Big shout to Rob from Yesmate a great music sharing platform for mixes and playlists (Mixcloud, Soundcloud, Youtube, Spotify, etc). You’ll definitely find something to keep you happy never mind what genre you’re into. We’ve been listening since the weekend to some fine mixes including the great Blundetto, Mixmaster Morris and Jon More. Log on…
Here’s a very apt tune from Akcept out of Christchurch, New Zealand with a nice and chilled dub called Springtime Stepper. The weather isn’t that spring-like here at the moment, we’ve had cold winds, sleet, rain and frosts of late and it’s more like winter!
As it’s nearly the end of the month this is more like a guide of what to sow late april/early may and it all depends on this mad weather anyway. My spuds are coming through the ground now but still have fleece on the top of them and probably will have for a couple of weeks or so. If you are going to risk sowing outside, sow under protection with some fleece, jam jars or a cloches or wait until the weather heats up later this month.
So it’s nearly time to sow those french, runner and broad beans (do wait as beans hate sitting around in cold wet soil) and peas. Also carrots, beetroot, leeks, radishes, turnips can go in and you can start sticking in your parsley, coriander, swiss chard, salads, lettuce, rocket & leaf beet.
To be on the safe side sow indoors: brassicas, french, runner and broad beans, all types of pea, sweetcorn, courgettes, squashes, cucumbers and melons.
May the weather be with you!
Here’s a nice collection of tunes to accompany your seed sowing this month. It’s an excellent mix tape from Chronixx and Federation Sound as mentioned on the great David Rodigan show the other week.
It features some well known chronixx tracks over some classic rhythm tracks like jah jah jahovah, king tubby meets the rockers uptown, cuss cuss, monkey man, joyride and much much more!
This month is a funny one for seed sowing as it’s still not warm enough to sow everything outdoors but you can give some carrots, beetroot, kale, broad beans, leeks, parsnips, spinach and turnips a go if it’s not too cold. I sowed a row each of beetroot, carrots, lettuce and spinach the other day, if they don’t work, they don’t work and it’s only a couple of rows of seeds wasted.
You can always start these indoors this month: aubergines, herbs including basil and the like, brussels sprouts, cauliflowers, chilli peppers, sweet peppers and tomatoes and what about starting a pot of salad leaves on the windowsill.
It’s still a bit early for spuds but in a couple of weeks time it will be and the gardening season will get underway and we won’t know what’s hit us!
STOP PRESS: Cheers to our mate Ciarán in Canada for sending us a pic of his advocado from seed (and some find looking sage in the background) that have grown all the way through their mild winter. How good is that? 
Here’s the first in a regular monthly series of tunes to accompany your seed sowing. It’s February and still a bit early, but for the eager beavers out there you can sow a few in the greenhouse or on that plastic propagator on the kitchen windowsill.
We’ve got our tomatoes just on their seed leaf stage at the moment and there’s some mini-peppers coming through too but you could also start off your aubergines, brussel sprouts, cabbage, cauliflower, calabrese, onion seeds and start chitting your spuds if you haven’t already.
And here’s a tune by Digid called Revolution Sound out on the Lion Charge label to crank up loud while preparing your seed sowing (making sure the compost has been warmed up a bit by being indoors for a few days beforehand rather than stone cold from the outside.) Sow on and sow forth.
Weeds up to me knees 