King carrots, stately onions and Princess Kate.

The recent sweltering weather and indeed lack of any rain since early March means the pests and diseases will be making an early start so we need to be on our guard. The first wave of carrot root fly should be on the prowl soon so after I'd thinned the long carrots in these pipes in my greenhouse I gave them a spray of Garlic Wonder, as recommended by ex-National champion Ian Simpson. All the long carrots in my drums outside have all germinated well which is the first time in a number of years that I haven't had any cause for concern. I shall now make sure they are kept well watered until they are growing away well, although these in the greenhouse shall be relying on me for water for the duration of their growth.

I shall also be renewing my yearly appeal to you all to get some slug pellets scattered on the sand surfaces of your stump beds and drums of long carrots. The lettuce munchers of the Garden Organic death to all chemical users brigade will have you believe that slugs and snails will not walk across sharp sand. This is bollocks. I've lost many seedlings this way so be warned!

During the course of sieving bags of compost for my long root mixes i'm left with quite a pile of lumps and half-composted twigs that I would normally chuck on the garden somewhere. The compost I used this year was good quality,as were the lumps, being quite small and I felt they could be utilised in a better way.Times are hard! So it struck me to use them in the potting mix for some 250g onions that I am experimenting with by growing them to harvest in 7" pots in the greenhouse in order to improve on the skin finish. Each pot was filled 2/3 with this compost residue, 1/3 soil, plus a handful of vermiculite and a pinch of Tev04. The result was a nice open mix and the onions have grown away well. I'm trying some Red Barion onions this way, some Setton from onion sets and will also do some Vento.

When I went to North Derby DA last week Dave Thornton took delivery of some celery plants from National champion Geoff Butterworth (he can't grow the sods from seed himself). I was surprised to see that Geoff's plants were a bit smaller than my own (below) so I was pleased about that.

Not everything is trouble free however. I've lost a few shallots to some strange maggoty creatures but the same happened last season so I can live with that. I've also struggled to get on top of the white tip disease despite several sprayings with a fungicide. The plants are ok but they look messy and just offend my eye when I look at the row. I gave them a dressing of ammonia sulphate as the more leaves you have the bigger the bulbs should be. I've split the pickling shallots already and the 'exhibition' ones will be done this weekend as they are already starting to burst out of their skins.

This weekend i'm off to Snowdonia for a couple of days of walking with the lads to avoid the Royal Wedding and to avoid a street party and having to mingle and be nice to the neighbours! Still, one good thing is that at least we'll soon be getting a stamp we can wank over! Eh boys? ;o)