Yes, I know it’s snowing!

After an early morning dash to cover up the recently planted potatoes before the frosts and snow returned on Good Friday, I was determined to get out to the plot at some point over the holiday weekend. So today, during yet another snow flurry I went to plot number 2.

Sadly the recent strong winds left the (plastic) greenhouse in need of repair. Unfortunately it was far too cold to be standing around trying to fix it properly, not to mention not having any tools to do so. So I propped the sides up as best as possible and wedged some bricks against them in the hope it will hold until the next visit. Despite this and the door constantly being blown open, the broad beans are finally through, the strawberries are looking well and two of the three trays of salad leaves are through.

Beds looking up the plot

Beds looking down the plot from the pond

Back outside in the cold, I dug over another bed and dressed with rockdust and tidied up a bit more. I discovered some mint and oregano (I think), seemingly randomly planted in the middle of a bed – OK so I know mint has a habit of appearing anywhere, but oregano? Dug up the remaining parsnips that had been left behind – all three of them -before digging out numerous dandelions and started on the couch grass… Get the feeling I’ll be cursing that a lot soon.

Despite the weather, the trees and rhubarb are showing signs of life. The rhubarb always looks like some weird alien creature when it first starts to appear like this to me! One of the fruit trees has some sort of growth on the ground around it, that I’m not sure what they are, but despite this being the main reason I took the camera up for I forget to take a picture of it…

So, instead here’s the ‘spot the shed’ competition!

However, because of the weather it was just a short visit to the plot! Maybe some time at one or both of them later in the week, let’s hope it warms up a bit.

Fruit beds, still a work in progress!

Time on the plot!

Taking advantage of the system being down for maintenance at work AND a decent day, I spent several hours in a planting frenzy on plot no 1. Planted my first earlies (Orla) – OK a bit early but you’ve gotta take a gamble sometimes – couple of rows of broad beans (Masterpiece Green Longpod), half of the white onions (Jet Set), a short row of carrots (Early Nantes), some coriander (both under a mini polytunnel), a row of spinach and a short row of spring onions (White Lisbon). I also moved the globe artichokes to their new position (after digging over and weeding the bed – again!). The roots on the artichokes were huge, so fingers crossed for a decent crop there.

Previously all the four veg plots were dressed with rockdust and dug over to remove (yet more) weeds, the hedge has been attacked (again) to bring it down to an almost manageable level – although there’s still some (!) work to be down there, the shallots have been planted, raspberries pruned, all (I hope!) the Jerusalem artichokes were dug up, eaten, given away to friends, family, fellow plot holders and replanted in a different position. Pause for breath.

Fortunately this time managed to take the camera down as well, so signs of life first:

The comfrey coming back to life

One of the rhubarb crowns

The tulips and daffodils – bit late with the daffs, but the ones at home aren’t out either.

The view down the plot, mini polytunnel on the left with the carrots and coriander in and the start of the ‘new’ path in the middle – the plan being some of the soil will go into the raised beds, the rest will be levelled and re-covered with the weed suppressing fabric, then eventually covered in bark chippings. This will actually narrow the central path and give more room for the fruit bed (on the right)

This one being the view up the plot, with the work in progress for the path in the bottom left corner, the potato bed at the bottom, polytunnel further up. However, the main reason for this shot is the hedge at the top (left of the pic) and to the side. yes it’s still too big, but it’s getting there!

On plot number 2 (sadly no photos), life is so much easier. Firstly despite the plot being approximately the same size as plot number 1, there is only about half the growing space due to bizarre bed layouts and large amounts of space devoted to growing non-fruit trees and shrubs. Secondly, the plot has been much more recently cultivated so has FAR, FAR less weeds so it’s far easier to get ready for planting. So another batch of shallots have been planted (Mrs D said she liked having them in – we cooked up a large batch and froze them in ice cube trays so we could just use a cube or two as and when needed for speed, and of course they tasted good! 3 of the 5 beds have been dug over already.

In the greenhouse, the salad leaves are through and growing (slowly). The sweet peas and broad beans on the other hand aren’t looking so good – mainly because I’ve yet to see any sign of them. On further investigation, the broad beans have put down some roots but they’ve yet to show themselves above the soil.

