January: Irish Kitchen Garden tips and advice

Well, its time to start a new year and plan ahead.
One feels that growing your own food in 2013 will be even more important in the times we have.
Oil prices are high, so food is set to become more expensive.
Even a container or fish box can give you salads, herbs and other easy to grow crops so do give it a go. Home grown food is going to be fresher, I believe healthier and certainly more rewarding than plastic shrink wrapped or frozen equivalents. The flavour difference between frozen and fresh veg is huge.

I'm coming home in a few days to make a start on this years crops. It will be interesting to see how the garden has coped in my absence.
Last October I advised as to winter crops and jobs.

But if this is a start its still a good time to get the spade or hoe out and start turning the garden.
Frost and rain break up the soil and help disrupt weeds.
Turn over fairly big clods this allows the frost to break up the ground for you, helps kill off pests and aerated the soil.
Also, it provides some extra food for the birds, they will pick away at pests and bugs.
Don't forget to put out some feeders for our little feathered friends - they guard your garden.
Only February is colder and only December has shorter days. Its a good time to clean things up.
Wash and sterilize propagators. sharpen tools and tidy stuff away.
If you do not already have a compost bin, build one now.

Start putting down traps, especially on new ground for wire worms and beer traps for slugs.
Its never too early to make a dent in their populations - although at the moment its probably too cold for nematodes.

If you live near the sea January was the traditional start of the seaweed collection period. For new potato beds lay out seaweed - and be generous

VEGETABLE TIPS JANUARY
Its time to order and browse seed catalogs and plan the garden, what goes where etc.
It is a great way to start to get past winter, reading up on those occasionally poetic and frequently funny veg names, its a reassurance of spring and growth and a new season on dark, cold and wet nights.
Save egg boxes as they will come in handy for potato chitting next month - whats an Irish veg patch without a few spuds?

Source your seed potatoes if you have not already done so.
When you’ve got your seed potatoes, set them in a light, cool, frost-free spot and leave them to sprout. Make sure you put the tubers with the 'eye' end - where the sprouts will grow from - upwards

You can already make a start on other vital crops - its getting a little late but get garlic cloves into the ground in a sunny spot.

On your window sill plant onion seeds in seed trays.
Indoors or in a shed for early crops eg: lettuces, summer brassicas (e.g. cabbages and cauliflowers), spinach, salad onions and turnips.


Stake or earth up Brussels sprout stalks and kales that look leggy and vulnerable to wind rock.
Pick the biggest sprouts from low down the stalks first.


Force chicory / witloof to produce plump leafy heads.
You can start forcing rhubarb, seakale and chicory in January.

Rhubarb is forced by placing an up-turned bucket/pot over the plant to exclude light.
The warmer the environment the quicker it will grow; you can place manure or straw over the top to encourage growth of the pale, sweet shoots.
Seakale is forced the same way, only there is no need for extra warmth.

FRUIT TIPS JANUARY
Apply winter washes to fruit trees and bushes. Ensure tree stakes and ties are firm and sound.

Prune gooseberry, currant and autumn raspberry bushes.

Prune apple and pear trees - but not stoned fruit trees like cherry or plum.

Plant bare-root trees and bushes, as long as the soil isn't frozen.

Apply a top dressing of sulphate of potash to all fruits and nuts.

Thanks for reading, if this is your first year growing your own food - stick with it, its fantastically rewarding, and if your a returning reader, thanks for sticking with my erratic blogging.



Again, Please do take the time to comment - I really do value and appreciate the feedback.
Please also let others know about the blog, its nice to think it is of help to others.

All the best for 2013 - Simon (the one in the middle)

Carna cake - Caraway and Sugar Kelp

Uploaded from 58 degrees North and 1 degree East - aint technology great!!
A lovely recipe based on one in Dr. Prannie Rhattigans great book The Irish Seaweed Kitchen. 
It is a very simple cake, using dried seaweed.
If you don't collect your own seaweed I would recommend an Irish companies products - Spanish Point Sea Veg - you can buy it online.

This recipe is kind of a Madeira cake, and the combination of sugar kelp and caraway works very well.

Dr. Rhattigan uses vanilla extract, I use a bit of lemon zest, other than that the recipe is the same.

Again, it introduces seaweed into your diet, which is full of minerals, vitamins and iodine.
The only thing you need to do with the dried seaweed is soak it in warm water before chopping.
The sea veg used is sugar kelp or kombu kelp.

