It’s been a seriously busy couple of months down on my Clissold site. The intermittent rain and sun, although frustrating for summer revelery, has meant there’s lots of lovely growth and I’ve really been battling to get everything done in the few hours a week that I have to spend there.
Part of the crazy-growing-ness is that I am harvesting more salad leaves than ever and this takes up most of my time. From a site that last year was providing a fairly low yield, we are now taking an average of 6 kilos of leaves a week. Feels record-breaking to me! In between the lovely flowers you see here…
…are beds of true bounty – rocket, catalogna lettuce, rainbow chard and, of course, the salsola I introduced you to a few weeks ago. Red orache is also doing particularly well. It seems to love this site more than any of the other Growing Community sites, with delightful self-seeded plants springing up along the pathways. We are letting a couple fully mature so we can collect the seeds later in the year.
In answer to my prayers for help, a couple of volunteers have been coming outside of the regular volunteer day (1st Tuesdays of the month) to give me a hand with the planting. And, of course, to deal with the weeds which all seem to be demanding their right to come forth in droves this time of year. For Becca and Ximena’s time, I am eternally grateful.
Tags: chard, Harvest, lettuce, red orache, rocket, Salad, volunteer
