Gardening recommendations

(image from gardenersworld.com)

I spent some time on Sunday looking through my packets of seeds - the weather has been so mild lately that thoughts are turning to Spring already.  It is far from Spring here, though, so I am limiting myself to planning really at this stage - the weather forecaster dared mention snow in Countryfile last night, so winter may yet arrive with a vengeance!

I have plenty of all the favourites, like dwarf French beans, runner beans, tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, beetroot, spring onion, etc but I did identify some gaps.  I have no seeds for growing chilli plants [need chillies for sweet chilli jam], nor for courgettes and I thought that we would try some mangetout this year as the EFG has developed a taste for it.

I have two favourite sources for seeds, and I wanted to share them, and recommend them to you, if you are in the UK.

Premier Seeds Direct is an eBay seller, and I have had seeds from them for several years now.  Their service is smart and their prices are very keen!  I have just bought a pack of 150 mild chilli seeds for 99p, 25 Italian courgette seeds for 99p, and 300 mangetout seeds for 99p, and the combined postage was just 57p.  The seeds will arrive packed in a Jiffy bag, each pack of seeds in clear plastic resealable bags.  So I have to confess to a spend of £3.54 on the garden, but I think that is reasonable.  I had to get the chilli seeds ordered because I want to get them going quite soon.

I also like Real Seeds, which is a members' club [you pay one penny when you place your first order each year] because they sell heirloom seeds which may not be on the official list of seeds.  Something to do with breeding and hybrids and stuff like that.  Suffice to say that they sell some very interesting stuff, and when you want something different, or a heritage/heirloom [ie not F1 hybrids], this is the place to go.  Service is a little slower as they are in deepest Wales and only post things out a couple of times a week, but they are well worth waiting for, and I would recommend them as well.