INGREDIENTS
2 heaped teaspoons, kelp - finely chopped (sugar kelp or kombu kelp soaked in warm water till soft)
225 grams butter - I always try to use Cuinneog butter
115 grams castor sugar
4 large eggs
340 grams plain flour, sifted
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons caraway seeds
Zest of half a lemon

METHOD
Pre-heat the oven to 180 deg C - 350 deg F or gas mark 4

Grease the sides of a 9 inch tin with a little butter and line the base with grease proof paper.

Place the butter and sugar in a bowl and cream until light and fluffy

Add the eggs one at a time and beat in well.
If the mixture shows signs of curdling, add a little flour

Stir in the baking soda, sugar kelp, caraway seeds and lemon zest
Add the flour  and mix well.

If the mix is a bit dry you can add a tablespoon or two of milk.

Put the mixture into the tin and bake for 50 minutes
After 50 minutes check the cake with a wooden skewer, you put it through the centre of the cake - it should come out clean and dry. If it does not, give it another 10 minutes in the oven.

It is gorgeous to have with black tea and lemon

Mushroom Magic

Mushrooms are pretty essential in a lot of cooking, great with steak or stir fries, the simple mushroom omelet or a creamy pasta sauce are some of the quickest, tastiest meals one can do.
There are so many varieties now it can be a little confusing.
If you are into types other than white button there can also be the question of availability.
Mushrooms can be grown throughout the year – under cover as I do or in a cellar, cupboard, garage etc.

In the autumn/winter mushrooms can even be grown in a greenhouse, as they don't need to have light excluded.


Mushroom seed, or spawn, is fairly easy to source on ebay, particularly the more exotic types.
I picked up a pack of dry spawn for simple white button mushrooms from Dangan nursery centre in Galway.
The type is Agaricus, produced by Suttons and retails at €6.80

Finishing mushrooms can vary, i.e. some require daylight to finish off or get colour but getting any variety of them started is exactly the same across the board.

What you need to think about first is a cellulose rich substrata - or for people like me wood or wood product mixed in with manure to create a subsoil.

I used well rotted farmyard manure, then lots of wood bark and wood bits from under the log pile and straw from last years oats that had been left on top of the asparagus and strawberry plants over winter.

But any woody - papery type substance will do, shredded waste, paper toilet rolls, old books or telephone directories, old cotton clothes, hardwood sawdust or woodchips - whatever else you can think of.

Sweepings from under firewood storage gave me a good supply of materiel. A little gypsum is also good.

Mushroom yield will be highest with a carefully selected mushroom compost made from straw, horse manure. Some people have even been successful growing mushrooms on sawdust and waste paper. Mushrooms can even be grown on the compost heap, although results will be variable. A mixture of horse or poultry manure and straw is preferred by mushroom growers, although most types of manure are suitable.

Anyway, I used some fish boxes to mark out the area I plan to turn into a mushroom patch. It is under an old hedge in some shade so a lot of old woody bits slowly breaking down there already.

Once the area had been marked out for each area I dug in straw, as much wood bark and bits as I could and half a wheelbarrow of well rotted farmyard manure to a depth of about 10"/25cm.

I dug in about half the spawn from a single envelope, my hope is this will give a different cropping time as mushrooms come in flushes.

I compacted the manure as best I could just whacking it down with the back of a spade.

The rest of mushroom spawn was sprinkled over the developed area and pressed in with a rake to a depth of about 3"/5cm.

Then a few sheets of news paper are laid over the area and damped down.

A fishbox is then put over the top to exclude light. These will be painted black to improve light exclusion and increase heat absorption.

A few days after spawning thin white threads - Mycelia - will appear.
After 10-14 days remove the newspaper and put in a 'casing' layer.

That is simply about 3cm or 1.5" of clean moist garden soil or bagged compost over the top.
This is called the casing layer

When the casing layer is established keep it moist but not overly wet.
Mushrooms grow in flushes. To pick gently twist the cap and pull away from the bed gently to avoid damage to developing mushrooms.

Pick regularly, removing old or diseased mushrooms immediately.
Mushrooms can keep producing 3-6 months after spawning.

Ideal temperature is about 15 degrees C, avoid temps if possible below 10 or above 20

Winters end, Springing into action

Well, just got home and turned over one of the beds, some nice surprise parsnips.
A bit skinny, but a fair few of them so that was nice. It really goes to show with a bit of planning you really can have food from the veg patch all year round.

