Allotment Week: Day 4

So what happened to Day 3? Although the weather is perfect, I am having health issues which means I cannot catch my breath properly. Anything strenuous gets me out of breath and often triggers a coughing fit. I hate asthma. :(

So today we're limited to watering. But when we first got to the plot there was a major issue to sort out. There was a House Sparrow trapped in the greenhouse. I suspect it got in through the open window vent. That opener seems to be doing it's job, but it's still regularly reaching 40C on there. I suspect the Sparrow had been drinking from the water trays which we're keeping the strawberries in because it still seemed quite healthy when we let it out.

The heat has helped the chillies to start sprouting though they seem to be way behind more of the other plants. The French Dwarf Beans have shot off to a huge lead now. I suspect they'll need planting out soon.

But we're rather disappointed with the Soya Beans. They haven't done a thing.

The heat has also kicked off the Cape Gooseberries as well, because they're now making a showing.

Seems we may be rather hit and miss this year. But we'll see what we get. We started off the cucumbers today, as the heat seems to be ideal to get them going.

Elsewhere on the allotment though, there are some real gems of beds made. This is from our nearby neighbour on 28.

Hows that for a good showing?

I'm scheduled to go see a Doctor soon, so hopefully I can get my lungs sorted and get back to some real work.

Dead, dead, dead

We had a heavy frost last week. We were hoping the Cape Gooseberries would survive enough to ripen. But no, they took it pretty hard.

The flower bed has also finished.

And finally the grapevine. It didn't really succumb to the frost, it just the end of the line for this year. So it's time to give it a drastic haircut.

Now whilst digging out the root stumps of the Cape Gooseberries, something else died. Alas my poor old trusty fork took one leverage too many.

Good job it's end of the season. But I'll need to get a new fork before next season starts. Wonder if they'll have new year sales on garden tools.

More Clay digging and a Friendly Fox

Felicia* came to visit again today. She's getting friendlier but she will still run off if you move too fast or make a noise. We've seen one of her cubs and we think we now know where she's made her den. I guess she was wondering if I was digging up some tasty treats for her.

On the subject of digging... I managed to get a second of the clay beds dug over and planted another lot of Sweetcorn and Cape Gooseberries in there.

Meanwhile The Wife planted out 4 of the 8 Honey Bear Squashes...

As well as weeding and raking over all the remaining beds ready for the tomatoes and other stuff to be planted.

And finally we planted the first of the three troughs with cascading Petunias. Hopefully these will start fully flowering in the next month or so, to produce a nice front piece to the plot.

But finally the sunshine defeated us. Another Sunny Bank Holiday! What is going on in the world? This just isn't cricket, old bean.

Time to pick some Pak Choi for dinner, and an armful of rhubarb for yet more Rhubarb and Ginger Jam.

* As named by Belinda.

Allotment Week: Potting on

So this week has been a bit warm. We've often reached over 40C in the greenhouse, which means that the seeds in there have really got off to a great start. Now a lot of them need potting on.

First off there are the old faithful Courgettes. We start them in the small pots (right). Those that actually sprout and make it to the cotyledon stage get potted on into bigger pots.

If you look closely above, you'll notice that some of them failed to germinate.

And then we have the sweetcorn. We're growing two varieties here labelled "sweetcorn" - and unknown organic, large cob variety, and "popcorn" - our existing variety that does superbly in the popcorn maker. Some of the sweetcorn have also failed to germinate, so planted another 9 to see if we can make up the numbers.

The Edamame (Soya Beans) are doing really well. The Toilet Roll trick seems to work well with them.

Then there are the Cape Gooseberries. These are the saved berries from last year. Also they are doing well and will need potting on soon. Probably at the weekend.

Outside, there are beginnings as well. The Apple tree has started to blossom.

And I've been delving into the murky depths of one of the compost bins.

I'm sieving out the compost. All the fine stuff is going into a clay and claggy bed whilst anything larger is getting thrown onto the new courgette mound.

