FIRST NOTE · OCTOBER PLANNING
What Percy plans
to plant in October.
Autumn glass is not summer in disguise. The sensible October plan is a small one: winter leaves, a continually refreshed salad bed and enough observation to know what the greenhouse is actually doing.
Start with the plan, not the packet
Our first season is deliberately manageable. The first-season plan includes winter salad, rocket, spinach and parsley, with a small summer list to follow next year. October is about establishing the cool-season work without turning the greenhouse into a catalogue.
Before sowing, check the packet instructions, the growing medium and the space already occupied. The calendar is a prompt, not a promise. Variety, temperature and moisture decide whether a date is sensible.
Choose crops for the remaining light
For a late sowing, choose a hardy salad variety whose packet includes the intended autumn window. Rocket and suitable oriental leaves are options to investigate; established parsley plants can give a quicker start than a fresh sowing. Keep spinach conditional on the variety’s sowing window. Later sowings may provide their useful crop in spring rather than through the darkest part of winter.
Keep one salad bed moving
A continually refreshed salad bed is more useful than one heroic sowing. Use a small section, label what went in and record the actual date. If the first batch is slow, that is information, not a failure.
- Choose a modest area you can inspect easily.
- Label the crop and sowing date.
- Check moisture in the growing medium before watering.
- Ventilate when conditions allow and prepare for colder nights.
Winter leaves need patience
Rocket, spinach and winter salad leaves will not follow the same timetable in a cooling, unheated greenhouse. Growth may slow as the light changes. Keep the work steady, observe the plants and avoid promising a harvest before there is one.
“One tray today. We do not need to feed the whole village.”
What Percy will record
The useful diary entry is simple: what was sown, where it went, what the conditions were like and what happened next. Percy can turn that into a story only after James has supplied the evidence.
Further reading: RHS guidance on growing for winter. Percy’s notes are beginner guidance for an unheated Cheshire greenhouse; variety instructions and actual conditions take priority.