green spayce

The grand unveiling! 2011

2011-03-08T14:43:19Z

I've now been down to the allotment two days running, and have dug over 1 and a half beds quite roughly, and a half bed extremely finely. It would be perfect for carrots and beetroots, except that it's in the wrong place! I am trying to work out if I switch it or just dig anew tomorrow.

The new crop map is updated, and the area I've got looking gorgeous is the fallow pile that was last year's onions section. Right next to the leeks that I abandoned, and which have apparently grown nicely for me despite being ignored for 3 months!

This area is earmarked for squash, and the area I should have been digging out was the next one down, which was squash last year. I think I'll see how well it digs over before deciding, because the soil that I've done today is quite light and fine, which would be better suited to carrots than the normal clay base I have.

I am not looking forward to digging out the half row of potatoes that I left in, as they were too small to bother about. I am hoping for a better crop of potatoes this year. But I've never been great with potatoes. The only saving grace is that everyone's were small last year.

There are also several rows of sprouting broccoli that have not been attended to, and would have been nice to harvest. Once the snows hit I just didn't go down there at all! I am not going to feel guilty about that though, not with how busy I was over christmas!

In the back room I have my potatoes chitting, and 4 seed trays on the go with the peppers, chillis, tomatoes, courgettes and cauliflowers.

We are now back in business!

The harvests

2010-09-25T19:13:33Z

I've not really kept this updated with each time I went to the allotment, but that's because I just did the bare minimum to get things going. But we've managed to be self sufficient since July, and I still have a freezer of vege set aside. So here are the harvests in photos.

Like real vegetables, only smaller!

2010-08-30T08:53:57Z

After weeks and weeks of rain, I finally got a chance to go and do some work on the allotment, beyond the snatch and grab harvesting that I've been doing. The weeks of rain had given a rather needed benefit of very soft diggable soil, so I was able to turn over and smooth out the ex pea bed, and the dwarf end of the beans.

I also turned over the middle slot of corn, as we've eaten all of those. They were golden nugget, and extremely sweet! We're now onto the second lot to ripen, and these are a paler yellow with more slender cobs. They are not as richly sweet as the golden nuggets, so I am considering doing a double crop of the nuggets instead next year.

The last corn slot are the mini pops, which are good for baby corn, and should be harvested soon too. It seems like an awfully large amount of area for the mini corn cobs though.

My squash are doing well - but with a tiny caveat. Out of 5 butternut squash plants, only one has provided fruit, and that one is a big monster. The turk's turban on the other hand is a mini squash. So are the vegetable spaghetti's and the marrow's. I have 6 small sugar pumpkins which look just right.

The plums are now ripe, and they are also tiny. They are half the size of last year's crops. Although we always have far too many anyway, so perhaps small ones will be eaten more?

The cauliflower are also showing up small, and my chevalier calabrese haven't produced any heads at all yet - they are normally huge, cropping a massive centre floret, then many side shoots. I am hopeful that they might still do something, as they are big and healthy. If the weather turns warm once school goes back, then they might have a chance.

The tomatoes in the back yard have finally decided to start going red, and the purple beans have been a bumper crop. I expected two or three crops from the blue lake climbing beans, but only got one, which was disappointing.

Oh, and did I mention my lovely new potoatoes? No wait, they were not new potatoes - they are just small. Rats. Still tasty, but fiddly to peel! My onions were tiny too, and we're using them as shallots! The leeks are looking small, but they are happy with colder weather, so they should continue to grow and we can use them through winter.

The areas I have cleared will now be sowed over with green manure, and I have plenty of that ready to go. Now it's time to start looking forward to next year, and how I can do better!

It's harvest time

2010-08-09T09:55:32Z

Today is the first day that my Abel and Cole fruit and veg box comes with just fruit in it. From now on, the allotment will provide all our vegetables week to week. I did this last year, and I was able to be self sufficient on the vegetable front for the rest of the year!

Although I've not been updating this blog regularly, that doesn't mean I've not been down there - I've just not had enough time to be leisurely about it.

