The Weather
You might have had your hopes up for warm and sunny weather, which predominantly is happening the next 1 ½ weeks though with very cold nights of temperatures still going down to 6º centigrade.
If you have transplanted your tender annuals outdoors, it might be an idea to protect them at night with some crop protection cloth (fleece).
They don’t like when temperature drop below 10º centigrade.
Having said that if you haven’t direct-sown or planted your tender and warmth loving annuals yet, it is the last chance to get them into the ground outdoors.
I personally would make a great effort to do so this weekend with the moon being in the constellation of the Archer.
Your outdoor cherry tomatoes, ridge and pickling cucumbers and sweet corn might do well, even though we have cooler nights coming up again. And make sure that you sow your squash and pumpkins.
Sow the fruiting vegetables directly best Friday, the 16. and Saturday 17. May.
Also, Sunday the 25th until 2 pm is still possible.
Plants for your Salad Bowl
On the other hand, plants which will do really well are all the salad crops of all the varieties from lettuces, mustard greens, mizuna, Swiss chard, pak choi, perpetual spinach, radicchio, endive, rocket, land cress, coriander, chervil, to summer savoury and of course all types of mints and lemon balm.
Some of you might have heard of cut and come again lettuces mixes you can sow, also called mesclun salad or salad mix. Sometimes you can buy them particularly in farm shops.
Sow Mesclun or Salad Mix
I highly recommend to sowing several varieties of open leaf lettuces, together with different types of mustard greens, beetroot and radishes in the same row very tightly (1cm apart).
Do not thin them, and when they are about 4-5 inches high (10-12cm) you take a knife to them and cut them about 1 inch above the growth points and they will shoot out with new leaves several times.
This will give you a flavoursome, tender and colourful dish of refreshing spring and summer salads.
If you want to add a bit of flavour and more spice to your salad dishes and prevent your mixed sowing form bolting in midsummer, sow a proportion of 5 seeds of chervil to 100 seeds of your mix.
Sow leaf crops best from Thursday, the 12. May after 1 pm until Saturday 10 am
Moreover think of sowing another succession of onions for spring onions, early varieties of carrots for tender and small carrots of the Parisian type or young purple carrots and beetroot for crunch, colour and minerals, radishes all in the same row for harvesting in succession or together while young and tender.
Sow root crops best on Sunday, the 18. Until Tuesday 20. May 7 am
