Late Summer Seed Sowing

Broad beans can be sown as a green manure in September or the tops can be taken out and used in salads or lightly steamed instead of cabbage.

Pak Choi produce some tasty leaves in winter.  Sow in early September, and leave in clumps for salad leaves, or thin them out for larger leaves.  Pick them from November to February, they will keep producing if you pick off flowering stems (these can be eaten as well).

Salad leaves can be planted in stages for an ongoing supply right through the winter.  They are pretty hardy if covered with fleece or a cloche.







Other things to consider sowing are Spring Cabbage, Spring Onions and other Oriental leaves.  I always think it best not to leave the ground empty of crops, so I use green manures such as Phaecalia, which covers the ground, excludes weeds and it nice to look at too, with its pretty blue flowers.  This can be either dug in or hoed off and left to cover the soil.
At the moment I have my seedlings in containers which I will be bringing in to the greenhouse at some stage, once the greenhouse crops are cleared, but they can be left outside and given some protection.