Right now it's the school holidays. That means that I have both more and less time at the same time! But this past weekend I had to see a client on the Saturday, so hubby and girls went off to Yorkshire to visit the in-laws without me. That gave me the freedom to spend 4 hours down at the allotment yesterday!

The results of that were that I completely cleared the mangetout and sugar snap peas bed and took down their climbing frame. I collected all the dried pods for next years seeds, and have so far dug over half of it. I'll be planting some green manure in there.

The blackberry bushes are bursting, and the red currants are still overloaded, despite harvesting about half of them a few weeks ago.

The poppies have died down, and their seed heads are ready to be removed (unless I want 8,000 plants growing in their stead next year!)

The french climbing beans are moving along nicely, I picked, blanched and froze all the ripe ones yesterday. And I also picked one corn cob to test. It was full of plump kernals, but it was white. It tasted lovely, but the cob was bendy when it was cooked. I am wondering what I've done wrong. After a bit of research I think a few of my other cobs are now past their prime as the kernels have started to deflate. Unfortunately taking a holiday in another country in the middle of summer can really damage your crops!

The brassicas are all getting along well, apart from the collection of rejects that I planted out to replaced the cauliflowers that bolted. They don't look like they are hurrying to grow, but they were surplus to requirements in the first place.

I have to admit to being disappointed with my butternuts - only one plant of four has a large fruit on it (or any fruit at all!). There are four good looking small sugar pumpkins, one turk's turban, one vegetable spaghetti, and it turns out that "random pumpkin" was a marrow. Bummer - now I have about four of those, and I am not a marrow fan! I have more vegetable spaghetti and marrow plants growing at home from the runners up pile.

So here is a few photos from the past month:

The final squash

2010-06-20T20:24:06Z

I got back down to the allottment today after a week of dashing down only once to water the squash that I had to leave in the shed. Finally they are all planted, although the squash area is very dry and could do with a some good compost. I was quite relieved that the shed dweller didn't eat them or sit on them!

The borlotti beans have suddenly flowered, and at the same time are looking yellowed. I don't think that they'll be a bumper crop after the cooking incident.

The potatoes on the other hand are looking spectacular. Or their foliage is, anyway. And so are the onions - despite a rather large amount of bind week trying to entwine itself odious self around them.

Our harvest today was a huge bag of peas, and two radishes. We ate the radishes on the spot, so there is no photographic evidence, but they were mildy spicy and very nice. The peas are here:

The girls set about picking the peas with a pair of scissors, and there may be some number of peas that were immediately eaten rather than being included in the harvest - but it's all ending up in the right place either way!

After getting the squash in and recreating the netting covers on the brassicas I decided to pull the carpet off the remainder of the second brassica row. This involved much dirt in the eyeball sockets from a combination of wind and flapping, so that was a highly enjoyable little game.

But having got it cleared of loose debris and then rolled up, I found that the soil underneath was excellent and pretty weed free. That gives me some nice space to plant in the chevalier calabrese that is in the greenhouse.

I also planted out the courgettes, electing to put them in the carrots row due to the larger amount of squash that I've planted. That row is very empty at the moment anyway, due to me losing the sieve! I don't want to plant my carrots until I've tilled out some fine sandy soil from my "home pile" which is full of weeds and probably the poo of some small children. That's a story for another day!

And I leave you with more lovely photos of poppies and corn, plus the full view update photo!

flowering

2010-06-13T19:32:21Z

I got some major work done today, finally getting some of my squash planted out. But I had to leave some of them in the shed still in pots, as I didn't manage to get all the area required done. The squash row was badly weed filled, and as hard as a rock.

The squash that I did get in is placed in the gaps between the corn, and will grow lengthwise through the corn rows.

Please ignore the weeds in evidence! (I do.)

The peas are still going strong, and I was also able to plant out the last of the beans - the heat injured borlotti beans. They seemed to have withered roots, so I am not sure how well they will fare, thanks to their earlier greenhouse cooking. I'll love and tend them just the same as the other boys though, and we'll see what happens!

I also got my first asparagus shoot, which I didn't cut early enough, but still - it was a real shoot. I am hoping for some more of those, but the area is very weedy, and I am pretty sure that the grass is crowding the crowns.

