As if to prove that we’re not past winter yet, the weather this weekend has flipped erratically between glorious sunshine and foul hail. This morning was bright and warm and I headed out after lunch to start planting in earnest, but ended up dodging the showers and running between the greenhouse and the plot.

It’s made me wonder whether I’ve not jumped the gun a bit with these earliest sowings. We do have spares of all of our seeds if they get killed off by a late frost, but how long do you wait before deciding it hasn’t worked and replanting?

Nonetheless, it felt good to be starting work on the plot again just a week after clearing out the last of the winter crops and, as of this afternoon, we have two rows of white onion sets, a row of very early carrots that should mature by early summer so we can eat and replace them with a late variety, and ten broad beans pushed a couple of inches under the earth in the hope they’ll give us a better crop than last year.

2008′s broad beans were delicious, but not exactly prolific. We made a couple of good three-bean risottos out of them, but then they were gone, and the black fly consumed the remains of the barren plants.

So, three crops on the go and the Black Russian tomatoes happily warming themselves in the dining room as they sit by the patio doors. I want to be methodical about our planting this year and I think we’ve made a good start. All we need do now is keep our fingers crossed for kind weather.

Related posts:

1. Broad beans
2. Planting beans, lettuce and sunflowers
3. What seeds should you plant in February?