Manuring the Raspberries

I have managed to get up to the allotment twice this week YEAH ! the weather is getting better, although of course we could always get another load of snow.  We moved into our house many years ago during a February and I have photo's of us all making a snowman, so you never can tell !!

Anyway! this week I have managed with the help of my gardening assistant (Austin) to put wheelbarrow loads of manure (that we had delivered at the end of last Autumn) onto my Raspberry canes.  Because of  the cold weather I was unable to cut them back before now.  However I have finally managed to cut the canes right back this week.  They are a late fruiting variety (unknown) I always get lot's of lovely fruit from them, but not as large as the fruit from the canes on the plot where my young canes came from.  I checked with the person who gave me my canes who says she always cuts hers back and manures them.  This is the third year that I have had mine planted, so I thought I would cut them hard back, manure them and see what happens. I only hope I have done the right thing?

There are lots of things going on in the beds, such as flower bulbs peeping through, buds sprouting on the gooseberry bushes and the blackcurrant bush. The herbs are starting to look healthy again, but I have to either dig up and thin out or cut severely back the purple sage as it's far too big for my herb bed.

I am looking forward to growing Globe artichokes this year and I am going to order some plants from Stephen at Victoriana Nursery  who incidentally is kindly giving any of my readers 10% discount on anything you order from him.  If you want to take up this offer just click on the link on my sidebar as it takes you to his website and when you order the 10% is automatically taken off, but please do check your order to make sure that happens before hitting the final step in ordering. I have checked it out and it does work, but technology sometimes does funny things.

I am going to sow my broad beans in the first week of February and this year I am trying a different one called 'Red Epicure' ( Unwin's) which are chestnut crimson coloured beans which apparently if lightly steamed keep their colour, we shall see !! as well as these I shall grow my favourite 'Bunyards Exhibition' which are tasty.
I think this year I am going to try sowing direct on some things, as I find that keeping an eye on seedlings gets to be a bit of a pain especially if we want to be away for days at a time. There are certain plants that I do like to see that they are good and healthy before setting them in the beds, such as - broad beans, onions, pumpkins, squashes, cucumbers,  come to think of it quite a few things, so maybe I wont be so brave after all ha ha.