The Russian kales, while small, have survived 8 weeks of neglect and are coming along. Nice little winter cabbage in the garden that was used up in champ yesterday.
The dwarf curley blue kale is a virtual perennial, still producing abundant and good quality leaves.
Sea kale did not make it through the winter, so need to start that again.
Fruit trees coming into bud - just came back to Connemara via Cork, down there a few fruit trees were already in bloom!

Cordoon is coming on very well, and that was the one perennial I was worried about!

Now Spring is here. Saw a couple of wild bee's yesterday :-)
Just preparing beds, a little later than usual but better late than never.
Manure was dug in last December in most beds.
First job, as with the last 2 years is to use the superb Irish made product, SuperNemo's, and apply that.
It is a broad spectrum, pest specific and super effective way of dealing with garden parasites.
I use Nemaslug as well for slugs, but when it comes to things like caterpillars, thrip, wireworm and leatherjackets Supernemo saves a lot of money and time in comparison with the nemasys programs that require pest specific doses, and Supernemo are an Irish developed company.
In actual fact, Supernemo this year wereshortlisted for the Irish Times innovation awards - I think they should have won the damn thing.

Leek nursary looking good, transplanting small leeks tomorrow.
Ready to put potato's in the ground, latest I have ever planted them.
Bed for turnips ready, this year again concentrating on Tipperary Turnips from Irish Seed Savers as the main crop.
Cabbage seedlings ready to go in as soon as the ground is turned.

Put in a new herb bank with potted plants from Dangan Garden Centre and will be cleaning that bank up using ground cover to supress weeds. Main thing is to get the herbs themselves established, apart from the bay tree they are all ground hugging types, so the idea is to get them to spread out and take over the area.

Nothing fancy this year as yet, making paper pots for some seeds to go in the ground later in the year, e.g. squash etc.
Folks, if you use this blog for recipes, best advice I can give you is grow a few bits and pieces for the year, even an ornamental kale, it is really rewarding.

Clifden Pony Show 2011

Got home to Connemara just in time for one of the best days of the year. The weather was fantastic and there was a great turn out this year.
For us here in Connemara, show day is a great time to catch up with people, even though you need to be careful where you step for horse manure and political candidates - equally hazardous on occasion.
Being such a widespread community its nice to be able to see so many old acquaintances who one might not have seen in a while. It's the end of the summer so everyone is more relaxed, its a great time of year.

My cousin Morgan with his entry, Morgans Pride the second.

It draws people from all over the world - and the horses are the major part of it, for the breeders and the association it is the major annual event.
The horses are the reason the show exists, and the amount of work that goes into preparing the ponies for show is immense. I got to the show early as one relative had an entry and did well, and with all the work that goes into it some year I hope he will win the overall prize.

The serious business of judging

But for me there is another highlight, the competition for crafts, home grown produce and home cooking and preserves.
The crafts section is really for kids, and in such a show with all the grown up horse trading.
Its great that this less serious but I feel equally important part of the show is there to include all ages and interests in our community.

Home grown foods prize table

I was very disappointed not to be able to enter this year as I could not find an application form online for the baking, preserves and homegrown section, and hope this can be arranged for next year.
No offence to the winner, but I really think my Tipperary Turnips could have won a red ribbon - I could have been a contender, the turnip king of Connemara.

3 table turnips, looked like Milan Purple Tops

I spoke with the chief steward and she will look into it. If the application form for 2012 goes online or is emailed to me I will make it available here by download or by link.

The home crafts section had been in decline for a few years, and there has been talk of moving out of the showground to make way for more commercial ventures - but this year with I think 80 entries, it's on the up again.
It has always been a great favorite of mine, my Grandmother who was great at knitting and crochet would meet friends and relatives there like Mrs Gibbons (who generally won) - it was a part of growing up.

To lose this part of the show would be a real loss to the ethos, the fun of the show. And of course kids would have less interest and involvement.
The show is one of the major social community events of the year, it is vital in my opinion to maintain and even expand the home crafts and produce competition - after all, not everyone owns or has an interest in horses.

In attendance was Mr. John O'Hara, President of the Irish Shows Association and a neighbour of our county in Co. Mayo who quite rightly said that to have variety in a show that is so focused is a great thing.

