The soil of the first bed at Plotgate was ready for seeding towards the end of May so we planted out four 100 meter rows. Three quarters of their length was planted with borlotto bush beans, the last quarter with lentils.

We also planted a few hundred beans in blocks as backup in case we had early losses in the beds and needed to fill up spaces in the rows. This proved to be wise planning as a few weeks later one of Plotgates long term resident pigs escaped the patch they were grazing, stumbled across our bean bed and then delighted in rooting about for buried bean treats.

The other two beds were ready for seeding a couple weeks later at the end of the first week of June and we got in two 100 meter rows each of linseed, quinoa and camelina.

Beans and camelina put on strong early growth. Fat hen, a common weed was popping up with significant amounts emerging among the quinoa. This proved somewhat problematic as they are closely related, so close they can cross breed. Young white quinoa can be very hard to distinguish from fat hen. One of our commoners aptly described it as black belt weeding to the youngster who was sharing our confusion as they joined our 5 person strong weeding team on the first day of a weeks work experience at Plotgate. It was their first time ever weeding a food crop.

We concentrated on hand weeding in the rows as a few days later we used the tractor for its first run with a steerage hoe which we set up to hoe the weeds from between the rows.

As is its way the quinoa sped up its growth after a few weeks. The linseed, which we have not previously tried, grows alongside the quinoa and stands much smaller. The lentils have been disappointing for the third year in a row. Camelina, an oilseed related to rapeseed which is apparently one of the first agricultural crops grown in England, put on strong growth.

None of the Olga pumpkin seeds we purchased germinated. We even tried a second planting from a different seller. Possibly they both sourced their seed from the same source as its an unusual variety?

The small trail beds of beans, lentils and quinoa down at Meadowsweet Meadow all failed. Victim to the large populations of slugs and snails in the meadow.

At least at Plotgate its looking like we should get some reasonable harvests.