Since I covered the red and blackcurrant bushes, they've managed to keep their berries, and even grow some more. Both bushes are literally laden! I can't wait for them to ripen.

And the plum tree is already heaving under the weight of thousands of tiny green plums.

My favourite thing at the moment though, are the huge pink flowers that I planted as tiny seeds last year. I was given the seeds by a neighbour, and for the life of me - I can't remember what on earth they are. I was sure that they were poppies, but they are not the common style with single petals. These have clustered petals on each flower.

updates from the future

2010-06-05T18:43:11Z

This is a backdated update, as I've been so busy with orchestra and school that I dashed about the allotment and didn't get a chance to make any posts about it!

The big excitement was the first sight of peas!

They were delicious! I forgot to take a photo of the harvest before we ate them though!

The big annoyance was that the foxes had walked over my netted cabbages, and broken over half of them. It's a good thing I don't actually like cabbages!

brassica day and an update

2010-05-31T17:55:35Z

I managed to send the family off for the day so that I could head down to the allotment and get the first round of brassica's in. These are the ones that have been growing in the veg-table, and were getting rather large!

I needed to dig over and de-weed the row for these, but I forced my hand by digging them up and taking them down laid on trays - that meant that I had to dig quickly and get them in.

This job took most of the afternoon, but the finished results were worth wrapping up (in insect mesh!) I got purple sprouting broccoli, two types of cauliflower and savoy cabbage planted out today, with calabrese and some more cauliflower still to come.

I also noticed that the peas are now flowering - my favourite time, and even better, I have one spear of asparagus showing! This is the third year of the asparagus, so I think I can start cropping it! And only a week ago I thought I'd killed it off completely.

The corn is also coming along strongly, and despite not getting down there to water during the week, the beans are fine. Not even nibbled by snails.

I also emptied out my compost, and transferred the secondary compost pile into the main bin. Once it's full I'll cover it over and leave it to quietly rot away.

Oh - and I almost forgot to mention the plum tree. It's so overloaded with tiny green plums that it's obviously going to be another bumper plum harvest!

This is the full view - things are starting to come together now!

burnt beans, baby

2010-05-30T19:49:12Z

Last weekend we have the good fortune to enjoy some of the nicest, hottest weather so far in the English springtime. Also, we had good timing to be on an activity day, with overnight camping on that wonderfully warm day.

Luckily, I thought to leave the greenhouses open while we were away. The evening was cold, but the plants should have been hardy enough to withstand that.

Except... that I didn't leave them open at all. I had the thought, but failed the action. As a result, the beans on the top shelf - the borlotti beans - were baked. And they haven't even been harvested yet.

About half of them are totally shrivelled, and about half are mostly fine. It's been a week since the photo on the right was taken, and there are also two beans that I thought were toast which appear to be growing back.

So yay.

Some of the squashes and pumpkins were also scorched, but most of those have bounced back admirably.

After lining up all the greenhouse veg in the shade and watering them profusely, I headed down to the allotment with the french climbing and dwarf beans so that I could plant them out. They were getting rather tall and precarious, and needed to start to climb up some supports.

Because it was still the hottest day of the year, made sure that I was well protected. Sun screen, a hat, long sleeved shirt, and an umbrella. See the photo below for proof of that!

That's the newly planted french beans you can see in the middle, and in the shade the dwarf beans that I was putting in at the time.

I've created a nice shelter around my redcurrents and blackcurrents, and the berries are shaping up nicely there. We might even get to eat some this year!

And for the first time I have cherries on my cherry tree. I suspect that I might need to protect it from birds too, so I need to check that.

Killing off the beans, frosty stylee

2010-05-15T21:20:56Z

I probably should have updated the blog last week, after my flying visit to the allotment during which I built a fantastic tent-like structure around my runner beans.

But I didn't. I'll have to live with that oversight, but I am sure I'll get over it.

I didn't even take a photo of the tent. Silly me. But I DID take a photo of the beans when I removed the tent today:

So, as you can see, the tent did diddly squat about protecting my beans from the frost. Yep, that's one dead bean.