5 veg basket winner

There were several entries for the 5 veg selection, and this would probably be the hardest to win. There was a wide range of veg. Cabbage and beets featured in most. Great cauliflowers were there as well - and a few fennel. With the advent of pollytunnels it is obviously now easier to produce very good examples of what I would call borderlines crops like cauli's and fennel, those plants that have a tendency to bolt outdoors.

Potato winner - could have had a chance at this

I felt the potato section was a bit disappointing this year, one would like to see more notes on variety presented etc. and I think my Mr.Littles would have been an unusual and eye catching entry.
Unless I am corrected, I think I am the only person on this Island that grows them. I opened up the ridge a few days ago and the results look really promising.
Roosters, Orla, Records and Nicola also did well. Because of the late planting, the Kerr pinks still remain to be seen.

There was a great selection of onions at the show this year, all perfectly presented and tops tied off French style with twine - that's probably the trickiest entry to win in Clifden.

Jams and preserves

Then there is the jams and preserves section, this years winner was blackcurrant. There is also a section for home made marmalade, and I feel the Mrs Beetons carrot marmalade would be a nice entry for next year - and I'm posting it here so if someone beats me with one of my own recipes I can point it out ;-)

Sponge contest winners

There is also a section for home cooked sweets, cakes, apple pie, soda bread and sponges. I would not even attempt to compete against the matriarchs of Connemara when it comes to soda bread, but maybe next year I might give some of the others a go.
One thing that was a bit of a downer on the day was chickens. I have always liked chickens, and there were some for sale. But being away so much it is pointless to even consider them, even though there was poultry for sale on the day. I loitered so much looking at them I started to worry I might be told to move on by the Gardai!!
My neighbour, whose chickens get all the kitchen scraps in return for eggs, generally wins a rosette for her eggs. I wonder if it is possible to rent chickens?

Anyway, it was a great day out and if ever readers get a chance to visit, you should really try to make it down to this part of the world on this special day.

Range of jam sponge cake

Thanks for taking the time to read the blog and please feel free to comment, I appreciate the feedback - and its reassuring to know that someone reads this blog on occasion.

Fruit n' Nut Pork and Greens - Chuleta de Cerdo y Acelgas con Pasas y Pinones

This meal is just a way of dolling up simple pork chops with a side of simple sautéed spring greens

The meal itself is a nice variation on the Northern European theme of pork and brassica like our bacon and cabbage or Dutch Rookwurst and borecole.

The greens are the main part of the meal, based on a Catalan dish called Acelgas con Pasas y Pinones.

Normally its made using chard and other greens sweetened with raisins and crunch added from nuts.

It’s a seasonal meal for me as I used the pine nuts left over from the nettle pesto and tidied up the leaves on my Tipperary Turnips and winter cabbage’s. I use a real mix, a medley of greens.

This meal serves 3-4.

The Pork could not be simpler. Its flavours are based on sage and onion stuffing.

You will need:

2 pork chops cut into cubes about 2cm

2 good sized apples, cored and cut into good sized chunks

About half an onion, roughly chopped

Tablespoon Donegal Rapeseed oil

About one and a half teacups course breadcrumbs (about 2 slices of well done toast through the blender)

Teaspoon dried sage

Teaspoon salt

Preheat the oven to 180 deg. C

Retain half a teacup of  breadcrumbs

Place all the other ingredients in a bowl and mix well.

Oil a dish with Donegal rapeseed oil

Chuck ingredients into the cooking dish, pour over the remaining breadcrumbs

Put in the middle of oven for 45 minutes/1hour until nice and golden.

I always throw a few spuds in the top of oven to bake or to roast depending on how I feel at the same time as the pork, saves energy and washing up

For the Acelgas con Pasas y Pinones you will need:

12oz-1lb of Garden Greens like chard, cabbage, turnip or beetroot tops. Later in the year I would use kale
These are cut chiffonade (see note)

4 tablespoons raisins 

3 tablespoons pine nuts  

2 tablespoons Donegal Rapeseed oil 

About half an onion (whats left from the pork dish really)

2 garlic cloves, crushed or finely minced
1 teaspoon dried oregano

Preparation

Cut the greens chiffonade.
In a medium pot, bring a pint of water to a boil. Add greens, stir to submerge, and boil gently, uncovered, for 10 minutes, stirring several times to make sure the greens are cooking evenly.

After 10 minutes, drain greens in a colander (press on them once or twice with the back of a spoon to remove extra water) and set aside.
Soak raisins in a small amount of the hot water and set aside.

