Taking shape

A lovely allotment evening

First pumpkin of the season - a little small but perferctly formed

Spade-meister working in straight stripes

Soil Karma

Clearing for the re-moved rhubarb. Also got the black eyed beans and chillies in here

Butternut now in flower and first fruit showing. Lots of flowers so hopefully we'll get a good crop!

Entries from Anda - 19th to 26th July (Recovered from a slight SNAFU on the blog posting!)

From Anda:
19 July, 2010
We have taken up more of the carpets, put down to keep the weeds down, leaving a section behind by the compost heaps for turning. Every time I go I work on the new bindweed which has come up since I was last there, and it is taking less and less time to clear the cleared places! John dug up the old peas to put them on the compost, an we planted Midgey's cucumber plant and an eggplant plant in the same bed, pretty far apart!

We planted out a a number of chili plants, several different varieties, and I sprinkled marigold seeds in among the peppers. There is a small bed with planks around it, and we planted a 2nd crop of peas. We did considerable weeding during this session.

23rd July, 2010:
We had left a sizeable bed open to the elements for a week or so after the carpet had been removed, and the during the 2nd session John dug the area up, manfully and steadily going down a full forkful and breaking up the large chunks of very tightly packed soil. This summer has been very hot and every time we went up we needed to water the plants. The peas had come up beautifully, no marigolds, and the peppers were fine. We borrow Nick's hose - thank you very much NIck - but it did not reach to the far corner of Andrew's allotment. We found a black hose neatly permed onto a couple of simbis protruding from the edge of the implement box, and John unwound it and spread it out on the grass to melt back straight. It had not cracked or perished, so he took the fitting off the one end so he could match it. We left with potatoes & onions, only digging up a few because we feel it is better to take what is needed and leave the rest to stay fresh in the ground. If we don't eat quickly enough we may have to change this policy! We left the carrots on purpose, as we had more than enough - Maureen was in exactly the same boat.
Courgettes doing terribly well and producing marrows when you turn your back. I trimmed the old stems out of the raspberry plants. The ones with the yellow leaves.


July 26th 2010:
We had left the turned diggings to breathe. WE have the odd spots of drizzle and drops, absolutely nothing penetrating or worthy of being called good rain. On the way to the allotment we bought one bag of manure, one hose fitting, some blood organic fertiliser, and a whole lot of worm juice with us. This time John tackled the compost heaps. THe first one was still far too new to be of use, and he left it. The 2nd one has produced a lot of compost, and still has more in it. We put the manure down on the raspberry plant bed and then covered it all with compost. And watered the whole bed with the extension of Nick's hosepipe. Works a treat. AFter that John put a lot of compost on the newly dug bed and we watered that too.

The peas are growing apace. I put some worm wee on them, also on the peppers and tomatoes (tied up because they were falling about) .

Maureen came up to hopefully pick some blackberries, but there were only a few that were black and they were pretty sharp - you know - turn the mouth into a spot and all the face lines come out of it - but there is a huge crop and when they ripen properly there will be lots of Jam. Maureen picked the beans, watered and Cathy came up and suggested that three workers on Andrew's allotment wasn't fair!!!

When he had finished, John dug up another bed at the top of the allotment along the path which borders with Des. More weeding and general splashing and tidying.

Photos from the last week

The Yellow Cherries that make a beautiful almond flavoured jam

Anda picking the yellow cherries for more jam making.



Peas, purple sprouting and potatoes
Sunfloweres, butternuts, pumpkins and courgettes.

Andrew has invited John and Anda to "allot" with him, and we are delighted to accept! The prospect of having super-fresh produce is worth diamonds. So we are now learning how to grow gardens English style. Mind you, with this hot summer, it is no different from the Tsitsikamma. ANd the "lawn" at the Matchbox (our house) looks exactly like a Transvaal winter garden. The only difference is that we are used to having our own necessary water on tap, and not one tap for umpteen allotments!

