Friday 29th July
As my back improved with a regime of exercises I felt I could do just a little on the plot. I came down for a light session, but with help. I therefore cajoled my family and visitors to come down and help harvest the potatoes, raspberries and french beans. My grandson helped dig out the row of Charlotte potatoes and then lift some onions and shallots while my wife and granddaughter harvested berries and beans. Watering was also achieved with me issuing instructions to my willing grandson. Sunday/Monday 24/5 July on Sunday, as usual, I came down to the site for the Trading Hut and cafe. Having bought my length of weed suppressant fabric and chatted about various issues with some of the committee, I went to my plot to start digging up some potatoes, amongst other things. As I put on my boots my back went. Unfortunately at that moment there was an incident when someone tripped and feel face down further down the track so, what with my back and filling in the Incident Book, I didn't get on the plot at all but gingerly slunk back home. I returned in the evening, again very gingerly, to water my seeds, using the tap to fill the watering cans as I could not lift them out of the tank after fillings them as I usually do. As I got in the car to go home I noticed that the front of my newly extended compost bin was beginning to break away with the pressure of the extra compost inside. I was going to post a photo to show how the extensions were made but this shows how the bin is disintegrating as well.
On Monday I was resting my back but managed to come down in the evening to water the seeds. However I noticed that the compost bin had split even more. A piece of wood made a temporary brace to stop the contents spilling out over the roadway until I can repair it. Saturday 23rd July 7am
This morning my target was to clear the unsightly heap from in front of my plot. A mixture of grass cuttings and garden waste from my neighbours at home and the weeds and spent crops from the plot, the pile had become huge and was not doing the grass under it any good at all. I started by emptying several bags of very coarse plant material I had collected from various gardens and kept for just this time. That way the compost will be easier to dig out and not just meld into the soil at the bottom of the heap. In quite a short time the newly emptied bin was more than half full and quite well mixed. I found dumping successive fork-loads into each corner in turn kept everything nice and level as well as mixing the different materials. That done I did the watering I should have done the night before and then finished weeding the asparagus bed and hoed the patch next to it, adding the heap of weeds to the compost bin. I also hoed the weeds beginning to thrive in the brassica tunnel. As there is a horse litter mulch they came out very easily. I then spent a few minutes trying to train the squashes along the rows of sweet corn as I remember in previous years struggling to keep my footing when moving amongst the plants when harvesting. I'm not sure how effective this will be. Friday 22nd July On this early morning visit I set about digging out the last of the compost in the end bin. I loosened some of the compost in the bin to be emptied, ready to shovel it over another time when I had fixed the extension panels in place. I then sowed a late row of fennel, a vegetable I really enjoy so worth trying to get a crop. Once again I used the trusty cultivator to form a seed bed in a shallow trench as in the photo below. Later in the day I persuaded my wife and grandchildren to come down and help with the harvesting. While they picked raspberries and broad beans I fixed in place the compost bin extensions and broke up the remaining contents of the neighbouring bin ready for transfer. We also took home a rather loose 'Spring' cabbage and the first of the Loganberries. Wednesday 20th July The link on the Facebook page shows Alan Titchmarsh explaining the most effective way off watering, albeit in a flower garden but the same applies to veg plots. I have always avoided watering on the plot as much as possible as I didn't want to be tied to daily visits but I think I have probably carried it too far and suffered crop loss very often as a result. I am now watering seeds and newly planted crops to give them a good start and then watering very sparingly when the weather demands it - like now! I have always sown and planted into trenches or depressions so any water I do use has maximum effect. The photo of the peas I sowed yesterday shows the trench on the right after sowing and watering. What doesn't show is the sprinkling of paraffin along the row to hopefully ward off the mice. On the left is the net tunnel I use to protect the emerging Mangetout from the pigeons. The dwarf French Beans in the middle will probably be safe from pigeon attack, though I will be ready with the net tunnel if necessary. My carrots will get special treatment however. Carrot seedlings die off if they dry out just a little bit so I always sow in a trench and the cover with a plank lifted off the surface by bricks, as in the photo. Later I will use a fleece tunnel to keep the carrot fly off - or maybe get round to buying and using Enviromesh from the Trading Hut which, though more expensive, will last for more than a year.
I was not quite so early this morning as I am off out for the day, so I concentrated on a quick visit to water and sprinkle paraffin. I also dropped off the extension pieces for the compost bin, but that is for another day. Tuesday 19th July 2016 In this hot weather I have discovered early starts. Arriving at about 7 o'clock I set about picking up the weeds from yesterday and emptying out two huge bags of garden waste from a neighbour. Then I loosened the rest of the compost in the oldest bin ready to shovel it all over into the middle, final, composting bin. The middle bin is too full at the moment but I have extension pieces at home under construction. Once complete and all the compost is transferred, I can remove the pile in front of my plot into the newly emptied bin making things much tidier. Then I started on sowing my peas. Unfortunately before I could I needed to dig out the raspberries that had spread over from the row next door. These took some doing as the roots had gone way down. Once cleared I scraped the horse litter mulch away and used my trusty cultivator to break up the soil, which was surprisingly damp, showing how effective the mulch is. Three passes with the cultivator and shoveling the soil out of the trench and it was more than 4 inches deep and I was ready to start sowing. I scattered two packets of Douce Provence seed (from InExcess @50p) along the trench and covered it with 2 inches of soil, leaving a 2 inch trench. A good watering into the trench was followed by a thin scattering of slug pellets. Paraffin, to keep the mice away will be squirted over the trench tomorrow. Doing it straight away would have been better. Photo tomorrow. In the last half hour I harvested a few peas, not many, and a whole bucket full of French Beans some of which are probably too tough to eat. I must pick them more regularly. Just before I left at 9 o'clock I remembered to use a fork on my ripening onions to ease under them and break the roots to promote the ripening process. I woke up very early with the sun shining in the window, despite a late night, so decided to go down to the allotment before it got too hot. I started with digging out another section of the compost heap - doing the hard work while it is still cool. I then dug out the rest of the King Edward potatoes and left them to dry off. Then I turned my attention to the weeds! Hoeing between the sweet corn was easy; just cutting down the few weeds that were left after the last time Then I started on the onion bed. I had hoed it some time ago but left it too long. It was a hard lesson. First I pushed the hoe up between the rows. This is one time when the traditional Dutch hoe is best as I know exactly where the blade is under the soil and can avoid cutting down the crop. Then I had to use the three pronged cultivator to pull out the loosened weeds as can be seen in the picture. Finally I used the hoe a bit more before finishing of by hand weeding. Quite a rigmarole! - and I pulled out several onions in the process.