In the seeding sowing, I’ve invested in a heated propagator – which is great! Seeds germinate far quicker, the main problem now is I have pots of seeds everywhere, which isn’t going down so well… Hopefully some of these will be able to go to the greenhouse soon, then of course I can plant more seeds! At the moment I have cauliflower, broccoli, celeriac, celery, two different types of tomatoes, carnations.

Need a bigger windowsill !

Seed planting continues apace. After visiting both plots on beautifully sunny days and discovering them both frozen solid it was time to put the greenhouse to good use! Planted up 3 trays of salad leaves (Romano Rosso, Red Cos and something else – which shall remain nameless for now as it’s in the boot of the car and its seriously cold out there tonight!) with my young helper – who to be honest was more interested in sitting in the shed eating biscuits! He did want to do some digging to be fair, but kinda difficult when the ground is rock hard.

Back home planted 35 broad bean (Masterpiece Green Longpod)in toilet rolls in a polystyrene container. Also planted up a large pot of Carrots (Amsterdam Forcing) and covered them with fleece – mainly to keep them warm rather than to keep any carrot fly off them.

The chilli planted last year on the window sill continues to flower, so I attempted to pollinate them by using the kids paintbrushes. I now have two chillies growing!

Fighting for space on the window sill is some celeriac (Prinz), Celery (Green Utah), Brussels (Groninger and Seven Hills) and Cauliflower (Snowball). Not to mention various spots in the kitchen being taken up by potatoes chitting.

Still Frozen Solid
As the ground was still frozen on Saturday, I decided it was time to tackle the hedge (again). Sadly I didn’t cut it down enough last year and it has grown very well since then, so started again from the top. After a couple of hours made it about a third of the way down the plot before realising I’d managed to break the pruning saw. I’d have been more upset but it’s my Dads…! I think the top end of the hedge was worse then the rest, so hopefully get the rest down to a reasonable height on the next visit. Possibly with a new saw.

First planting of the year

Planted up some Sweet Peas and two different types of chillies – Ring of Fire and Hungarian Hot Wax, the former being the seeds from last years chillies. Would have planted more, but ran out of room on the window sill!

Bought some greenhouse staging cheap from Argos at a third of the normal price. This was obviously well publicised as they didn’t seem to have stock in for long. Cheap and cheerful but good value at £6.66 and assembled it in the greenhouse on plot no 2, now with sweet peas on the shelves. Would have planted more up there, but the bags of what I thought were compost left on the plot were in fact bark chippings! So instead of staying in the greenhouse planting up some salad leaves I decided to give one of the fruit beds a weed and mulch with compost from the home composter. That was the time it rained very heavily and I got soaked…

Did discover that some of the raspberry canes up there are Tulameen, which apparently are a late variety that crops over a long period. Hopefully these will start before the Autumn raspberries on plot no 1.

A Shed
Got the key to the shed on the new plot. Loads of stuff left in there from previous plots holders – every thing from a huge container of weed killer, garden lime, tools, netting, a radio (still working and in its box!) and a birds nest.

Some pictures!

Firstly the ‘old’ allotment:

The terraced beds, looking up from the bottom of the plot. I like to think it actually looks slightly better in real life!

Signs of life! Is it a bit early for the rhubarb to sprouting like this?

It was a cold, but clear day, looking down across the site towards the valley below.

The ‘new’ allotment
Entrance to the new plot. Small stone wall at the front, with the rest of the plot surrounded by privet. Shed (well hidden) to the left and greenhouse in the distance.

The Fruit bed with apple tree in the foreground. Rest of the bed has a mixture of raspberries, gooseberries and currants. Like the rest of the plot it could do with a tidy!

View from the plot looking over towards Hillsborough and north Sheffield.

