91Èȱ¬

What a difference a few days make! Last week had only a few signs of winter coming to an end. Now fat white heads of snowdrops are splattered over my borders and the first winter aconite flower has opened its welcome yellow bloom. So I guess the weather will turn nastier again, such is the way.

After all February is a hard month, often very cold and wet, certainly here in East Anglia we expect heavy rain, the old nick name was February Fill Dyke. And it has been dry till now - in the freeze I was only able to get my roots out of the frozen ground because it was not waterlogged so crumbled easily.

My carrots have been much appreciated; they're substituting for potatoes now as my stored ones were decimated by the cold. Carrot mash, carrots buttered and carrot chips may be a tad monotonous but are good fare. Still I doubt they will last till the first new potatoes appear.

I have been planting tubs of potatoes under cover and their tops have not yet popped up making them a tad late. As is the pot-grown garlic - these should have had green leaves showing since the end of last year but none have yet shown though there are plenty of roots sticking out the bottom. Anyway I've brought in and potted up an extra lot just in case. And likewise the onion seed has not germinated yet so I've planted a couple of packs of onion and shallot sets in trays of cells.

I like to get roots on my sets so when I plant them out in the beds in a month's time they can be fixed in position without the birds and worms upsetting them. Before I learnt to do this I reckon I could replant the same onion set up to half a dozen times. My packs of replacement potato sets have arrived and I've placed these in seed trays, rose end up (when not sure I look for the remains of the stalk on the other end), to start sprouting as this ensures earlier crops.

The trays of chitting spuds are laid on a bench and covered each night with an old quilt to keep any further cold nights at bay. However it looks as though I over-reacted as maybe a third of my own seed potatoes appear to have survived despite my fears. Not a bad thing as I want to grow many more potatoes this year as the twins are eating much more now - and they just love home made chips. (I know, but chips in themselves are not unhealthy, particularly home-grown organic ones fried in organic oil served with salad!)

But shame on me, I'm having to buy salads! I'm almost out of home-grown leaves and it will be several weeks before the new sowings of loose leaf lettuce, pak choi and rocket amount to much more than a garnish.

Bob Flowerdew is an organic gardener and panellist on 91Èȱ¬ Radio 4's Gardeners' Question Time.