OK, progress: we have sowed carrots, beetroot, radishes, rocket, tomatoes (three types), aubergines (two varieties), basil, celeriac, potatoes (four types), kale, spinach, sweetcorn, courgettes, pumpkins, peas, onions, shallots, tomatilloes, leeks (three types), pak choi. Pak choi? Yes, I did that. I don’t even like it much but it seemed like something different.

Ah, something different. There lies my Achilles heel. The fennel. The damn fennel. Because I want to grow something different. For the third year running I am struggling with it. This time I tried out some peat pots: 12 little modules which you wet and they expand to become little squishy pot things which you stick the seeds in. Then they go in their own mini-propagator with its own plastic lid. Couldn’t spoil them any more than that, could I? And only two germinated.

I always have to sow fennel at least twice, and then some into the ground as well – which actually works fine, only they don’t grow so big before bolting. It’s a hell of a fussy one, fennel. It doesn’t like being transplanted, doesn’t ever want to dry out, doesn’t much appreciate being cold. And it bolts like fury. The bulbs never look squat and fat, as they do in the shops, either. All in all you just don’t get a lot of bang for your buck.

So why do it? It must be the challenge. Fennel was my first personal thing out there: all those other vegetables, potatoes and parsnips and peas, are your bog-standard allotment stuff. I wanted originality. I had the good sense to give up on okra after a single year, but the fennel lives on, year to year, never quite dying, either literally or in my mind, as it probably should.

Sarah Wain's expert advice

Fennel responds to stable growing conditions of warmth and moisture. Extremes of heat and drought tend to make it bolt. Your problem might be that you are not checking on your seedlings every day, so when the weather is hot you are unable to remove the cover from them. This is important as the temperature needs to remain stable: high temperatures can inhibit germination and if you leave your seedlings for any length of time they may dry out.

If compost dries out it can become hydrophobic – unable take up water easily. Monitor germinating seed once or twice a day, otherwise your seedlings may suffer from lack of water.

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