Hello What to sow in May
I’m Liz Zorab and this is Byther Farm.
Just as there was in April, there’s a lot
of seeds that you can sow in May.
Once again I’ll start by reminding you that you’ll
need to adjust your sowing times according to where you live so the further north and
the further high up in altitude that you live the more you’ll want to push these sowing
times towards the back of the month.
But if you live in the South or in a very mild climate
you can sow these seeds towards the beginning of May.
I’ll look at what seeds you can plant in May by groups and I’ll start with brassicas.
Kohlrabi, Swedes which are Rutabaga in other areas. Kale, I use this for a salad,
this is a Red Russian Kale and I just pick very young leaves and they are absolutely
great in salads but you can let them grow on and have them as a green like a cabbage
or a collard. Cauliflowers can be sown, this is that lovely green one called Romanesco,
I’m also doing a purple one called Violetta and of course the standard white ball cauliflowers
that can be sown now too.
If you didn’t sow them earlier in the year you can get in a sprouting broccoli now so
this is an early purple one so it’s Purple Sprouting Broccoli, which we’ve only just
finished harvesting the seeds that were sown this time last year. You can sow beet leaves
and I sow these about once every month to every six weeks throughout the spring and
summer to give me a fresh supply of very young leaves because I like them in salads as well
as in stir fry’s and there’s a selection of Chinese leaves like Chinese Kale or Chinese
cabbage and also something like a very rapid broccoli, Broccoli Raab 60 days, so it’s
in and it’s out again within 60 to 70 days, it’s a really nice quick turnaround and
to give you something different in your cooking. And it’s certainly not too late to sow cabbages
now. I’m not sowing anymore until the end of the month when I will sow a few more red
cabbages so that we have a second harvest of them later into the autumn.
There’s a whole selection of root vegetables that you can sow now so carrots, turnips,
parsnips, beetroot and there’s radishes. This is the kind of what I call a standard
almost Peter Rabbit radish with a red body and white at the end but I’m also trying
a pure white radish and a very nice red one, Cherry Belle, which is a globe one, so trying
that and also I’m growing some Mooli, which is a Japanese radish and is larger than a
standard radish and it’s also more fiery and I don’t like this just to eat in a salad
or anything but I tried it grated mixed with a little bit of yoghurt and it made a really
nice alternative to horseradish sauce and there’s also Salsify which is worth growing
for it’s beautiful flowers alone although, I have to say, ours has seeded itself all
over our garden so we have Salsify where I wasn’t necessarily expecting it but it’s
actually very pretty so I’m going to leave it there and then I can harvest the roots
at the end of the summer and you can also sow Root Parsley so that’s something like
Hamburg Parsley, this one’s called Atika Root Parsley, but those are absolutely great
because you can use the leaves all summer and then in the autumn and winter you can
then harvest the roots as well, they’ve got a very mild parsley taste and we’ve
come to really like them in a tray of mixed root vegetables.
In May, you can sow seeds of perennial vegetables, so I’m going to be starting off some more
artichokes, but you can also try some Cardoons or Asparagus or any other perennial vegetables
and I’m really keen on perennial veg and if you haven’t seen my videos about perennial
vegetables, I’ll leave some links in the video description and you can see some of
the perennial vegetables that we’re growing here.
Herbs and salads can be grown now so I’ve got basil and coriander, and I’ll be sowing
those on a regular basis throughout the year to keep a continuous supply of the young leaves
and then things like lettuces, spring onions, your radishes again, and don’t forget things
like cress and mustard cress, which you can just grow on your windowsill, in a small tray
or a saucer on some cotton wool or damp tissue paper and you’ll have the very young plants
in about 10-12 days, if you just cut off and use in things like egg mayonnaise sandwiches.
I’m going to be sowing some more spinach and I’ll be sowing that in a bed that isn’t
in full sun, spinach wilts and then bolts and goes to seed if it gets too hot, so I
try to keep it in a shadier bed to keep the temperature down on it a little bit and then
hopefully I can eke out the season of the spinach just a little bit longer.
I’m excited about these, it’s sweetcorn, now May is the month to plant your sweetcorn.