This is a first attempt to post something to the blog site. Tomorrow I will take photographs and see if I can post them too.

Picture of Allotment Garden Party

More help with the plot - Mom & Dad have arrived!

Mom has asked me to post this as she has not been able to set up as an author for the site yet. I'm sure the allotment and the site will benefit greatly from this injection of care, attention and labour! Great to have you with us Mom & Dad!

July 6, 2010. John and I pottered down to the allotment in the early-ish evening, coolish and cloudy, a blessing as we have been so very hot and dry. Everything is struggling. John set to to clean round the old strawberry bed, which is raised by planks. I started to take the bindweed and other weeds out of the raspberries which are putting all their energy into getting their fruit to seed stage. John prefers weeding with the soil dry, but I found I had to be careful not to disturb the raspberry roots - so John got the water and then it went easier. ANd the raspberries enjoyed the water. I also picked and ate three gooseberries on the plant away from the general goosegogs, and very sweet and juicy they were too. The black currants and gooseberries are really good this year.

We cleared the strawberry bed a few days ago, and I have taken some of the old strawberries and soaked them in water, hopefully to find a few still alive and able to regenerate. They are now soaked in small pots. I also raised a whole lot of shallots, and they are busy being pickled even as we speak. There will be three big bottles of them, mildly pickled because of young sensitive tastebuds.


The peas,purple broccoli beans and chili plants are going a treat. Spinach has shot (too much heat and dry again) the bush beans are flowering, we have picked one golden beetroot and we are waiting for ANdrew to give his verdict, the courgettes are doing VERY well, looking very pretty with their huge leaves, yellow squiggly flowers and bouncing baby marrows.

John thinks the potatoes are maybe ready for lifting.

I am going to ask Andrew for a Sunflower to take to my botanical drawing course.

Picking started

Got a bag full of black currants and gooseberries today (thanks Mom & Dad for the hours of picking). Also lifted the shallots and onions. Broadbeans already finished - suffered from blackfly. Beetroot, peas and carrots ready for picking too. Looking forward to trying the Golden Beetroot. Going to have to start jamming soon. Still not lifted any potatoes.

Beds update - Courgettes, Rhubarb, Beetroot, Onions & Carrots but no Parsnips :-(

New Coourgettes from Danny planted out last weekend (dead runner beans in the foreground - the cold snap 10 days ago got them along with all the damage to the potatoes)


These are the rhubard heads from the one that I split in Feb and moved to this side of the allotment. Have not picked them at all yet, I thought I'd let them settle in and allow the leaf to feed the root ball for a while.

Bed 1 - no parsnips have come up but beetroot and shallots doing well. Have seeded extra golden detroit beetroot into the lines where the parsnip has not come through.


Onions, shallots and carrots doing well too.

Soft fruit progress - Goosseberrys and Strawberries

Strawberries

Young gooseberriy fruit

Broad Beans getting eaten by something.....

Don't know what is hammering my broad beans. Leaf damage looks like bird pecks, but there are holes in the middle of the leaf as well. Insects of some sort? I can't find anything on the leaves that appear to be the culprits??? Help!

Frost Damage, Planting Runners too early

Frost last week has damaged the growth on all the potatoes. We've pruned the brown leaves and hoping that there is enough green underneath to all the plants to carry on growing. Have also re-seeded rows of beetroot where the plants have not shown yet.


Also planted out a couple of courgette plants, four cauliflowers and the rest of the peas today. Ran the strimmer around the plot - huge number of dandilion heads shedding seeds all over the plot :-(


I scrumped some pea sticks from the hedgerow along the side of the allotment where the hawthorn had been cut back and some dead branches were perfect for building up a climbing frame for the young peas. Thankfully the peas planted out to the allotment early have not been too damaged by the cold.


Also planted two of the pumpkins plants out - these were germinated from seeds I took from the haloween pumpkin that the we hollowed out for the kids to put at the front door. Have planted these to ramble between the gooseberry and blackcurrents. The runner beans planted out 10 days ago are all dead. The allotment must be alot colder.