I generally take a break at this point, let the greens drain until you relax, maybe get a baked dessert ready etc. and wait while the pork cooks off

About 10 minutes from when you expect the pork to be done, continue with the recipe.

Heat a large dry heavy pan and toast pine nuts over medium-low heat, stirring frequently, until light brown. Do not walk away while they are cooking or they might scorch. Remove nuts from pan and set aside.

Heat the Donegal Rapeseed oil in same pan and sauté the onion for 3-5 minutes, or until soft and just beginning to color. During the last minute of this cooking time, add garlic and oregano, so as not to scorch the garlic.

When onion-garlic mixture is done, add drained greens to the pan and stir to combine. Drain raisins and add them, cooking on medium and stirring a minute or two to evaporate any extra water that has accumulated.

Stir in pine nuts and serve with the pork and potato’s, and as the pine nuts came from the nettle pesto, why not use a little of that to garnish the spuds.

Traditionally of course the meal is cooked using olive oil, and Catalan olives are fantastic - but this is local, regular farm food. They use olive oil simply because it is available, so I really feel we should try cooking with our own rapeseed oil to reduce food miles and support our own farmers.

It is for that reason as well that I source most of my shop bought meat from McGeoughs Butchers in Oughterard or Seamus Mannion in Clifden.

As always, please feel free to leave a comment, I love the feedback 

*Note - Chiffonade:

This is a technique in which leafy greens are cut into long, thin strips. 

This is generally accomplished by stacking leaves, rolling them tightly (a technique I am sure many readers are familiar with) then cutting across the rolled leaves with a sharp knife, producing fine ribbons.

"Chiffon" is French for "rag". To chiffonade simply means to turn into rag-like strips, as seen in the pictures.

Stack

Roll

Slice

Soil testing, ideal vegetable pH levels and veg patch pH adjustment

As I may have mentioned before, the kitchen garden I set up is in a challenging environment, and soil acidity - particularly near pine trees in waterlogged soil, is a worry.

The first thing to do is a Ph test of the soil.
As most readers know, 95% of the time I will always advise to buy in local Irish outlets, but I got a great deal on ebay for the kit I got.
Preston Bisset Nursaries in England do a great deal on a kit I got via their ebay shop, but you can also order them direct - tell Jacqueline and Peter I sent you.
A Westminster test kit will give you approx. 30 tests - more than enough for 2-3 years for me.
It only cost £5.95 + £2.25 postage.
That is a real bargain, its very easy and simple to use, giving accurate results.
I looked at electronic soil testers, but for the affordable ones the reviews were poor, so it is this kit I would recommend.

VEG PATCH pH ADJUSTMENT
Alteration of soil pH should ideally be done about a month prior to planting.

To lower your soil pH, then you will need to add agricultural sulphur.
To increase your soil pH, then you will need to add agricultural lime.

Lime and sulphur are available at garden centres and packs will have directions for use.

Another idea I will be testing this year is ashes. I tested some old ash from a turf and wood stove, and found it to be very alkeli, so that will be used as a soil adjuster as well as providing bulk to try and raise a few beds.

IDEAL VEG pH AND PLANNING
It's important to get this right when you set up. I should have done this last year when I started, but in western Conemara it is a fairly safe assumption to say the soil is acidic.

The veg patch I have laid out is roughly in the "People Love Bunches Of Roses" format for crop rotation and planning - and that is the way I laid out this ideal pH guide, group by group.
As the garden develops, and new crops are introduced, I will update the list in future.

POTATO
Ideal pH of 4.5 - 6.0.  Soils with a pH lower than 6.5 are best-suited for raising potatoes; the ideal soil pH for potatoes is 5 to 6. In fact, potatoes are one of the few vegetable crops that can tolerate and thrive in more acidic soils — soils in the 4.8 to 6.0 pH range.
Potatoes may not do well in soils with a pH higher than 7, because if the pH level is high, many of the nutrients that potatoes require to grow will not be available.