On seeing how much of a mess the next door bed was after I hoed it yesterday, I raked the dying weeds off, leaving them heaped on the path. By then it was 8 o'clock and getting warm do I settled for planting out a few Cos lettuce plants I had been given yesterday at the cafe. They went straight in where the potatoes had just come out. After that I got on with hand weeding the strawberries. Again I had left it too long so managed to pull up one strawberry plant. Only the Mara des Bois still have flowers and promise more fruit. The Elsanta variety have had a crop of lovely berries - for a week or two and now, even though there is lots of lush growth, is only producing runners. I decided to cut off any runner beyond the first plantlet. While not hard work all this took a long time. I forgot to recover it with netting so any strawberries that come before my next visit will disappear down some birds throat! Leaving heaps of weeds on the path to deal with next time I set off home with the onions, only to have to turn back to pick up the now well dried potatoes from beside the newly planted lettuces! More brassica plants needed planting out today but I started, out of sympathy for my neighbours, to tidy up the compost heap. I emptied the bag of hulled Broad Beans on the top and then covered the smelly kitchen waste with most of the grass cuttings heaped in front. That keeps the smell down. Then I went to my Brassica tunnel to continue planting. When I had finished I had set out 3 rows of Brussel Sprouts, a row of Purple Sprouting and half a row of 'Kilaton' cabbages. The last I am told can be pulled up in mid-winter and hung in a cool place to store for up to a couple of months. Useful! I then set about harvesting the crops I did not have time for yesterday. The Loganberry at the end had fruit so I stared to pick, only to discover the 'wild' raspberries growing round it were very prolific as well, once I had learned to distinguish them apart. In fact the 'wild' raspberries produced more than the transplanted ones. I got a big picking of peas, the last of one row and the beginning of the next row. Then I uprooted a row of old Broad Beans, extracting any beans left and got enough not to have to start picking from the follow-on row. Finally I pulled up a large 'Spring' cabbage to take home. It does not have a very dense heart but there will be plenty to eat in it. I have various plants growing on in the greenhouse at home so planting out was a priority but on arrival on the plot I realised I also needed to lift some of my potatoes. I cleared the rest of the row of earlies only to find that what I thought were tasteless Foremost was, if the label is to be believed, actually tasteless Pentland Javelin! We have 3 or 4 meals worth so I think we will be having lots of garlic mashed potato - unless someone can suggest something better! I then set three 'Marketmore' cucumber plants along the row. These small outdoor cucumbers cropped well last year and were tasty despite thick skins. A phone call home confirmed that boiled potatoes were on the menu so I dug up a batch of King Edwards leaving them all on the surface to dry and harden their skins. I was also asked for a green veg so I picked a second crop of climbing French Beans, collecting far more than I needed for a meal. I was hoping they would be less tough than the first batch and fortunately this proved to be the case. I then set about planting my Brussel Sprouts. They have to be spaced so far apart (30") that I only need 5 plants for a row but it is a laborious process. First scrape clear a strip in the mulch. Then cut holes 4-6" deep and a spade width wide. Use a bulb planter to cut a hole in the bottom of each and scatter half a handful of lime in and around each hole. Then use a thin bladed trowel or spike to stir the lime into the soil at the bottom and plant each young plant into the hole using a normal trowel to loosen the surrounding soil to bed it in. Finally I firm the plant in well as brassicas like to be firmly planted and then water in well. Later, when the plants grow taller, I shall earth them up by filling in the larger hole but in the meantime water and fertiliser will be concentrated around the plant. I managed to plant 10 plants before it was time to go home. Monday saw me make a flying visit mainly to drop off more of my neighbours' garden waste. One bag had to be returned so its contents were dumped on the ever-growing pile outside the front of the plot. The rest was in plastic disposable sacks so got humped up on top of one of the bins ready to empty at a later date.
As my grand-daughter had come with me (on the pretext of checking for scooters and bikes at the tip) I only could stay for a short while. However, I did manage to dig up a King Edward potato plant and got more than enough for dinner. Up to now we have been eating the 'Foremost' earlies but find them watery and somewhat tasteless. This may be because they caught the Blight so early, or that we have had wet and cool weather recently. It would be interesting to see what others think as I think I might try another type next year. Any comments? We then checked the row of Charlotte potatoes and found the Blight was decimating them so I cut off the tops and bagged them up for the tip. The second row of King Edward's were also beginning to show signs of infection so I probably will cut them down on my next visit. Finally I put out on the floor of the shed some rat/mouse poison I had bought on Saturday. As I did so I saw that there was still some rat poison I put out several weeks ago so perhaps all the rodents are dead and the smell in the shed is something else! |
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May 2023
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