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.

Just a quick reminder about our Root Vegetables workshop this Saturday.

The guest speaker this time round is Ray Hulm, a Royal Paddocks allotment holder and experience grower. Ray will be demonstrating how to prepare and plant carrots, turnips, parsnips, beetroot, swede and scorzonera.

This workshop runs from 10.30am to 12.30pm at our allotment site off Faggs Road, in Feltham

More details can be found on our calendar here.

We hope you can make it along!