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Sowing the Seed
Now’s the time to grow your own chillies, tomatoes, potatoes and broad beans. Or create crackin’ cress heads!
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The popularity of ‘Grow Your Own’ continues to rise, with 38% of British adults saying that they use their garden or outdoor space such as a balcony or window box to grow their own herbs, fruit and vegetables. Growing your own fruit and vegetables from seed is sometimes made to sound harder than it is. But all you really need to do is to pop a few seeds into some seed trays or pots filled with compost, place indoors in a propagator, or in a greenhouse if you have one, water well and watch your plants grow. In no time they will be ready to be planted out (usually after the last frost). Now is a good time to plan what you are going to grow and choose your seeds.
Chillies and tomatoes
Chillies and tomatoes can be started off indoors from March through to mid spring. Plants will be ready to go outside in a sheltered, sunny spot from May or after the last frost.
Potatoes
Potatoes are a family favourite and are very easy to grow. Buy seed potatoes, which are small potato tubers that are certified disease free (don’t be tempted to use old potatoes from the vegetable rack) and start chitting them in March. Chitting involves letting the potatoes grow shoots by placing them in trays or egg cartons and standing them in a cool, light spot until 1-2cm long shoots have formed. Work organic matter and a general fertiliser into the soil of an open sunny site. Potatoes do not like frost so don’t rush to plant out too soon. Water regularly and you should be able to harvest after 10-12 weeks.
Broad Beans & Runner Beans
Broad beans and runner beans can be sown indoors or straight in the ground outside as the soil warms up. They are easy to grow and you’ll be able to enjoy delicious freshly picked veg this summer.
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Grow Your Own Selection pack (£45) available at Squire’s Garden Centres An electric propagator makes growing seeds indoors easy
Cress
Cress have some fun and create your own crackin’ cress heads with the children. Carefully remove the top of your eggs, wash the shells and dab them dry. Draw faces on your shells with felt tip pens. Dip some cotton wool in water, squeeze out the excess, then place one cotton wool ball inside each shell. Sprinkle a few cress seeds on top. Sit your cress-filled shells in egg cups or an egg box on a sunny windowsill and watch them grow. If you are new to growing your own then garden centres will have ‘Grow Your Own Selection’ packs with many options to choose from.
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Walk from Standen to Kingscote Bluebell Railway
A country walk for more experienced walkers. Please note normal admission applies to enter the property and car park. Time 3 hours • Distance 6 miles (9.6 km) • Map Explorer 135 • Dog friendly
Standen car park, grid ref: TQ391356 1. Leave the car park and walk up the hill towards the house. At the top turn left and walk along the path with the Kitchen Garden on your left and Goose Green on the right. Continue ahead on the mettled and grass path through the rhododendrons, and woodland until you reach a second wooden gate (do not turn into Hollybush
Wood) into a field. 2. Go through the gate and bear left to follow the path along the edge of a small wood, with a barbed wire fence to your left. Ignore the first stile and continue downhill. Go through the metal gate at the edge of the wood, turn left and follow the path downhill towards the reservoir. Go over a stile. At the next finger post turn right to follow the High Weald
Landscape Trail. Continue along the right-hand edge of the field to a metal gate in the bottom corner. (Note the position of this gate. On your return, this
is where you will turn left to head back up the hill towards Standen.) 3. Here the High Weald
Landscape Trail joins the
Sussex Border Path. Go through a gate and turn right and continue along this path, with the reservoir and chain-link fence on your left until you meet a tarred lane. 4. This is the old road which was submerged by the water, and blocked by a padlocked double iron gate. Turn right at this gate uphill for a few hundred yards, as it turns left and levels off. Turn right at the junction with the road
(Please take care here as visibility is poor). 5. Walk 50 yards uphill to the finger post opposite the entrance to Stone Hill
House, cross the road.
Follow the path above the rocks, which soon develops into a sunken path as it goes downhill, and continue until you reach a three-way finger post and a metal gate at the top of the hill. 6. Go through the gate, and head downhill across the field in the direction of the pylon. Go through a gap in the trees at the bottom, and follow the stream to a wooden foot bridge.
Cross the bridge and turn left in front of a pylon to follow a track to a finger post at the entrance of a wood. You are still following the
High Weald Landscape Trail. Follow the path through the woods, cross the stile and climb a steep bank to cross the Bluebell railway line.
Go down the steep bank on the other side and cross a waymarked stile into a wood. 7. Follow the path through the wood to emerge onto a tarred lane. Turn right (ignoring the path to the right) for about 500yd (450m) to a large wooden gate and stile.
Mill Place
The name Mill Place was first noted in 1547. It was part of Lewes Priory’s manor of Imberhorne from the early 12th century but later became independent of it. A water powered iron furnace was working here in the 16th and 17th centuries. The core of the building dates from the late 14th century, with 16th century and Victorian additions. It is grade II listed. 8. Go through the gate or over the stile and continue straight ahead along the lane. Just past Brookbank and Holly Tree Cottages on the right. The lane swings around to the left and you can see the railway line again.
Where the lane joins from the left continue straight ahead. The lane goes under the overhead lines, between hedgerows and through a wood. The wood on your right opens out onto a large field, with two large white houses in the bottom right-hand corner. Continue for about 100yd (90m) downhill and look for a gap in the righthand hedge with a finger post. Go through the gap and follow around the edge of the field towards the houses, keeping the woodland on your left. 9. At the end of the field turn left onto a track and follow uphill, through a metal gate onto Vowels Lane. Kingscote Station, part of the Bluebell railway line, is immediately to your right. 10.After visiting Kingscote Station, retrace your steps. Go left down the private road. just before the large white house (Bluebell
Cottage) go right along the right-hand field edge. At the lane, turn left. Where the path forks, go straight ahead (signs to Mill
Place Farm) passed Brooksbank cottage and Holly Tree cottage on your left. Before the gate turn left down the lane to Mill
Place Farm. 11.Go under the railway bridge and continue ahead along the track through the farm buildings and past a pond on your left.