Soon this will get covered with weed membrane and then we'll put a few holes in it and plant the courgettes through. Wonder what this year's tally will be. Probably less than last year as we won't have as many plants.

Cape Gooseberries

The Cape Gooseberries (also known as Inca Berries by some) have gone rampant in the beds this year. But it seems that they have put more into the growth of the plant rather than the actual berries.

There have been some frosts recently which has effectively killed the plants. "Not so bad", we thought. But it was only when we started harvesting them that we realised that many of the pods had no fruit developed inside them, which was extremely disappointing.

However we did manage to get a reasonable amount of fruits. Certainly enough to keep some of the fruits for seeds next year. And possibly enough to make a small batch of jam as well.

Other than that, there has not been much done on the plot this time. Illness over the past couple of weeks and the cold/miserable weather has meant that doing anything down the plot is an unfulfilling experience. Possibly more will be done in December as there is still a lot of infrastructure work that needs doing... building new beds... making new paths... cutting trees... You know. Stuff.

The stuff which every allotmenteer has to do to get ready for next year.

Almost the end of the season

Things are coming to an end now. The plot is definitely starting to look a little worn and bedraggled. Not surprising since this year has been pretty productive.

The Cape Gooseberries outside are still pretty green. But the ones we had in pots (outside) and all those in the greenhouses have certainly ripened enough to harvest. Fortunately they do keep well. But considering the total amount (or at least the potential total amount) then we should be on course for a very good harvest, and possibly jam. i think we'll probably wait a couple more weeks for the ones outside to see if they are ready. If not then we may be forced to pull them and work with what we get.

The outside sunflowers are also starting the die back and go to seed. rather than let the seed scatter, we decided to start pulling the heads off. We'll probably make sure they are properly de-seeded then we can make seeded fat balls for the birds over winter. And of course keep some seeds back for next year.

Remember the dodgy carrots from last week? Well, the Wife made them into soup. Plenty of onions and carrots boiled up with seasoning.

Then a blitz with the blender and it made a delicious thick soup, the colour of which is not done justice in my poor photos. Purple carrots at their best... no matter how they look.

Add some tomatoes from our stock and you have a meal fit for kings. This is what allotment good food is all about.

Rain

We've had a little bit of rain over the past few days. Some places more than others. So we carefully checked the weather report before walking to the plot this morning.

I say walking, it's about 2 miles away and we usually drive there. But now the car has failed it's MoT. It needs about £1,400 of repairs on a car worth about £200. So now we're carless, which means we have to be careful what we take too and from the plot. Since we've had a bit of rain it's time for wellies. And breakfast. And kitchen waste. It all adds up.

Anyway, the plot is looking pretty good.

The sweetcorn is starting to put forth flowers at the top... which means that somewhere down below there should be some corns forming. But I can't seen anything at present, but there are a few lumps on the stems.

The Cape Gooseberries are also doing well(ish). Notice the ones at the back, compared to the ones in the front. Huge difference. The ones in the front were put in there after the onions were pulled at the start of July. But there don't seem to have done very well. I guess they don't like onions.

Meanwhile in the second greenhouse, there is lots of promise from the tomatoes. But unfortunately not much in the way of immediate production.

Oh, and the courgettes are still pumping them out like crazy. Been giving them away at the office and to neighbours.

The 2017 Courgette Tally:

31

Didn't really get much of a harvest today though. Been getting more throughout the week.

And the Star Flowers just keep on coming. There are little seed spikes that are left after the flowers have moved on. Guess the Wife will be gathering those for next year.

Going back to the rain. The weather report said that it would be raining in the afternoon. And there are dark clouds gathering on the horizon. Well lets just say that dark clouds can travel faster than us. We were about 5 mins away from home when it started absolutely throwing it down. Needless to say, we were drenched by the time we made it back. Guess it's time to start looking for a new car.

The courgette tsunami has begun

Somethings we manage to do quite well with. Courgettes for example. But we've not had much luck with others.

