This is always the most frantic time of the year in the garden. The weather is bright and quite cool, perfect for gardening and there is so much to do. Every year I plan to get the garden prepared for the mad May planting rush but it never works because my soil is so wet and unworkable for most of the winter. It can even damage the soggy grass to just walk on it. The prospect of pushing a barrow on it is unthinkable – it would just ruin the lawns. So weeding and soil prep in many areas has to be tackled now.

And then there are all the seedlings and tender plants that are growing and need space and attention. The greenhouse is full and temporary benches in the polytunnel are full of plants, causing unwanted shade on the alstroemerias. A crop of lettuce is occupying beds that will soon be planted with tomatoes. Another set of lettuce is ready to plant outside and a second set of calabrese and cabbage to plant out. Grapes are sprouting and will soon be in flower and need pinching back. It is almost panic!

The big sowing season is almost over but it is never quite over! It is important to keep sowing veg to ensure crops all summer. It can be difficult to remember to sow more lettuce when you are enjoying them in the garden.

And these sowings need to be thinned to allow all the plants to reach maturity. This year I am trying carrots again after a few bad years put me off. I have a raised bed that I have been improving with coir and grit for the spring bulbs and I will try carrots this year instead of summer flowers. They are just appearing so maybe this year I will get a crop. And I am trying spinach again. I usually grow leaf beet but thought I would try true spinach this year.

The brassicas and outdoor lettuce are doing OK. At first, every morning there would be a limp lettuce where leatherjackets had eat the base of the plant. I treated it as a way to trap the pests and dug around and found them. Losses are less now. Much of the soil here was removed from the polytunnel when I changed the soil for the tomatoes. I was a bit surprised at the leather jackets although the soil is full of them in flower borders. Cultivation should reduce their numbers but I think being surrounded by grassland will always provide a reservoir of these pests. It is also interesting that the masses of tomato seedlings that have appeared, because of fallen fruits last autumn in the polytunnel, were not killed by the frost that did so much damage in the garden two weeks ago. If I had left out my carefully nurtured seedlings in the greenhouse I know they would have died but these tough little seedlings were undamaged. Such are the mysteries of gardening.

polytunnel, spinach