This year I will mostly be growing…

In no particular order, those ordered this year:

Real Seeds
French Bean (Cherokee Trail of Tears)
Summer Squash (Early Prolific Straightneck)
Miniature White Cucumber
Belleville leaf sorrel
Mizuna

Alan Romans (all potatoes)
King Edward
Maris Piper
Orla
Pink Fir Apple
Salad Blue

Organic Garden Catalogue
Purple Sprouting Early
Purple Sprouting Late
Calabrese (Waltham)
Red Cabbage (Marner Fruerot)
Cabbage (Cuor du Bue)
Savoy Cabbage (Vertus)
Snowball (Cauliflower)
Celery (Green Utah)
Courgette (Goldie)
Gherkin (Vert Petit de Paris)
Pumpkin (Tom Fox)
Butternut Squash (Sprinter)
Perpetual Spinach
Shallots (Longor)
Onions (Jet Set)

King’s Seeds (via the NSALG scheme)
Beetroot (Bolthardy)
Carrot (Early Nantes)
Radish (Mixed)
Broad Beans (Masterpiece Green Longpod and Windsor Green)
Borlotta Lingua di Fuoco
Shallots (Golden Gourmet)
Onion (Red Baron)

Seeds from last year:
Chilli (Ring of Fire)
Pea (Hatif d’Annonay)
Tomato (Gardener’s Delight, Aurora, Costoluto Fiorentino, Gigante Liscio, Dragotsenost)
Broad Bean (Witkiem)
Celeriac (Prinz)
Pea (Telephone)
Spring Onion (White Lisbon)
Carrot (Amsterdam Forcing)
Brussels (Seven Hills and Groninger)
Spinach (Matador)
Leek (Bandit and Pandora)
Parsley (Italian Giant)
French Bean (Canadian Wonder)
Wild Rocket
Pumpkin (Mars)
Carrot (Long Red Surrey)
Runner Bean (Desiree)
Butternut Squash (Waltham)
Sweetcorn (Kelvedon Glory)
Courgette (Albarellodi Sarzana)
Cucumber (Paris Pickling)
Chilli (Hungarian Hot Wax)
Sage
Coriander
Basil (Sweet Genovese)
Spring Onion (Ramrod)
American Land Cress
Dill
Rocket
Basil(Dark Opal)
Basil (Ararat Flamed)
Leek (Saint Victor)
Kale (Pentland Brig and Ascott Purple)
Red Veined Sorrel
Beetroot (Bulls Blood)
Red Stemmed Leaf Radish
Baby Leaf Lettuce (Romana Rossa)
BabyLeaf Lettuce (Red Cos)

I’m not sure I have enough…

On top of that I’ve order 4 bags of Rockdust to rejuvenate the soil.

Still no pictures
Went down at the weekend, chatted a lot, gave some Jerusalem Artichokes and Rhubarb to a neighbour, took some Jerusalem Artichokes home and put most of the remaining scaffolding boards in to mark out the beds/terracing (it being far too wet to do anything else). It was far too miserable to take any pictures, so I didn’t but I did take my Dad to the new allotment to help identify some plants. Needless to say having seen the old allotment at its (almost) worse he was slightly more impressed. Between us (to be fair it was mainly Dad!) we identified lots of Rhubarb, strawberries, raspberries, some black/white/red currants, couple of apple trees, some herbs, and quite a few flowers.

A plot too much?

Birthdays, Christmas and the weather have all conspired to keep me away from the plot recently meaning there has been little to report. However I abandoned the family to tend to the plot this weekend. My main aim was to dig over enough of the plot before the growing season starts to have the four large beds for the veg, and I’m pleased to say after a few hours of digging on Saturday this has been acheived. Unfortunately it has been my back that has paid for this exertion.

The ‘miniature’ Brussels are still hanging on in there and we did manage a small hand full of baby Brussels with Sunday lunch (and an even smaller handful for Christmas lunch) but I’m not sure how much longer my patience will hold out before digging them up. Given it’s just them and the Jerusalem Artichokes that are productive at the moment, they’re still in place for now… There’s no sign of the garlic still, bit worried all the rain will have rotted them. The water running down the lane was coming on to the plot again making things quite sticky (yes I know I shouldn’t dig it when it’s like that, but needs must!), so I repaired the ‘flood barrier’ at the entrance in an attempt to keep the water flowing down the path. Some kind soul has seen I’m missing a nice gate and kindly left me something to use there – others may think it was just someone dumping some rubbish on my plot…

The next job is to put the scaffolding boards in place to mark out the beds/terracing. After that tidy up the paths so that they are level, dig some manure into the legume bed and we’re all set for this year.

