Snowed in

Well, that was just about the worst Easter I can remember. There I was, poised with chitted new potatoes ready to go, and the snow started to fall. And kept on falling.

It's bitter cold weather like this that has me grinding my teeth in frustration. I almost always succumb and start sowing seeds far earlier (which means in colder weather) than I should do. I've got a bit wise to this and am now armed with assorted cloches, fleece and bubblewrap to cover the seedlings with, but I expect given this awful weather I shall have some failures again. It always seems as though delays will kibosh all your best-laid plans, and there will never be time to catch up - mostly of course this doesn't happen at all, and you still end up with a full allotment by June, but it's hard to find that thought very convincing right now.

Taking cover

When the weather's at its worst - and let's face it, it has been for the last week or so - this is where I retreat to.

It's my greenhouse, technically speaking not on the allotment but in my back garden. I did experiment with raising seeds in my allotment greenhouse, but I couldn't reliably get up there often enough and lost a lot when the weather turned warm.

So these days I sow dozens of trays of seedlings where I can keep an eye on them - as you can see, it's almost full and the sowing season hasn't really got into top gear yet! I have no idea where I'm going to put the seeds I intend to sow next week. I've already decided to direct-sow more than I usually do this year - leeks, for example, carrots and broad beans have been deemed tough enough to fend for themselves out on the plot. But most veg I raise in modules simply because that way, you can stop most things eating them, keep an eye on watering and growing rates and generally mollycoddle them until they're big enough to look after themselves.

Another somewhat overlooked benefit of greenhouses is that you can retreat in there in rainy weather, so you can carry on allotment gardening even in the worst of downpours. Essential equipment, I'd say - I just need a bigger one!

And... we're off!

At last, it's seed-sowing time again. After the long, wet, cold winter, there's hope in my heart and compost in my seed trays, and here's just one of the little babies poking their heads up bravely to see what the world's all about.

I get hopelessly sentimental about sowing seeds. It's the start of a new season; laden with hope, innocent of all the disasters to come. There's a sense of adventure, of stepping out into the unknown: who knows what will happen to this little cabbage seedling, so safe in my greenhouse for the moment - it could end up scoffed by slugs... flooded by spring rains... pecked at by pigeons... or (and of course this is the hope I cherish) burgeoning to beautiful cabbage-y perfection so I can enjoy it on my plate.

This is my early sowing date, so brassicas feature highly. I've sown savoy cabbage and two kinds of brussels sprouts - one early, one late, to extend the cropping season to the max. Parsnips, the first carrot sowing and the first batch of salad leaf are also coming up. And I've been in the habit of sowing my Mediterranean veg at this time of year, too - you need a frost-free greenhouse to do this successfully, but since I had electricity installed last autumn this is getting less risky and more profitable every year. So I also have three big pots of tomato seedlings, five melon seedlings (!) and three cucumber seedlings putting on growth almost as you watch them. The sweet peppers and aubergines are in the propagator, and won't be far behind.

Planting, planting, planting...

This time of year I abandon everything else in the rush to get my baby plants into the ground. That means my poor allotment is looking increasingly shaggy - grass up to my knees and weeds in the strawberries. But the coldframe is full of hardened-off veggies which demand to be taken to their new home.

Today it was the turn of my calabrese - Pacifica is a good mid-season hybrid which I'm hoping will take the place of my poor failed Tiara (early) sowing. Just two seeds germinated - I still don't know quite what I did wrong - and then I turned up this morning and found that one of the seedlings had been eaten by slugs.

Since one early calabrese plant is too sad for words, I've filled up that row and the one next to it with the Pacifica. I try to sow three "sittings" of calabrese - otherwise you get a glut which can't be frozen easily. Last year the whole thing was a failure as the drought got the lot; this year the Tiara have, as I said, turned up their toes, and I was away on holiday when the Pacifica germinated so though I got lots of lovely seedlings they were very leggy. Time will tell how they survive their bad beginnings.

The third late sowing is currently two seed-leaves in my greenhouse, but looking lovely and healthy so if I can keep the slugs off (beer traps have been set!) I might yet get some sort of crop...!