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I cleared the greenhouse today. The sun was shining so I thought "better make the most of it". I always think it's a bit sad when the greenhouse is cleared🙁

Still got tomatoes and peppers on the go but pulled up the melons and cucs a while ago.  OH is planning to hoe the other side of weeds (endemic bindweed) and cover it with cardboard ready for me to stand pots on there for winter.   When the toms do come out I should have sweet peas and broad beans ready to over winter and some seedlings I'll be potting on but can't yet plant out.

No rain means no new beds for them. 

Mine is chockablock full with cacti , succulents and pelargoniums ..and ongoing botanical experiments !   

The tomato greenhouse was cleared a few weeks ago, the green ones slowly ripening indoors.
The borders have been sown with rocket, corn salad, winter lettuce and perennial spinach and have a few early cabbage plants to go in.
I like to try growing crops over winter - whether it works depends on the weather, though ;)

Still time to sow winter or spring veg.  Lambs lettuce, rocket, cress, endive, lettuce, mizuna, mustard etc.  Quite often lettuce sown at this time of year will bide its time and sprout at the earliest opportunity in spring.  But the brassica will sprout no problem. 

PS Ace has written that he has just sown his broad beans.  There is of course nothing stopping us sowing them in a greenhouse where they have a bit more shelter.  Should give really early beans next year.  They can be finishing whilst tomatoes and peppers are still waiting in pots (rather than being planted into the ground) and then cut off, where the nitrogen nodules on their roots will help feed the young tomato plants when they are planted where the broadies were. 

Quote from: galina on October 19, 2018, 14:11:12
PS Ace has written that he has just sown his broad beans.  There is of course nothing stopping us sowing them in a greenhouse where they have a bit more shelter.  Should give really early beans next year.  They can be finishing whilst tomatoes and peppers are still waiting in pots (rather than being planted into the ground) and then cut off, where the nitrogen nodules on their roots will help feed the young tomato plants when they are planted where the broadies were. 

Do you pollinate them manually; for there are few if any bees or hoverflies before mid April, and they dont find their way into my greenhouse?I know they are self fertile but need a motive agent. Better that they are cross pollinated for a worthwhile yield, by insects.

Another issue with broad beans is their ability to come up when they can cope - every time I've tried protecting broad beans with cold frames they came up too early and were killed by frost. I haven't tried the polytunnel  - if it works you have a longer picking season, but my advice is use outdoor too - so if it doesn't you'll just have to wait for the usual crop.

I always sow 3 times anyway, in October and November and March - you never know which will avoid blackfly because you never know when the ladybirds will arrive.

Cheers.

Ancellsfarmer, they mostly self pollinate, as do French beans and peas.  Runnerbeans also (but only to a degree, some varieties easily, others need insects or gentle agitating of the flowers). 

My autumn sown broadies are in a south facing bed outside the poly, (huge new empty plot needed something in and growing)  I should have enough frozen to tide me through to the next harvest, but in the poly I have put some Durham early spring cabbages. I put a few outside but the poly ones are weeks ahead in growth. I shall plant some more broadies next march. I hated them as a nipper, one of my favourite veg now. Loads of perennial and half hardy annual flower divisions taking up room in the poly to get their roots strong so not a lot of room for edible stuff.

I also cleared the greenhouse this afternoon, I'd stopped watering the tomatoes and chillies weeks ago, and they had all ripened, so it was time for a clear out. It's now got the tender plants I want to overwinter in there, I've never been able to clear the greenhouse so early in the year before!