Luckily, about half of the beans are mostly fine. And even more luckily - I don't even like runner beans. I only planted them because I didn't eat so many last year that I had lots of seeds to harvest.

And they were so pretty I had to plant them again!

I have to say the most lucky part is that I hadn't planted out the french beans or the borlotti beans.

Alos, a lot of other plots on the allotment lost their entire potato crops in the frost. But mine had gone in late, and were hardly showing, so I didn't have that problem.

And I'd also only planted out the first earlies - the Duke of York - and still had the maincrop in the shed chitting.

Chitting... That word still makes me snigger.

So today I decided to plant the maincrop out. The only problem facing me here is that the purple sprouting broccoli is in the way, and it's still harvesting. Not so much now, but still putting out a bit - like a faded old tramp. But I was tired of waiting for it to finish.

I compromised, and dug two potato trenches as normal, but in a slightly condensed area. And in the centre of the trenches, the middle pile - there is still one broccoli plant growing.

The other big achievement of the day was getting all the corn planted out. There are three varieties, minipop, tuxedo and golden nugget.

And then of course, there are my peas, still going strong. Here's a photo (just because I like them!)

voting with veg

2010-05-06T15:47:23Z

I made best use of the polling day today by taking the kiddos down to the allotment and making them work hard. Face it, it's educational!

The dandelions are still there, laughing at my face with their wicked wicked weediness, and they are also turning overnight into puff balls of weed invaders, then blowing over the allotment. But they don't really worry me - they are pretty easy to pull out of fresh soil once they are as big as your hand. Does that make me sound bad? Probably!

I fixed up the last two rows of peas in front of each of the existing rows. These two rows are likely to grow to 1m and 75cm respectively, while the two inner rows are looking at 1.5m - so hopefully I can harvest all 4 relatively easily. I do perceive that there might be problems with the lowest crop on the inner two, but we'll see how that turns out. The outer two rows are sure to be more straggly, with more gaps for reaching through, as that is how they both turned out last year, and seem to be starting off in a similar vein this year.

I fastened the top of the runner beans support onto the end of the pea support and lay out a double row of bamboo poles in a zigzag pattern. I have three more sets of beans to add in, and I want them all to have sufficiant space, but I am still condensing the area in which they'll live. I've put the supports much closer to each other than last year. As they grow up they don't need as much room on the side.

The next lot of beans can probably go out as soon as possible. The main thing to consider is another bout of frost, and as it's now May 6th, I am counting on this risk being very low. The french climbing, borlotti and dwarf french beans are the ones that I want to protect most though, so I don't mind holding off planting them out for a bit longer.

I also started to dig over the weed choked carrot row, which still has fennel happily growing in it, and a lonely celery plant and three bluebells. I was delighted to find it easy to dig up, despite the total coverage of garden weeds. The interesting mix of weeds in this row was brought about because we imported the dirt from our back garden when we dug out the slag heap that was left by the builders who put up our conservatory (14 years ago!).

And by "we dug out" I mean Mr Boxer shorts really.

This dirt is sandy rather than clay based - so it was fabulous for carrots, and now proves to be easy to dig over which is great. I have a pile of leftover dirt by the shed which I plan to use for this year's carrots. I am going to dig out a large triple width trench, then fill it with filtered garden dirt and plant the carrots. Last year I had one carrot that was 1 foot long. That just proves that this dirt is winner, since the year before all I got was barbie legs and octopusses!

The only problem with the spare pile of dirt is that I MAY have planted a poo or too in there. We don't have access to the toilets while at the allotment, so I keep a solid potty down there for the kids to use. It has a pull out draw to empty. Wee goes directly on the compost, but poo isn't so welcome. Apparently foxes think it's tasty too, so I have to bury it or take it home, as there is nothing quite as disgusting as the leftovers of a poo meal.

This weekend the forecast is for rain, so I don't know if I'll get much more done, but I am pleased that I had the chance to use polling day if the weekend does turn out to be rubbish.

The eye of the storm

2010-05-03T18:37:38Z

Today was an excellent demonstration of the changeable quality of April weather (even though it's May). We had rain, hail, gales and sunshine all in the space of an hour. Rinse and repeat.

