Stockport. With the weather warming up and a bit of sunshine on the cards, it feels like a good moment to start thinking about sowing and planting.
We have a range of tomato varieties available this week, including cherry types like Clementine, Black Cherry and the ever-popular and productive Gardener’s Delight, which are great for snacking on straight from the plant. If you’re after something a bit different, Green Zebra produces striking green striped fruits with a fresh, tangy flavour. For earlier harvests, Matina is a reliable choice, known for coping well in cooler conditions and suitable for outdoor growing. If you’re looking for a larger, traditional heirloom tomato, Marmande offers full-flavoured, ribbed fruits that are ideal for slicing. They’re later to mature, but the flavour makes them worth the wait.
These join a growing mix of beans, brassicas, leafy and salad plants, including Broad Bean (Ratio), Pea (Senator), Cauliflower (Snowball), Kale (Cavolo Nero and Russian Red), Rainbow Chard (Bright Lights), Rocket and a wild garden lettuce mix. There are also Sweet Pea flowers if you’re after a bit of colour alongside the edible crops – they produce an abundance of fragrant flowers all summer, and the more you pick, the more they flower!
A quick note on tender crops, tomatoes in particular: while it’s tempting to get them straight outside or planted in the greenhouse, they’ll still need a bit of protection at this time of year. It’s best to harden them off gradually and keep them somewhere sheltered, especially overnight, until the risk of colder nights has properly passed. Keep them on a warm windowsill or under fleece in the greenhouse if temperatures are dropping overnight.
We also still have plenty of seed potatoes for planting this week from Newfields Organics, compost from Moorland Gold, and we’ve started stocking Vital Seeds, a UK-grown range of organic, open-pollinated seeds adapted to the UK climate, that you can save and sow year after year. These join our abundant range from Tamar and Franchi.
Happy planting!