Progress in the other beds - gold beetroot is not germinateing as quickly as the red so have planted extra seed between sprouts.

Having to remove a number of smal spud plants that are sprouting amongst the carrots and onions.

Spinach is coming on well. Pasnips have been decidedly unsucessful. None of the seeds planted have germinated. Must read up a little more on what parsnips need. (spot the hedge bindweed popping up all over the place!)

Purple Sprouting, Peas, Runner Beans, Beetroot and Comfrey

Planted out a Comfrey which will be used for green manure whne it is big enough.



Birds have been pecking the young broad bean leaf, stunting their growth so I've tied lines with old CDs across the bed and tied a supermarket bag which should hopefully make it a slightly less chilled restaurant for the local pigeons!


Planted out the purple sprouting brocolli today and created a net frame around it. Done with old plumbing pipes and electrical cable ties - a magnificent invention and so much easier than fiddling with string. Also pushed the soil up on the first early potatoes. First lot of peas also planted out and netted.


Planted and polled the first of the French Runner Beans. Hopefully these will survive
the birds and slugs, but I will be planting more out expecting to lose some of these.


The net frame and runner beans from the front of the allotment.


I dont think the seeds hav sprouted on this side of the box bed so I have planted out some more Golden Detroit Beetroot at this end. The beetroot at the other end of the bed has started sprouting as have some parsnips. Carrots in the middle beds are also showing, onions and shalots are doing very well.

Late posting - Frost damage to Potatoes and Seedlings

Had a problem getting the photo's off the blackberry and a lack of time to fix it meant that I did not post these pictures when they were taken. The early potatoes that I planted out in the first bed got hit by some frost damage - which surprised me because I did not think that we'd had any serious frost - perhaps the allotment is colder than our garden at home? These pictures were taken 10 days ago and thankfully the plants have recovered. At first I thought it might be blight from poor quality seed potatoes but thankfully it isn't.



Seedlings update
Planted out 8 tomato plants into grow-bags under the kitchen window 2 evenings ago. These are now about 3 -4 inches high and have had to be tethered to canes. Last time I grew tomoatoes I did not support the plants and they rambled all over the place. All the other plants have been potted into medium sized pots. Will have to give some of these away and will plant some out on the allotment.

Most things have sprouted well. Butternut seeds harvested from a supermarket bought plant have sprouted, as have the Halloween pumpkin seeds. Not sure where I am going to plant these out. The potato seedlings (planted from seed harvested from fruit 2 seasons back has taken extremely well. I've decided to pot these into small tubs and grow them at home so I can keep an eye on them - the plan is to harvest the first tubers for planting next season. I have also planted out the extra seedlings in a hidden patch in a garden flowerbed. Quite excited about these.

Runner and Black Eyed Beans are also progessing well, although have lost a couple of plants to a blasted snail that got amongst them - ate through a Runner bean stem and stripped the first leaf off a Black Eyed bean plant. The Italian beans from Nick have not sprouted (yet). Some have rotted in the pot, but when clearing these out I found a few that looked like they were about the sprout so I apologetically pressed these back into their soil.

Chilli plants have sprouted at last - these were kept inside on the kitchen windowsill and took over 2 weeks to germinate - thought I have used a poor potting compost or the seeds were old but at last we have the little elf-like sprouts lifting their backs through the soil and lifting their slender arms to the light. Have habenero and cayenne so should not be short of a little HOT to add to dishes.

The tray of purple sprouting MUST be planted out this weekend - otherwise I will lose it in the tray. Only one line of the lettuce seeds that I planted in the window box has sprouted so may replant another type this weekend.

Only work on the allotment last weekend was to weed, weed and weed. The Bindweed has gone crazy around the raspberries as I have not turned that soil for 2 seasons.

