Socially distanced gossiping

Now things are starting to ease up a little we can now meet some of our friends that we haven't seen sine the start of the lockdown. And what better way than a cuppa and cake down the allotment.

Fortunately there is plenty of room to spread out. So, whilst The Wife and Friend are chatting away, I can get on with some real work. Like pulling weeds and such. Notice the difference?

No, neither can I. This damn grass grows all over the place and unless you can get the roots out, it just keeps coming back. Despite a few hours in the baking sun, there does not appear to be a noticeable difference in the weed count. But the piles in the wild area tells me otherwise. As does my aching back.

Weeds, watering and... waiting?

It's going to be a hot "scorcher" today. That means an early trip to the plot. We were onsite by 7.30am. It was cool, calm, and the birds were singing. Just a perfect time to sit down with a cup of coffee and enjoying the silence (apart from the birds that is). I dragged one of our patio chairs out, and The Wife sat in her usual flowerbed seat surrounded by flowers and the gentle buzzing of a rather large number of bumblebees.

We have our first strawberries of the year.

Only two, but there are plenty of others promised for the future.

Our main job today was more weeding and watering. We won't be back until Wednesday night, so we have to make sure that everything has enough water for a couple of days, through some pretty serious temperatures according to the weather forecast.

The apple tree is starting to form loads of little "applelets". We can't really count them as proper apples because at present all the apples are growing upwards, which is the same as the apple blossom. Then there is the "June Drop" where the weight of the growing fruit makes them hang down, and if the apple tree does not have enough sap and strength, then those which can't make it, fall off.

So whether this year will be a good apple harvest remains to be seen. It's certainly promising a good crop, but we'll see. It's all a matter of waiting.

Woodchips, Weeds and watering

Just as well I grabbed a few barrow loads on Thursday. They're all gone now. That's what happens when you get a whole load of allotmenteers starved for manure and woodchips. It's a somewhat vital part of growing on the allotment.

Anyhow, the pile I did manage to get has been liberally spread around (most of) the goat paths. But before that was done, I had to remove all the invasive grasses and weeds. So most of the day was spent digging out weeds. But now, the plot is looking a little better.

After that, it was case of watering, watering, and more watering. We haven't had rain now for, I'm guessing, about 2 months. The soil is like dust. Whenever you water it hits the surface and then runs away. So the only way you can make it stick is to rake a few small furrows in the soil (when you're weeding) so the water drains into them. Then allow it to filter down for a while, before going back and watering some more.

Mind you, this heat is being loved by some of the plants. Most notably the Chillies. They're coming along just fine since being potted on.

Elsewhere in the greenhouse, our spare courgettes are looking rather yellow. Not only their leaves, but they have also started producing flowers. A sure sign that they're under stress. Most probably from the fact that they're pot bound. I guess I may just pull them all out and throw them in the compost bins.

But one which we threw into a bucket half full of manure, and topped up with compost and kept in the greenhouse is looking really good.

Outside, the netting which I put over the Kale decided that it was going to all fall down. The trough is empty and as such it's rather light. So we've had a stiff wind blowing around the plot and it fell over and took all the netting with it. Well if it wants to fall over, then let it. I dragged one of the other spare trough over to join it and then re-arranged the netting.

At least it'll keep the damned pigeons off.

Woodchips: Now you see 'em, now you don't

When we popped along to do some evening watering on Tuesday there had been a delivery of woodchips. Great, we thought. We can do the paths at the weekend.

Roll on Thursday evening trip for watering, and that pile of woodchips was almost depleted. So cue me going into manic mode to make sure that I at least have enough to do the goat paths between the beds. So I scraped about 8 barrow loads off the floor of the woodchip bay and dumped them into the middle of the plot.

The chips are quite leafy. From the shape of the leaves I'd hazard a guess at Chestnut. Sweet or Horse I couldn't tell you. Either way, hardwood chips are nothing to be sneezed at. Even those I did sneeze at the dust that I dragged up. I just wish it would rain a bit. But at least I have some woodchips for the weekend.

Quick visit to plant Beetroot

So whilst The Wife is doing the shopping run, I'm off to the plot.

The Beetroot which survived the munches of the Mouse is getting a little pot bound. So it's time to get it out into a bed. I tried my usual method of digging a hole, dropping the plant and then watering them in. Unfortunately the bed that I'm putting them in hadn't seen rain or a hose pipe in well over a month so it's a bit more like a dust bowl than a bed. So instead I had to give the bed a good soaking before I could actually plant anything.