Well kinda. After waiting for three and a half years I was offered a plot on another site. This is much more accessible for Mrs D and the kids, not to mention it being flat, having a shed, greenhouse, pond, fruit trees and marked out beds! There are only about 30 plots on the site and they are like gold dust. Obviously I have to take it, but I can’t let go of the original plot either after all the work I’ve put in (and also because it’s not actually mine to give up – it’s in the wife’s name). So the only option is to move to the allotment and live in the shed ;>) Will have to put in some careful planning, well once I’ve managed to identify what we have on the new plot. So far we have rhubarb and, erm… Some unidentified trees and some lethal looking slate edged beds.

Hopefully some photos in the next update. But still to decide whether to add the new plot to this blog or give it one of its own!

Long time no visit!

After about a month of not managing to get down to the plot, I took advantage of the bright sunny (but bloody freezing!) day to get down there and plant my garlic. Things were looking very desolate, most of the tree has been chopped down (and still trying to decide whether the rest should go), the leaf basket had blown over, even the weeds have stopped growing and there was still ice in the bath at 2pm in the afternoon. Sadly the hedge between me and the neighbours is still going strong.

So ignoring all the advice I took a couple of bulbs of garlic I had grown this year, from the original Thermidrome from the Organic Garden Catalogue I’d ordered last year. Good sized cloves so hopefully get some good plants. Have planted slightly less than last year so should have a slightly more manageable crop, although I have been supplying most of the family in garlic and numerous other people in garlic to plant.

The recent manure supply was put to good use as well as I covered the potato bed with manure. It’s been dug over some time ago and has a few bits of buckwheat growing on it, but I have decided to go with the plan that the worms will take the goodness into the soil for me instead of digging it in. Watch this space for results…

I managed to dig over a bit more ground and do some general clearing up. My ‘gate’ had disappeared (been destroyed by the hedge cutter in the yearly trim courtesy of the council) so I put a few twigs over the entrance. Took down the poles for the beans, the poor runner beans only got as far as the first couple of flowers before the frosts killed them off.

The next job is to reposition some of the plants (rhubarb, comfrey, globe artichokes to name a few) and carry on digging. The Brussels look fairly pathetic and I may get some marble sided sprouts if I’m lucky (probably cost a fortune as ‘baby veg’ in the supermarket!), but luckily the neighbours have plenty and gave me a pocket full! Need to move the ‘sticks’ I’ve been saving for beans, etc for about the 3rd time – this time they’re going in the corner I’ve never going to use thanks to tree roots in the hope I don’t have to move them yet again. Then I can get digging all the veg beds and hopefully use up the scaffolding boards to divide the beds up.

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A ‘proper’ allotment

Managed to visit a few times this week and am now the proud owner of a large pile of leaves and an even larger pile of manure!

The valley below the allotments is a great source of leaves and I have added about 10 compost bags full of leaves to the leaf mould basket now. Which when compressed down fills a surprisingly small space, and no doubt will make a significantly smaller amount of leaf mould.

My leaf supplier

Saturday I shared a delivery of cow manure for the local farm with my allotment neighbour Dan. The farm is where I regularly buy our meat from and has a policy of rearing their animals using non-intensive methods that “forbids the use of growth promoters and antibiotics”. Much credit to the tractor driver for first managing to reverse onto the lane and then actually getting as far down as my plot to dump it all – but I guess when you’re driving a tractor you don’t care much about overgrown hedges scratching the paintwork!

The farm fortunately has a huge supply of the stuff which has obviously been around for sometime. Now allotments are very popular again, they’re getting through it. Ours was still last years stuff though, which you could tell by how good it looked, and more importantly how little it smelled! Ah who’d have thought I’d be sitting here raving about cow manure…

It’s all piled up at the (newly cleared) top end of the allotment. It does look fairly well rotted down, but still some straw in parts of it. Can I use this now to add to empty beds or should I wait for it to rot down further? Any advice greatly received.

In between collecting leaves and shifting manure I’ve also done a bit of tidying up. Note to self, try and keep on top of the weeds when they are small…! Spent a couple of hours weeding and digging over the bed where I grow the daffodils and tulips, and planted some more in there. Attempted to control the mint in this bed too – no laughing at me next summer when it takes over again!

