[VickyR]

Hi

Unfortunately my allotment is in a different city to my work  :cry:
after two years of commuting I am resigned to weekend only allotmenting with occasional week day afternoons and time off    There are currently no allotments available where I work and as we reclaimed our plot from scratch I am quite attached to it!

Having mulched, does anyone have further advice about how to prevent total veg melt down?  Unfortunately my allotment friends are rather busy at the moment with ill family members so none of us can guarantee to regularly water for each other.

Can anyone with more experience tell me which crops I should be concentrating my efforts on?  I've abandoned tomatoes/courgettes/lettuces for this year on the plot.
When it gets a little hotter I will be commuting back in the week to give the fruit bushes a good soak.

[DD.]

I think we worry too much at times about watering. If we water too much, it discourages roots from putting down depth. They just hang about on top where the water is.

Remember the record hot August a few years back? We went away for 2 weeks, no one watered and we came back to enormous marrows and nothing dead. The potato crop that year was fine also.

There were things that may have benefited from a drop of water, such as the salady stuff, but these were fine anyway.

And I have NEVER watered my fruit bushes.

DD

[VickyR]

Thanks DD... this has inspired me to put some courgettes in then to see what will happen.  Perhaps I am a bit soft on my goosie bushes as well! :oops:

Thanks for the advice
Vicky

[muntjac]

you can use the plastic soda bottle method of watering .fill 2 litre pop bottles with watewr .tighten the tops till they just have a very slow drip /now put them down on the plants near to the stems and leave them the weather will do the rest with high and low pressure they will drip on for a few days

[DD.]

Thanks DD... this has inspired me to put some courgettes in then to see what will happen.  Perhaps I am a bit soft on my goosie bushes as well! :oops:

Thanks for the advice
Vicky

Your problem with courgettes is that if you leave them for a week, you'll have marrows!

[little sweetpeas]

fill 2 litre pop bottles with watewr .tighten the tops till they just have a very slow drip /now put them down on the plants near to the stems

Sorry if this is a stupid question but do you mean stick them in the soil upside down?

I've been tempted to buy a couple of watering wizards which you stick in a bottle and then into the soil but your idea sounds the same.

[WG.]

Sorry if this is a stupid question but do you mean stick them in the soil upside down?

Yes, upside down

[little sweetpeas]

Thanks WG

I've got a 3 litre squash bottle, do i just unsrew the cap a little and do i need to put in holes in the cap or that make the water come out too quickly.

[little sweetpeas]

I've got it - such a great idea, thanks muntjac

Bottle now upside down in garden with three children sat watching it.

[frazzy]

fantastic idea go go munty

[WG.]

You might also want to put some gravel in it so that it doesn't blow away when empty.

[wellingtons]

... that weekend only watering is perfectly fine and that your problem is going to be keeping up with the picking ...  

Soaking your allotment once a week or on a Friday night and Sunday night (so twice a week) should keep pretty much everything going other than shallow rooted salad crops.  To be honest even in the hottest weather I only water my plot twice a week anyway.

The leaky bottle trick is a great idea.  I also make indentations around my veggies, so that when I water, all the water goes to that particular plant rather than the surrounding weeds.  And this method is perfect for courgettes.  Build up a little hummock and plant them in an indentation in the top ... perfick!

[Trillium]

I was just going to suggest Welly's tip about building little walls of dirt around each plant to catch and hold any water or rainfall so it directs it where needed. Otherwise, don't get too worried about watering too often. Gardeners tend to baby their plants a bit too much.

[Aunt Sally]

I was just going to suggest Welly's tip about building little walls of dirt around each plant to catch and hold any water or rainfall so it directs it where needed.

That's what we do with thirsty plants.  We've always called it a "bund"

[VickyR]

fantastic!  Lots of stuff to keep me busy this weekend then - thanks everyone.  Next problem is "visitors" looking to nick equipment/plants etc, apparently they were decent enough to visit my plot yesterday according to my neighbours. Once water retaining measures sorted I'll get onto the pests of the human variety with spiky plants, manure and Indiana Jones style traps!   Thanks again

Vic