There's no welcome in the hillside for vampires here boyo.

Today I planted 3 different varieties of garlic to hopefully get a decent sized crop next year. These have gone into the beds formerly planted with tomatoes (the ones that got blighted) so next year the toms go somewhere that isn't full of nasty tomato pox.

The chinese gooseberry bush is also looking good. The little lanterny shaped things should contain gooseberries with a bit of luck.



The leek patch is also doing well although there are no more ready to turn into leeky comestibles just yet.



Finally, the whole plot got a good scattering of chicken poo pellets to ensure that what gets planted in here next year should have lots of goodies to suck up out of the soil.

Leeky action

There's not a lot to do on the plot at this time if year so I wandered up to see what was ready to pick, and to turn over some of the empty beds to keep the weeds down.

The leeks have started to come good at last so I harvested the first two for my tea tonight.



There are several dozen in the bed still growing but not quite up to this size yet so looks like leek soup will certainly be on the menu this winter.

Last weekend I cut back all the spinach in the bed that looked ready, and this weekend you can't even tell I was there.



I cut a whole lot back again but looks like this might be a nice regular crop at this rate.

The brussel sprouts are also coming along nicely.

You can just make them out up against the stalks and with another couple of months they should make an ideal accompaniment to the christmas turkey.

Cabbages and salsify are also doing well but the fennel is still not forming bulbs, preferring instead to go to seed which I keep lopping off the top.



Next week, the garlic should be going in the ground (to give it time to form bulbs which this years crop didn't).