Closing the stable door…
My miniature Brussels are still surviving despite the attentions on the local pigeons and pheasants, and in an attempt to actually get something off them I have constructed some bird scarers (tip from Grow Your Own magazine) using some string and the collection of naff CDs from the newspaper. This may be a little late in the day for them, but it we get anything off the plants they will have done the job.

Finally managed to get one bag of the ‘home grown’ compost down to the site to use as a mulch for the raspberries – now sadly at an end with the frosts. Could do with another bag as I had to spread it quite thin, but it will do until the next visit. Fortunately I have a few more bags at home to add round the raspberries and also the strawberries – although they need weeding first. Planting the strawberries between the comfrey and rhubarb doesn’t seem like such a good idea now either. Still undecided on which will be moving.

The courgettes and pumpkins have now been added to the compost but I’m still hanging on to the sweetcorn. Not sure why as it’s obviously not going to do anything now the frosts have arrived, it’s just one of the few things still growing (well it’s alive, maybe no longer growing). The Jerusalem Artichokes have flowered as well, and I discovered just what happens when you leave them in the ground on a walk to the local cafe the other day. I could be wrong and the allotment holder really likes them, but it doesn’t look like the site has been cultivated much recently. Difficult to judge the distance from the picture but I’d guess this ‘row’ is about 15m long!

The green manures have been mixed. The buckwheat fed the pigeons and pheasants nicely, but the crimson clover did eventually grow well. I’m probably supposed to dig it in now, but I haven’t got anything to put in this bed yet so will leave it for now. Never got round to planting any Hungarian Grazing Rye though and probably too late now.

The plan for the winter is to get as much as possible dug over and to add various nutrients to the soil to improve it. One thing I have noticed is that most of the stuff I’ve grown has been quite small and I’m sure it’s down to a lack of soil improvement. I’m looking at getting in some volcanic rock dust – anyone used it? – together with the usual manure, lime and the seaweed meal I’ve got left into the appropriate beds. I will be planting some garlic shortly, and possible some broad beans but not sure if I’ll get enough space cleared to get them in.

Autumn is definitely here

The odd cold night (which leads me to suspect the sweetcorn are never going to fill out and that the runner beans may have left it a little late to start flowering now!) and lots of leaves falling from the trees means autumn is now with us. To take advantage to these I have ‘salvaged some of the materials on the allotment and ‘created’ (some may say bodged!) a leaf mould basket.

Last years leaves (just a small bag from off the plot) still have some rotting down to be down so were added first before I left for the valley below with two large bags. Fortunately the valley road below is lined with 700 lime trees and has plenty of leaves to spare! OK so leaves from the roadside may not be ideal but that’s the problem living in the middle of the city.

Beans!
The French beans (Cherokee Trail of Tears) that have finally started producing beans are proving a big hit at home with the family – the wife loves them, the kids eat them and the mother in law declared them ‘the best beans I’d ever eaten‘! So will definitely be growing them again next year. Sadly never around long enough to get any photos! I can’t help but wonder how well they would have done if it wasn’t for all the floods.

My pumpkin plants seem to be dying so I picked the two pumpkins that looked ready. I’m hoping they are packed full of flavour given the size of them…

There are a couple more pumpkins left on the plants which still seem to be surviving so will leave them and see what happens. At least the two that have been picked are the perfect size for two small children to carve and carry around come Halloween ;>)

Red Onion Marmalade
Since I wasn’t able to get down to the plot very much in the previous month, I thought I’d look at using up some of the onions in the kitchen. After some searching – well very little really it was the first one listed on Google! – chose the recipe from BBC Good Food Magazine. It tastes pretty good (he says modestly!) but thought it might be a bit stickier.

Next up on the preserving is spiced apple chutney (from one of Nigella Lawson’s books). My grandad has lots of apple trees we raid at this time of year, Mum and Dad are never going to eat the chillies on the chilli plant I gave to them to look after, and we’ve still got plenty of onions.

Bulbs
Have bought some more tulip and daffodil bulbs to plant down the allotment. They were a real incentive to keep going when not much else was happening this spring. And hopefully this time I’ll make it down to pick some of them to bring home. Next week the whole family will also be planting daffodils for my grandmother who passed away last week. She loved her garden and we’re scattering her ashes round one of the trees in sight of the house and then planting a bulb each.