Ray Hulm was the guest speaker at the third HCFA weekend workshop.

The plan was for participants to prepare and sow two beds during the two-hour workshop. Ray had other ideas!

Clearly our lack of experience showed and, as Ray explained, it is worth investing more time in seed-bed preparation to avoid disappointment. So under Ray’s expert tutorage we finely raked the seed-bed and carefully set the seeds out along perfectly aligned rows.

Other handy hints picked up during the course of the morning; never leave carrot thinnings lying around (and possibly interplant with marigolds/onions), be generous with the seeds when sowing parsnips, pigeons like turnips so beware, beetroot is a relative of spinach so eat the leaves and scorzenera is an odd root vegetable.

Many thanks to Ray and once again to Nathan for fighting off a cold to cater for the masses.