On the 16th of March the first covers came off the raised beds as we prepared them for planting. I decided to sow climbing garden peas in this bed.
The bed was given a good rake over as this allowed air back in to the soil after a Winter of being under plastic. You can read here about how I put the beds to sleep for the Winter and the use of weed barrier and then plastic on top of each bed kept the bed beautifully rich and weed free.
Our lovely Cathy then gave the soil a good sifting. She now realises that I like the soil to be sifted before planting as it makes it so much easier to work with and it’s actually one of MY most favourite garden jobs. I find it strangely relaxing to sift soil. But I couldn’t really bend down for that long because of my bump and at that time one of the twins was still trapping a nerve. So Cathy got the job. I was a bit jealous really.
These are the peas before being planted.
And this is the drill/channel we made to place the peas in. It was about 6 inches wide and flat bottomed. You can flatten the bottom with your hand, patting the soil down.
The drill was then given a good watering…..
….and the peas were sown in a zig-zag pattern along the length of the bed. You need to allow about 24 inches between drills so we only sowed one more row in this particular bed….
The drills were then filled in carefully and now we are waiting for some shoots to come up.
As this took place about three weeks ago we are now seeing some small signs of life and this Sunday Robert and I are erecting the nets to go over the top of this bed so that the birds don’t get to feast on my tender bean shoots. I’ll take lots of pics of this process too so that you can all follow along. You still have plenty of time to plant your peas outside so if you’re stuck for something to do this weekend you can join me in the garden!!
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[...] Way back in early Spring we prepped this bed and sowed our climbing garden peas in it. You can read how we did that by clicking right here. [...]