Update picture of progress of Broad Beans taken 19/04/2010

Beans, beans and potatoes

Managed a good three hour session on the plot on Saturday. Continued clearing the bind-weed root from the soil below the old manure pile, dug a manure trench for the runner beans and turned and bedded up a section of the bean bed ready for planting the peas and black eyed beans which are coming along fantastically well in the pots at home.

The first broad beans have also started well - about an inch of growth from the first set that I planted and the second lot is now pushing through. I also could not resist planting the empty bed that I had set aside for purple sprouting. I have put french dwarf beans in instead. Will have to work out where to put the brocolli when its ready. (Note the good successional planning going on here!)

First of the early potatoes are also now pushing leaf through and the seedlings that I harvested two years ago from fruit that the potatoes produced is going great guns. I am considering planting these out into grow bags and not harvesting them in the first season - and then chitting and planting out next season as I am not sure how much they will yield in the first year.

I've also planted out Cosmos flowers in the flower corner of the allotment - Imogen and Amelie helped with these. I've also put chilli and parsely out in the seed trays - bally slugs have had a go at the purple sprouting and savoy cabbage - I think I've all but lost the savoy cabbage :-(

Broad beans - early growth


The manure bed and trench for beans and peas.


French dwarf beans planted in bed 6.

Dandelion roots & Rasberries

Spent a few hours weeding the rest of the raspberries this afternoon. Was amazed at how deep the dendelion tap roots were - because the raspberry canes are too close together to use a small garden fork, I had to use a hand fork which made it bloody difficult to get the longer tap roots out. I can only assume that these plants put these roots down late last summer - there is now way that these roots could have grown through the winter we've just had???

Finger tips are sore from lifting the claggy couch grass but at last finished weeding the raspberries.

Seedlings

Set up a planting rack on in the sun-trap near the back door this afternoon. Have planted quite a lot out today:

1. Second tranche of peas to follow those set out 2 weeks ago - in small pots
2. Black eyed beans - these were left over sprouts that we past their best for eating so I popped a few into some small pots to see if they grow. I have no idea whether they are a climber or ground bean. Will have to wiki it.
3. French Runners - first crop. Planted into bigger pots so I can delay planting these out if we get late frosts
4. African Marigolds - two tub trays with 2 seeds in each. These will be to plant amongst the legumes to hold back the snails and slugs, I also have some French Marigolds which will need planting out later.
5. Livingstone mixed Daisy - in a tray, these will add some summer colour to the allotment
6. Italian Beans (from N-PG - need to remember to ask him to check the pack as not Bortolli as I have written on the envelope)
7. Butternut - these seeds were harvested from a supermarket fruit. I dug the seeds out, washed them and then dried them laid out flat on a plate. Then popped them in an envelope.
8. Pumpkin - these seeds were also taken from a supermarket plant- harvested after halloween. I'm going to see if I can plant them on the compost heap.

Good Friday Potatoes

I've been told that it is tradition to plant your main crop potatoes on Good Firday - I have done that. Planted these today - going left to right:
King Edward
Kerrs Pink
Cara

Broad beans are sprouting now, showing first through which is great. Garlic is about 1 inch now and some onion leaf is showing.

Seedlings & Rhubarb

Took the tomoato seed trays indoors last night as a frost was likely. Peas, poptato seedlings and thyme are on a outdoor shelf about 3 feet off the ground so unlikely to get burnt by the forst. Propagator lids removed from Savoy Cabbage and Summer sprouting Brocolli seedlings three days ago.

Rhubard starting nicely too. Took out the large crown in Feb (it was about the size of a large wheelbarrow tub!) and split it into three and moved it to the other side of the plot - dug them into manure and fed the one plant that I did not move. Gave Mandy and Stu one quarter of the crown as had too much.

Weeds

Weeds that deserve special mention:

Nipplewort
Redshank
Creeping Buttercup

Stinkhorn Fungus (Phallus impudicus) See comment