So I only have 20 beetroots. I was expecting more, but since mousie had his breakfast, I have to make do with what I can get.

I'll leave you with a picture of yesterday's sweetcorn, since I forgot to take a picture yesterday.

This is the bed that has two beans planted under each transplant. Whether it works, who knows. But it's worth a try.

Repairing the damage

So we have totally lost the Courgettes. But the Crown Prince only appear to have suffered damage on the outer leaves of some of the plants. Yes, some are completely dead, and one seems to have been the victim of a cut worm, but a couple of the plants are sprouting new small leaves which means that the damage is not as bad as we initially thought.

Even so, when I reported the failure earlier in the week, I immediately started looking online for replacement Crown Prince seeds, only to find that there were none to be had. Steve from the Seaside Allotment Channel, offered to send me some replacements which I gratefully accepted. If you have not been following Steve, then you are really missing out. This is somebody who is relatively new to the allotment, but who has taken to it like the proverbial duck to water. He is doing stuff the likes of which you would find in commercial Market Gardens and the sheer amount of food that he turns out is absolutely astonishing.

Anyway, our day started off with the Divine Miss Vulpine turning up, despite the amount of people who were on the plot.

We re-planted the courgettes with some of the spares we had in the greenhouse.

Meanwhile is was transplant time for a number of other plants. The Wife did the Petunias, and a donated flowers (not sure what it was) and I later re-potted the Chillies.

We also had a damn good clear out of the 2nd greenhouse, as this will later be used for the above mentioned Chillies and the Two remaining Cucumbers. It definitely looks a bit cleaner compared to the last time you saw it.

I've nipped the seed heads out of the Pak Choi as they were starting to reach for the skies a bit. Oh and got rid of another of those pesky snails which were munching on our produce. But there are plenty of leaves on them still.

Whilst cleaning it out, we came across a few tubs of old beans. Since we also lost our beans in the previous cold winds, we took this opportunity to re-sow. We also planted out all the sweetcorns. Sine we've had to split the sweetcorns across two beds, I'm going to try a little experiment. I've dropped a few peas into the base of each plant in one of the beds, and beans into the base of each in the other bed. Hopefully they'll germinate in a few weeks and can use the corn as ready made canes. It's a bit random but we'll see if it works.

No frost - but they're all dead

So I popped down to the plot to do a spot of mid-week watering. We've not had any rain for ages and the ground is bone dry.

Nor have we had any cold temperatures. Being in the middle of London we're in a "heat island", so we don't get the late frosts like you do "out in the sticks". So imagine my surprise when I found that our recently planted Crown Prince and the Courgettes all exhibit signs of frost damage.

It's only the outer leaves that appear to be hit. The inner core of the plant is fine. (Apart from the one CP which appears to have been sheared off at the root).

What I suspect has happened is that the recent winds have caught them as they are in an exposed part of the plot. A wind chill could easily drop the temperature another couple of degrees and made them suffer, despite there being no actual frost.

Good job we have a few spares courgettes in the greenhouse. But I hope the CPs recover, because we have no spares of those and we can't get any more seeds as everywhere seems to be out of stock.

Kale, Weeds and a visit from an old friend

So I was down the plot bright and early this morning. I'd actually been up since about 5am, but I arrived on the plot about 7am. First job was to plant out the Kale. The last Kale we had (a good few years back) was eaten by the pigeons. So this lot I am determined to protect.

I put the netting over one of the troughs. The Tomatoes are not yet big enough to be put outside, so I'll use it for support for the time being.

After they were done, I started attacking some of the weeds and grasses that were infesting the goat paths between the beds. The plot is looking much better these days.

And of course, The Wife's Strawberry Empire is looking pretty good.

I also managed to get a decent photo of a Bumblebee on the Phacelia. (The others were too blurry)

Inside the Greenhouse, we have the remainder of the Courgettes.

And on the other side there are the Tomatoes, a few sweetcorn, a couple of Sunflowers (need to find a home for them soon), Mint and Chillies. Plus a few Beetroot which survived the ravages of the Mouse.

Up on the top shelf, are the rest of the Sweetcorn. They'll have to go out next week I suspect.

Whilst I was packing up to leave, I noticed some movement out of the corner of my eye. Not seen any sight nor sounds of the foxes for a couple of months. But here she is poking her nose in.

Not sure which one this is, as we've kind of lost track of the fox history. But I wish she was around earlier in the year to deal with that mouse. Anyway, good to see her back.

Hard day in the sun

I nearly passed out.