LEGUME'S 
Beans 6.0 - 7.5
Pea 6.0 - 7.5

BRASSICA'S AND GREENS
Water Cress 5.0 - 8.0
Cauliflower 5.5 - 7.5
Turnip 5.5 - 7.0
Broccoli 6.0 - 7.0
Brussel Sprouts 6.0 - 7.5
Cabbage 6.0 - 7.5
Chinese Cabbage 6.0 - 7.5
Kale 6.0 - 7.5
Kohlrabi 6.0 - 7.5
Spinach 6.0 - 7.5
Mustard 6.0 - 7.5

ONION FAMILY
Shallot 5.5 - 7.0
Garlic 5.5 - 7.5  
Onion 6.0 - 7.0
Leek 6.0 - 8.0 

ROOTS AND TUBERS
Jeruselem Artichoke 4.5 - 7.0
Chicory 5.0 - 6.5
Carrot 5.5 - 7.0  
Beetroot 6.0 - 7.5
Parsnip 5.5 - 7.5 
Oca 5.5 to 7.5
Radish 6.0 - 7.0

SALADS AND HERBS
Tomato 5.5 - 7.5
Cucumber/Gherkin 5.5 - 7.5 
Lettuce 6.0 - 7.0 
Celery 6.0 - 7.0
Cress 6.0 - 7.0
Horseradish 6.0 - 7.0

FRUITS
Rhubarb 5.5 - 7.0
Gooseberry 5.5-7.0

Acid Soil: Apples, Macadamia, Nectarine,Blackberry, Blueberry,Strawberry,Watermelon

Slightly Acid to Neutral Soil: Grapes, Peach, Pears, Apricot

Neutral to Alkaline Soil: Cherry, Plum, Almond 

GRAINS
Quinoa, 6.0 - 8.5
Acid Soil: Oats

Slightly Acid to Neutral Soil: Barley

OTHER'S
Pumpkin, squash 5.5 - 7.5
Asparagus 6.0 - 8.0
Mushroom 6.5 - 7.5 

 

Expansion and coppice plans

Just watched that new RTE program on Monday - How to Create a garden. Not a patch (pardon the pun) on Garrai Glas that I finally caught up on with their website.
I have to say at least it is a gardening the How to Create a Garden is a gardening show - and fair play to the people who make it, but I found it of little use.
At first I felt was it just me, but the program got pretty badly slated on by others as well on boards.ie as you can read here. 
I think it is well meant, but in fairness it is a re-development of a patch of well cultivated land at Fota house that has been cared for over centuries, hardly typical.

I'm fairly sure the average back garden or small holding has not recieved one tenth the attention before being set over for crop's or a kitchen garden.
The use of roundup was disturbing. Why not show people how to make their own weedkiller or support a small Irish company making organic weedkiller like OWK? I feel that RTE should when possible try to promote Irish companies.
Also, there is one piece of advice I always give people when developing a new garden for veg from grass is use supernemo's - again - an Irish company but vital against cutworms and wireworms - in particular when starting a veg garden on virgin grass land like a lawn. If you don't listen to anything else I say, that's the one thing you should heed - I speak from bitter experience.

Garrai Glas seem's a lot more practical and is certainly better made, presented and interesting.

Today I spent most of my time opening up a new area of the garden. Rather than well tilled and maintained land this is what I faced into.

Thats briar, rush, heavy udergrowth, waterlogged and pine boughs. It is this area that will either be used to grow oats or spuds, depending on how things go with seaweed collection, weather ain't great at the moment.

Today it was back to basics, and it was time to get communist in the garden. With all the rock, water and pine trees a strimmer - even if I could afford one - is not really an option, very much back to basics - the heavy curran or sickle.

Not the easiest job in the world - but effective. The long briars that I pulled from the undergrowth were big, and impressive. They are also a very hardy plant that produce fruit. Because of the boggy ground, the root stock was reasonably easy to lift. This gave me the idea of using them to my benefit - a coppiced hedge over a drain.

Tomorrow I will need to put in a drain to make this new patch productive.
The drain will serve three purposes.
Firstly, obviously, to provide irrigation.
Secondly, it will be a place to grow watercress.
Thirdly, with the drain and overhang of bush I hope it will attract frogs and toads to eat slugs.
The flowers should also attract bee's and make use of otherwise lost space - that integrates into the overall plan for the garden long term.

Finally, it will provide a boundry to the veg patch, backed by the idea of a fruit producing but prickly hedge.
My plan is to put in a coppiced hedge, made up of fuscia and rosa rugosa cuttings with pine branch off-cuts and laced in the briar's I pulled from the undergrowth.

I am lucky that I live in a place with abundant roadside fruit - but as this recession bites that resource may well come under pressure and there is an increase in interest in home produced and wild food.