Continue until you reach a brick bridge. Go over the bridge and follow the track around to your right past another pond on your left. Keep ahead following the fence and hedge on your left and a stream on your right. Continue up the sunken track around the left-hand edge of the field, following the line of finger posts, to the top of the field. Continue past the rocks on the right and retrace your steps to the road. Take care here. Turn right and go downhill to rejoin the lane on the left which takes you back to the Sussex Border Path along the northern perimeter of Weir Wood reservoir.
Follow the border path past two memorial benches until you reach the metal gate in the corner of the field where you joined the path originally. Cross the stile and head up the hill following the High Weald Landscape
Trail, under the power lines, keeping the hedgerow and fence to your right. Go through the metal gate at the top of the field through the bracken, continuing to keep the fence and hedgerow on your right.
At the fingerpost, continue uphill and follow the sunken path along the edge of the wood. After emerging from the wood, there is a gate on your right you can use this to retrace your path to Standen, Goose Green and the house, or continue up the hill, following the right-hand edge of the field, to the top corner. 12.Go through the metal gate at the top of the field, and follow the path right between the woodland and barbed-wire fence (on your left) until you reach the main drive to Standen. At the drive turn right, past
Standen cottages and continue to the main entrance to Standen and the car park. With courtesy of The National Trust ©
Carrot & Courgette Muffins Recipe
Est.1984
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These savoury muffins make a tasty snack – ideal for hungry kids. Or why not pop one in their packed lunch?
SUDOKU BrainBashers Sudoku - Feb 17 - Super Hard
Ingredients
• 125g butter, melted and cooled slightly • 2 tbsp milk • 2 large eggs, beaten • 100g grated carrot • 100g grated courgette • 100g wholemeal self-raising flour • 1 tsp baking powder • 1 tsp mixed dried herbs • 75g porridge oats
Method
1. Preheat the oven to 180C, fan oven 160C, gas mark 4. Line a muffin tin with 8 paper muffin cases or squares of baking paper. 2. Mix together the cooled butter, milk and eggs. Stir in the grated carrot and courgette. The secret to successful muffins is to avoid over-mixing the wet and dry ingredients. 1 of 1 3. In a separate large mixing bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, dried herbs and porridge oats. 4. Stir the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients, taking care that you do not over-mix. Spoon into the muffin cases and bake for 25 to 30 minutes, until firm and golden. Cool on a wire rack.
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Clinton Lodge
Fletching, East Sussex
6 acre formal and romantic garden overlooking parkland. The Caroline house (not open) was enlarged by the Earl of Sheffield for his daughter, who married Sir Henry Clinton, one of the three generals at Waterloo. The 18th Century façade is set in a tree-lined lawn, flanked by a water canal of pools and fountains and overlooking parkland. The 1987 storm removed old oaks but these have been replanted in a Repton-style landscape leading to a stone column on the distant hill. The garden itself is approximately 6 acres of clay soil and is divided into rooms reflecting English garden design from the 17th century to 21st century. The 17th century herb garden has
camomile paths and turf seats, and four knot gardens. The Victorian era is represented by tall white and blue herbaceous borders, the pre-Raphaelites by an alley of white roses, clematis, purple vines and lilies, the 20th century by an unusual swimming pool garden encircled by an arcade of apples and the 21st century by a garden of clipped beech with a newly built classical stone folly. A wild flower meadow has been replanted with standard apple trees and a pleached lime avenue leads to the medieval herb Stonewall Park garden and potager. An enclosed garden of old English roses, trained Chiddingstone Hoath, nr Edenbridge high so that you are enveloped by Even from the driveway you can see a vast number the scent, surrounds a water feature of self-seeded daffodils, leading down to a romantic by William Pye. Gardens of interest woodland garden in historic setting, featuring species include a small shady glade, small such as rhododendrons, magnolias, azaleas and knot garden, canal garden and bluebells. See them in full flower on our May opening orchard planted with crinums, and day. There is also a range of interesting trees, sandstone folly garden enclosing a classical outcrops, wandering paths and lakes. temple. Sunday 14th March 2pm - 5pm Postcode: TN22 3ST, online pre-booking only. Sunday 2nd May 2pm – 5pm Sunday 25th April 2pm - 5:30pm Monday 7th June 2pm - 5:30pm Online pre-booking only. Home-made teas in the conservatory. Adult: £6, Child: free Refreshments: Home-made teas. Due to the current situation, you are advised to check the Admission: Adult: £6, Child: Free website for uptodate information before travelling.QUICK CROSSWORD QUICK CROSSWORD
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EQUICK CROSSWORD1 2 3 4 5 6 S Answers on page 6 I Across Down G 7 8 E N 1 Slower mail (6,5) 7 Inheritance chromosome 8 Tynesider 1 Afternoon nap 2 A plus sum in the bank 3 Evenings S T 9 9 First note of musical scale 4 Small tenant farm in Scotland 11 12 B A S 10 Persuade to do wrong 11Pours fat over roasting meat 13 French brandy 16 Mature female cat 18 Married woman’s title 19 One part of a TV serial 5 The belly 6 A doubting Thomas 11 Legacy 12 USA law enforcer 13 Snapshot taker 16 19 E Q U E U P H E R I 20 Ocean liner 14 Tittle-tattle, chatter S F 21 Caramelcoated fruit on a stick (6,5) 15 Guidance, words of wisdom 17 Looped rope to tether ponies 21T O F
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