Onions is one that we have a reasonable result. But it looks like this years onions have started to go over. The leaves are starting to die off.

So we decided to pull them all, and plant in some of our spare Cape Gooseberries.

Meanwhile I finished off dealing with the tomatoes in the 2nd greenhouse. It's Tom City in there now. (Oh, and the Chillies)

The the weeding and general plot maintenance. But it didn't stop us getting a small harvest.

It looks like I'm going to have to re-instate the Courgette Counter. So far this year we're at...

The 2017 Courgette Tally:

7

It's like a jungle sometimes...

...makes me wonder how I keep from going under.

No, I'm not trying to outdo Belinda and her music with every post. The greenhouses are starting to feel like a jungle now. We definitely have to evict some of the current residents otherwise it's going to be a nightmare.

First off we have the Cosmos which has now moved to one of the arms of the flower bed. The stalks are still a little fragile, so a simple bamboo cane support helps them stay put.

Next to be vacated is the Cape Gooseberries and Chinese Lanterns. These have now been put in separate beds.

Meanwhile, I've been attacking the old courgette mound. Since this year it's been retired, or rather, moved, to another spot, the old spot has been somewhat rather over run with weeds.

Of course the problem is that there are quite a few rogue potatoes in there as well. So I need to pull weeds without disturbing the spuds. Well in the end I opted for a compromise of pulling big weeds then stamping down the other and putting a large piece of carpet over it. We'll eventually have to move the butternut squash out here later, but in the meantime the greenhouse now looks a little more empty.

I think it's time for a well deserved cold bottle of cider that I have chilling in the fridge.

Naked Gardening?

So apparently I and the Wife should have been naked down the allotment today.

The first Saturday of May is the World Naked Gardening Day. Yes, apparently that is a thing. But then again I really don't want to scare the chickens and put them off their lay, so maybe it's for the best that I found out about this after I got back from the allotment.

Today's challenge down the allotment is potting on. And boy have we had a lot to do. So much so that I didn't really take much photos.

The one photo I did take was of the result of me attacking that bed with all the clay sods. When we last saw it, it was heap of baked clay blocks that lay for a year under weed membranes and was as hard as rocks. It took some seriously bashing to break up those sods and liberal mixing with coconut coir and a dash of compost to turn it into a usable bed.

Meanwhile we've been potting on the Cape Gooseberries. Most will probably go to next week's Plant Sale.

I've also potted on my Chillies seedlings into suitable containers. After all these were the original reason why I got the second greenhouse.

Then there was all the wood work in trying to build a set of shelves into the second greenhouse. I've cannibalised a couple of pallets into potential table tops. Just need to get some sort of legs fitted onto them.

All-in-all, a very busy day down the plot, but not a lot of photos for the blog. Ah well, you can't have everything.

Blight? Already?

So today when I went to the plot I noticed that some of the rogue potatoes growing had black leaves. Tell tale signs of blight. :(

(Apologies for the blurry pictures.)

Needless to say, they got pulled immediately. Others in the bags seem to be OK though. I think it's because it's been so dry recently. We've had no rain for nearly a month which seems to have let the blight spores dry and get blown around.

And for more bad news, the Courgettes that I planted out two days ago are already suffering the effects of slugs.

On a more positive note though, the sweetcorn went out today.

But this should produce an interesting grow bed. Mr Mousie had been burying some of my courgette seeds in a cache. One of which seems to have been put in one of the sweetcorn pots and has sprouted. So it looks like we might have a rogue courgette growing in the middle of the sweetcorn bed. No big deal. It's similar to the infamous "three sisters" growing method.

Although the strawberries are going great guns, the Wife is starting out in another Empire. Last year she grew Cape Gooseberries. Well she kept some seeds from them just to see if they'd germinate. Yeah, they did. And now she has a "few" seedlings.

So I guess we're going to have to find a planting location for these once they grow up too.