I am going to try my hand at coppicing them into a hedge to protect the veg patch and provide blackberries closer at hand. Using the hedge as an extra space to produce food or fruit is - in a way - another form of complimentary or companion cropping

I have the base materiels from what I pulled today to make a start. I have a lot of stripped pine branches, those pulled from the undergrowth or trimmed off have been laid on the raised bed paths, and the needles and small twigs stripped off as part of the anti-slug program.
I also intend to try and incorporate other cane type fruits like rasberries or thorny ones like gooseberry in future.

One thing for sure, before any root crops go down on a virgin grassland patch, the site will need to be dosed with supernemo's - which I anxiously await in the post.

Rock's n' Roller's, Oca inna Tuber Tube

Now, before anyone takes my advice on growing Oca, there is one other blog I would strongly recommend.
That's Ian's Oca test bed blog, this is only my second season growing Oca whereas Ian has been at it for a while. The basis of my knowledge of Oca is based very much on his blog and advice, just an attempted adaptation to the colder, wetter west of Ireland climate.

Last years tubers, this years seed

Well, to be stuck between a rock and a hard place in a Connemara kitchen garden is not an unusual predicament, it sort of goes with the territory.

The back yard

Last year I grew Oca, sourced from Christoph at Macalla farm on Clare Island.

It was a good day to start on the tuber tube, I felt it was appropriate having heard the first cuckoo of the spring. Macalla is the Gaelic for the cuckoo.

I was delighted that the Oca grew last year, but a bit disappointed at the yield in terms of tuber size and amount - so having heard of people doing something similar with potato's I have decided to do a tuber tube.

This has the advantages of saving space for starters. It is designed to fit in a nook in the garden that would not otherwise have been utilised on very shallow ground.

Rock should provide extra warmth

In addition, with a little thought this method will also increase the heat and soil depth available to the crop throughout its growing season, at least that's the theory.
So, where to start? Well, my seed tubers were saved from last year with the intention of growing them again.
Over the winter they were kept in a basket on news paper in a cool dark place.
As Ian advised me, when they are ready to be planted they let you know, they start sprouting fresh green shoots.

Tubers sprouting, ready to rock

So it was off to a local garage in Cill Ciaran where 6 tyres that would probably have ended up as landfill were very kindly given to me free of charge, and more if I wanted.
It should be possible for any one who knows a garage / tyre centre to be able to source these.

Seaweed base, rocks in cavity

Now, rocks retain and radiate heat, so the first tuber tube was placed in a very rocky corner dug out of a crag to give an even base using a chillington hoe, straight forward.
The cavity of the tyre was filled with the fist sized rocks that came out during digging, soil set aside.

The base of the tube was heavily lined with seaweed to provide nutrients, deter slugs and retain moisture.

Old turf dust

From the base of last years turf stack I pulled a few buckets of small, powdered turf and roughly sieved in what is best described as peat moss, again the idea being moisture retention and slug deterrent.

Sieve setup

There is no need to shell out €25EUR on a garden riddle, chicken wire between two tyres will do the trick, just dump on turf dust / stoney soil and give it a bit of going over with a hoe, it's another job for my now favorite tool, the chillington.

 

Sieve in use

Onto that went a thin layer of roughly sieved soil, throwing away weeds and roots, adding the small stones into the tyre cavity.

Onto this went the oca tubers, I am doing three in one tube, four in the other to explore growing capacity and yield.

Tubers in place

Over this went a layer of soil mixed with a little more seaweed and manure.

First cover

As usual, prevention is better than cure. As a slug and snail deterent, I surrounded the base with ash, and will dump some pine needles there as always.

Basic anti-slug measure - turf ash boundry

Because I am using a lot of virgin soil for this, the tube will be dosed with supernemos next week.

As the season goes on, as the Oca grows, more tyres and soil will be added to force the plant up by earthing in a what that would not be achievable on a normal bed.

I hope that the additional heat and depth will produce bigger tubers, and a bigger yield later in the year.

One important thing to remember is that one can buy stacked tubes for potato's, this is not a new idea, but by going to a garage and getting a few tyres, your saving money and taking stuff out of landfill.

Potato growpots do the same thing, but cost about €25EUR for a three tier version, and just use up more hydrocarbon's. In addition, I think the rubber will provide extra insulation.

The tyres on standby to be added later in the growing season are also being used by me as nursery beds for slow growing plants like leeks that will replace fast growing plants or harvested crop's later in the season.

As always, thanks for reading - if you have anything to add to this post, or any comments or even if you found it of use - please do take the time to comment, I really appreciate the feedback.