We went down to the plot early as we knew we had a lot of work to do. But even trying to get The Wife out of bed in the morning is quite a struggle. I've always been an early bird though. But we eventually managed to roll up to the plot at about 9am. Surprisingly there were a few others who arrived before us.

Any way I made a finish on getting the remains of the compost sieved out. The bed is now clear of compost. But it still needs a little attention regarding the grass and other detritus that spilled out from the digging.

Meanwhile The Wife was on a mission. She had to improve her Strawberry Empire. So all the little pots of plants that were scattered around the plot were rounded up and forced into trays and bigger pots. And now The Empire spans nearly half the plot.

Although I'm sure there are more hidden around, just waiting to ambush me when I turn my back.

After digging the compost, I finally finished off digging the Deep End bed No.4. The one which had all the clay in it. It did get a liberal helping of the compost that was previously recovered from the afore mentioned compost bin. But it was at this point that I started feeling very faint. I crawled away into the shade to nurse a drink of water and get my breath back. I think it was sun stroke. Or just plain exhaustion. But either way, The Wife finished off planting the 15 Crown Prince squashes into this bed.

Last, but not least, before we left for the day, we picked a whole load of non-snail eaten Pak Choi leaves. This will be tonight's dinner.

Hopefully it will replace the leaves picked with loads more tasty treats for us. Now I'll see if I can get home without passing out. Maybe it's the fact that we left early without breakfast?

The Last Compost

Last as in the Compost Bins that is. Not the last of all the compost. I still have the couple of bags that I bought a few weeks back. But those bags will be used for the Tomatoes.

No, todat is a day for digging out the final compost bin. This is the bin that's been here the longest. About 3 years if I recall correctly. So for the most part there is a load of compost in there. However the bad news is that because it's been there so long it's settled and compacted. Which means that digging it out is hard work.

Ok, the stuff on the tops is still fresh. So that simply gets moved en-mass to the new bin area. (The bed at the very front which was the old Chard bed). But the lower levels need to be dug out, sieved and so on. It's back breaking work. Especially in the hot sun.

But when the jobs done, we can relax in the sunshine, guzzle a cool drink and watch the bees humming in the flowers in The Wife's raised bed.

The Foxgloves are just starting to flower, but the borage (I think it's borage anyway) Phacelia (Thanks Belinda) is already in full bloom, and if my camera didn't have so much issues trying to focus on the bees close up, I'd give you a photo of them too.

This sunshine isn't doing the Pak Choi any favours though. It looks like it's starting to bolt to seed already. Guess what we'll be eating over the weekend?

An unexpected Potato harvest.

So I did the usual "drop The Wife off for shopping and head to the plot" thing. Following on from yesterday's digging, I dug out the small bed in the middle of the plot which was last year's dumping ground for odds and ends.

So imagine my surprise when I find stumpy old carrots, half eaten beetroots, nettles, thistles, and a load of spuds.

Now, I'm not sure whether they are edible as they all seem to have sprouted and many have a zillion little roots. But one thing I can do, is plant them again, with a little more space and care. Normally I use bags for planting potatoes but these ones seem to have done OK, in the bed. It's just a matter of making sure you dig them all out, because you have spuds for life otherwise.

Digging (again)

So here is the missing photo from last week regarding the Courgettes.

But today is a day for digging. First thing I have to sort out is the the bed adjacent to the above three, more commonly known as Deep End 4.

It is full of weeds. Although that's not the biggest problem. This bed has not had any additional material added to it (unlike the other three) so only the top few inches is actually decent soil. From about 5 inches down it is solid clay, which making the digging really difficult.

In the middle (just behind the fork handle in the above photo) is a large rogue chard plant. It needs to come out. However it won't go to waste, because I'll strip the leaves and it will be tonight's dinner.
(In fact as I write this, it was dinner. And very tasty it was too).

I didn't take any more photos because I was just too knackered. But apart from the digging, we potted on the sweet corns from their little trays into reasonable sized pots. It's still too early to put them out. The Wife also increased her Strawberry Empire by potting up some of the little runners that she kept into large trays - the same size trays as the Pak Choi. Talking of which, they are coming on really well. But there appears to have been an invasion of the snail variety as a lot of the leaves have been munched on. I did pick out (and squash) all that I could find, but I'll have to keep my eyes on them.

I also planted my first lot of potatoes into bags. Not sure how well they'll do, but there is no harm in trying.

I'll be back tomorrow whilst The Wife does her usual massive shop. So drop off at the Sainsbury's Mega Centre and then back to the plot for more digging and delving.