I’ve heard of a couple of different methods of sowing sweetcorn. I know Erica over at
Erica’s Little Welsh Garden soaks her sweetcorn for 24 hours in water before she sows it , I
don’t, I put mine straight into compost and I give it a good water, make sure it doesn’t
dry out. The important thing with sweetcorn is that it does need some warmth to germinate
so it likes about 18 degrees C or warmer and once it’s germinated then it can be in a
cooler temperature, so I’ll be sowing mine into trays of compost and take them into the
house, keep them in the house just until they germinate and then I’ll bring them back
out into the unheated polytunnel. You can find a list of all the plants and
all the varieties that we’re growing on our website www.Bytherfarm.com and I’ll
leave a link to that in the video description too.
And it’s also time to start sowing beans, so I will be sowing a few runner beans, now
I grow my runner beans as perennials because we’re in a very mild area so in the autumn
I just cut them off, I leave about 4-6 inches of the stem intact and leave the roots in
the ground and the next year hopefully most of them will grow back but I do sow a few
extras just in case there are any that didn’t make it through the winter and then I can
get those straight into the ground to replace any that don’t grow and French beans can
be sown now so that’s both dwarf French beans and also climbing ones, so that lovely
yellow one is a variety called Sonesta but I’m also growing a climbing French bean
and that one’s called Neckergold and I have just sown these in the last couple of days
so hopefully by the end of the month I will be able to get those outside.
Peas can be sown direct into the ground, you can sow them into compost into guttering if
you want to but at this time of year they should be absolutely fine to go straight into
the ground. There are lots of other seeds that you can sow at this time of year. Most
seed packets have a guide on the back of them that will give you some sort of vague guidance
of when they can go into the ground and the last group of seeds but absolutely by no means
the least in fact they’re probably the biggest of the plants that we grow are the cucumbers,
squashes and pumpkins. Now is a really good time to start those off. We are growing several
different varieties this year including Butternut squash Walton and Hunter, my very favourite
Jumbo Pink Banana squashes which produce these absolutely enormous fruits which we really
like. There’s Spaghetti squash, Uchiki Kuri squash and I’m trying several others, I’m
trying one new to us this year called Honey Boat, which is supposed to be even sweeter
than a butternut squash. And May is also the time to plant courgettes, we’re growing
at least 3 different varieties, the ones that I can remember is a Gold Rush which is a yellow
variety Genovese which is a paler green but it is green and a Di Nero one which is a very
dark one, no doubt by the end of May I would have also sown some Patty Pan which look like
little flying saucers, they come in white and I think there’s a yellow variety as
well and in the same family you can also start melons now. All of these seeds will start
with a large rounded seed leaf and then after that they will produce their true leaves.
And one last thing to sow this month, don’t forget to sow some flowers, I’m growing
a really pretty pink nasturtium, I’ve never seen a pink nasturtium before, I’m really
excited about seeing it and I grow things like Nasturtiums and Marigolds so that I can
add the petals to salads, makes them look really pretty, they’re completely edible.
If you’re sowing flowers for eating, be sure to do your research and just check that
what you’re about to eat is safe to do so. Don’t forget to keep an eye on the weather
forecast and if frosts are predicted make sure that you protect your plants, but May
is also the time to start hardening off some of the plants that you have grown earlier
in the year. And hardening off is the process where you get plants used to being outside
and its slightly cooler temperature and more wind being around them. So you take them out
of wherever you started them off whether that’s a polytunnel or greenhouse, cold frame, your
kitchen windowsill, wherever it is you take them out and put them outside during the day
and then you take them back in at night so they don’t get too cold overnight and you
do that for a few days to maybe a week and then they’ll be hardened off enough to put
outside just make sure you don’t plant them out too early for the area that you live in
while there’s still a risk of frost. I hope you found this quick guide to what
to sow in May useful and if you have please give it a thumbs up or leave a comment, but
best of all let YouTube know that you’re enjoying my channel by watching another video,
try this one. And so wherever you are in the world and whatever
you’ve got planned for the day, I hope it’s a good one and I also hope you’ll join me
again next time.