The Garden At The Belvedere Centre (4)

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On today’s task at The Belvedere Centre we had a change from rain, as the showers were of hail. In spite of this we managed to finish off the path edges, plant a few more perennials and weed out the many Green Alkanet seedlings that are appearing in the flower beds.

Although some leggier growth has been damaged by heavy rain, most plants are settling in well and we’ve received plenty of praise for what we’ve done so far.

We need to finish off the planting in the centre of the garden and then put down a layer of permeable membrane on the paths and cover it with slate chippings. After that we’ll need to level up some of the slabs and do a bit more weeding, as well as putting down slabs for a barbecue area.

Thanks once again to those who have helped, by hard physical work, supplying cups of tea or giving us plants. We have made a lot of progress since I last wrote about the garden on 24th April.

Read the next update about the garden.

Using a mattock to remove roots

Using a mattock to remove roots

Putting in bed edging

Putting in bed edging

Shade Border

Shade Border

Bed edges in place

The wooden bed edges are in place

Weeding

Weeding

Spring harvest from the allotment

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We’ve just been to the allotment to put up frames for Runner beans and Climbing French Beans. I’ll sow the seed sometime next week, now that the weather is becoming warmer.

Seed germination has been very slow in the cold, wet weather and weeds are mostly growing faster than the seedlings.

Radishes

A fine harvest of radishes

The success story so far this spring has been Parsnip seedlings, which I planted in late February and March in mild, sunny weather, and the Radishes I sowed at the same time to mark the rows. The Radishes are ready now, all at once, and have been the feature of most of our recent meals (see recipes). In dry springs the roots are riddled with the tunnels of Cabbage Root Fly larvae but this spring the rain has deterred this pest and the radish roots are of almost showbench quality and, with all the water, large and tender.

Winter Purslane, like the radishes, has appreciated the rain. Its lush leaves and little white flowers are a welcome source of salad greens. I planted just a few seeds several years ago and have had this plant in abundance every spring since then. I dig in the excess as a green manure but some always self seeds.

With the cold weather, Asparagus has been very late and is still growing rather slowly, though what we are picking tastes as delicious as ever (see recipes). (Last year, when it was hot and dry, we had Asparagus from late March onwards; this year we started cropping last week.)

Finally, we are almost at the end of the Purple-sprouting and White-sprouting Broccoli. The plants are in the ground for a long time but they’re well worth growing for their delicious young flower shoots.

Asparagus

Asparagus

Winter Purslane

Winter Purslane (a.k.a. Miners’ Lettuce)

Wild Garlic, Allium ursinum

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Wild Garlic

Wild Garlic, Allium ursinum

One of my favourite sights and smells of early May is Wild Garlic or Ramsons, Allium ursinum. Like Garlic Chives, this plant is both beautiful and edible, but it is also a common British wild flower. It is flowering at the moment in woodlands across the country, and in my back garden, where I introduced it several years ago.

Wild Garlic thrives in damp shade in deciduous woodland and often forms dense stands of wide green leaves, followed by groups of white flowers borne on stalks. The leaves resemble those of Lily of the Valley, Convallaria majalis, which are poisonous, but the strong garlic smell of Wild Garlic leaves is a giveaway. The smell gets stronger towards the end of May as the plants wilt and start to die down. By midsummer no leaves are visible and the Wild Garlic goes dormant again until the following spring.

If you grow Wild Garlic it will gradually spread if it likes where you’ve planted it and its black seeds will drop fairly close to the parent plant.

Wild Garlic is very pretty, especially en masse, but it is a great edible plant to grow as well. You can eat the bulbs if you grow it yourself or have the land owner’s permission, otherwise it is illegal to uproot it.

I often put a couple of leaves in a cheese sandwich but there are more sophisticated ways of eating it, such as these recipes on the BBC Food website and on the Guardian’s Word Of Mouth Blog. Wild Garlic is poisonous to dogs. According to Wikipedia, cows fed on Wild Garlic have milk that tastes slightly of garlic, and butter made from this milk was very popular in 19th century Switzerland. Wild Garlic is known as Baerlauch (Bear’s Garlic) in German because it was a popular spring food for Brown Bears. So, if you go down to the woods today…