Sowing the Douce Provence Peas

I finally got around to sowing the peas.  I dug in the green manure, mostly grasses, and raked to give me a good tilth.  The soil in this bed is particularly friable.  I had put some seed in sectioned trays and they had germinated well so I decided to set them out as well.   I covered the Douce Provence with scaffol netting  over cloche wires to give them a little protection from the cold weather, pigeons, rats and mice.  The seeds I had left over I will put with the Kelvedon Wonder so they are sown and not wasted.  Some would say that it is a little early to sow peas but Douce Provence is a hardy early variety and survives the colder nights.  I am going to sow Kelvedon Wonder next week. 

The parsnips I sowed were Tender and True, Gladiator, and Sabre - one line of each.  All three lines are covered with enviromesh to give them a litte protection from the weather.   

I cleared up the last of the  ramail next to the allotment putting it onto the plastic sheet over the abandoned allotment opposite.  There was some good remail on the  other carpark so I went down with the barrow to collect some for the  new vegetable mould windrow.  This remail is just like leaf mould because it had so many leaves in it.  I mixed it with the scrapings from the path.  The blackbirds like to cover my paths with soil and ramail dug out from the beds.  This means that the remail is process by the birds and I walk over them crushing the pieces.  I will empty the darlek bins mixing the contents and adding them to the windrow.  Eventually I will have a 5 foot vegetable mould windrow.  

I walked a 2" square concrete paving slab around to the pea and bean bed to finish off the path but it didn't fit so I just left it on the allotment path and put remail around it.  The allotment path could be improved by concrete slabs, however I will not have enough to stretch all the way to the trackway.  

The sweet pea plants will have to be put out soon because they are getting quite big.  The weather forecast is not too good for the rest of the week so I am keeping them in the green houses for the moment.  Flea beetle is a major pest of sweet peas this time of the year and is another incentive to keep the plants indoors for the moment.  

I need to take a note book down to the allotment to record where I plant each variety.  The wooden lables rot away and are made illegible in the process.