I had hoped to get down to the allotment and finish digging the last few rows, but in the end I spent the entire afternoon in the backyard being intermittently rained on, and repotting a few more of the seedlings.

I now have tomatoes, gemma courgettes, random pumpkin and minipop sweetcorn in individual pots.

I also got the first of the brassicas sown in segregated seed trays.

I am hoping to get a lot of the seedlings into the ground a lot earlier than last year, as I have much more area prepared than I did at this point 12 months ago. That should mean that I don't have to repot the rest of the sweet corn in individual pots, as I can just put them straight into the ground.

I just need to know that there will be no more frost. God, do you have some kind of definitive word on that one?

My final two sets of peas are looking quite gangly, and I am sure the roots are badly entwined, but they are in a large segregated seed tray, so they are only tied together in groups of 4, so I could just plant them in close clumps with greater spacing between.

I noticed that the pea weevils are back again in the rows I've already planted out though. I had them hitting last year, and I can't remember what I did about them. I've read that a nicotine spray can work - all you have to do is boil up old fag ends. Well, the disgusting smell that pervaded the whole house when I created garlic spray last year was bad enough! I can't imagine how revolting a nicotine spray would be. And where would I get the fag ends? I don't want to hang around outside The George and pick up the leavings at night!

sneaky digging

2010-05-01T21:30:33Z

I heard a rumour that Sunday was going to be pouring with rain, so I needed to get my arse down to the alloment on Saturday in order to get some digging done.

I could really do withOUT the rain, to be honest, but controlling weather never has been a talent I aquired. I wasn't able to do a brownie "Weather badge" when I was 7, and it's not got any easier 30 (something) years later.

So with the grey clouds scudding across the sky and hubby safely at home keeping one eye out for rain in order to take in my washing, the kids and I headed down to the allotment.

They ran off to play with some friends, and I didn't see hair nor hide of them for over 2 hours - which was plenty of time to get some digging underway.

I have to say, I DID get a lot done, but I had a large amount of things on my "I'd really like to get these done list", and I didn't get all of them done.

I also forgot to take my camera down, so if it doesn't rain tomorrow I'll go back and take a photo, but in the meantime, here are some of my happy little squash plants, who are waiting for me to get a row cleared for them.

This next one is called RP - that's short for Random Pumpkin. I have no idea what it actually is, but it's growing bigger and faster than the rest!

The funny thing is, the row of seedlings that is doing the best are the ones from my harvest last year - most of whom where unlabeled, and so I was mostly guessing to which type they were. The packaged seeds (which were a year old, but sealed) are growing much slower (or not at all).

peas on earth

2010-04-27T11:28:37Z

I snatched some allotment time this morning instead of working, and took two trays of pea seedlings down to plant out. I'd erected a pea frame Monday afternoon with the help my number one gardener, so it was all ready to go.

I had to finish stringing the frames up, as I abandoned that in order to administer first aid to my mini digger, who had fallen over her fork and landed on her knees. But that didn't take long.

These are the two tallest types of peas, sugar snap and carouby mesane mange tout, so I've built the pea frame in the middle of the row, and I plan to run two smaller frames on either side for the other two.

Right now it's really hot, so I hope I've given them enough water to settle in!

digging day

2010-04-25T22:16:14Z

I woke this morning to the sound of rain, and my first thought was "No!!!! I was going to be down at the allotment!" and then my second thought was "Oh no, why didn't I do the washing YESTERDAY?" and then my third throught was "Well at least it's nice for the London Marathon".

So you can't say that I am ALL selfish!

But luckily, after the initial rain the day settled into a grey and overcast one with windy weather, scudding clouds and sunny patches. We went off to the allotment afterall and got loads done.

I now have several rows re-dug, onions and shallots in, and potatoes planted:

The rhubarb has gone mad, as usual, so I had to do the first harvest of that. A nice surprise also was the purple sprouting broccoli which I left to its own devices. In fact - strangely - the ordinary broccoli which had already been harvested, but not removed had decided to grown a sprouting variety too!