Earlier in the year, we reported that we’d decided to not grow any brassicas this season – opting instead for a lower maintenance garden that doesn’t involve spending an hour each evening looking for caterpillar eggs or combating their attacks by building net-covered constructions around the garden. Initially, there were going to be two exceptions to this rule; (1) we would grow a few turnips for our Cornish pasty recipe and (2) we would continue to grow radishes as a fast-turn around crop to munch on whilst sitting on our new garden bench.
However, as the year progressed, a third exception to our brassica rule arose since a stray winter cabbage, which was planted too late last season, survived numerous pigeon attacks in our front garden and consequently found a fond corner of our hearts to nestle in. This was compounded upon when it also survived being uprooted by the hoe when I was distributing chicken manure pellets, as well as the drought we experienced earlier in the year. As a result of all this, we decided that the cabbage had earned the right to reside in our garden for the remainder of the year and was therefore re-planted in a quiet, sunny corner of our back garden.
The cabbage (we haven’t named it yet) has settled into its new resting place well and has been growing happily under our watchful eye. It should be easy to keep the caterpillars off just one cabbage, and the fact that we only have one this year will earn it a very special place on our dinner table. We are very hopeful about how it will taste upon harvest, and can still remember the magnificence of our very first cabbage which we’d nurtured from seed to a mature plant bigger than a football. Up until that point I thought I didn’t like cabbage (my mum always boiled it to death) but growing your own makes you open to trying things anew, and cabbage has been back on the menu ever since.
Here’s a photo of this year’s cabbage in its quiet, sunny corner.
I had a chuckle over the naming comment, and the way fate put a cabbage in your garden. This was a fun read.
But That doent look like typical cabage. If I may ask, what kind of cabbage is it?
p.s. I dislike rubarb and I have been mowing over a patch of it. This year I uprooted it and then put several feet of dirt over the spot for potatoes. Would you believe there is still a tiny frond of rubarb that still keeps apearing through the potatoes? But I aways break it off.
Hi Sara, the cabbage is a vertus cultivar. It’s meant to be harvested in December-January, but ours seems to have a mind of it’s own so we’ll eat it as soon as is produces a good heart. Greyhound cabbages are our favourite, they’re smaller and just the right size for a meal. Unfortunately, whippet cabbages don’t exist.
Your rhubbarb would be welcome in our garden. We’re planning on introducing some next year. It’s one of the things on the list that we’ve never got round to.
Best wishes, David (and Didi)