Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Growing => Grow Your Own => Topic started by: JayG on January 01, 2020, 12:50
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Happy New Year - 1st January, suspect not too much hard work being done today! ;)
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Finished prepping a bed ready to plant out new raspberry canes tomorrow hopefully.
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Greenhouse cleaning at home.
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Sussed out where to plant my aquadolce broad beans. Now I have to clear that bed up and then plant 'em.
Then it's digging out the bindweed and couch roots in the other beds and manuring. The plot is at last drying out a bit.
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Took some kitchen waste down to the compost heap and shovelled a couple more barrow loads of woodchips onto the paths. Should have done a bit more than that really, but I had a fairly late night last night and didn't feel particularly energetic!
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Made a dozen soil blocks to warm up in the propagator to sow some Californian Reaper chilies.
I planted out those raspberries yesterday and they had some lovely root growth after being healed into a large pot for around a month or two :).
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Dug out and leveled a piece of inclined ground that has just been left to grow wild for the insects. Transported the soil up to my dump spot, gathered the worms that had come out to play and gave them a new home in my compost bin. Washed out the last of my containers and stored them away, same with my little slug beer traps. Started washing down one side of my greenhouse and cleaned the guttering out. Got hungry and gave up.
Oh no, by typing this, I just realized I might have left my phone on top of a fence post. Hope nobody's died or anything! :nowink:
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On the 2nd trip to ‘do’ the chickens today I did a bit of clearing up, about 4 ft of the brassica cage whilst I’d opened it up to harvest some sprouts, then I moved over to the front flower border & finished clearing the last of the chrysanthemu stems & gladioli, a tiny bit of weeding was required but the very deep mulch of chippings I added last spring had really kept the weeds at bay. Hope we get some more delivered by the council this year.
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Collected six bags of seaweed and mulched half a bed with it. Harvested some leeks and parsnips.
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Husband's started with the removal of soil from the dead bed and found out we need to fix or re felt the roof and a gutter. We've got some manure which he's dropped off.
We didn't go for the oldest stuff as it was way off. but the stuff we got had no horse lumps. So while there is some wood chips left but they squashy so we think it's rotted enough. Also there was grass growing on in and it was filled with worms. Husband dug out one shovel and there was more worms in it than in everything we dug last year so the worm bounty has been lifted. Between the 2 plots we dug over one entire plot and saw 7 or 8 worms and they were scrawny and a bit pathetic. These were big sods and several were huge, one big proper Daddy of a worm bigger than all the plot worms together.
I'm getting enthused about worms :ohmy:. This is not where I thought my life would lead me. But I was expecting to be a greying mad cat lady spinster.
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Collected some potting soil from my allotment, I'm going to try growing some onions from seeds this year.
I'm told there more stronger.
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I can't dig so Husband and I had a flail around in some horse manure to get 2.5 barrow loads in the boot. Then he took it up to the plot and dug out of the contaminated dead bed; 4 barrow loads, that's 7 in total. He reckons there's another 10 to do. He thinks he's done 2/3s of the top level. He'll take out 2x spade depths. But it's claggy so it's pretty wet. When it's wet it's like grainy course poorly mixed cement but darker. It's not clay and the local survey says it's alluvial silt.
With narry a worm, beasty or anything alive in the lot. To quote him "Nothing has crawled away from me, nothing has squirmed, I'm sure there's bacteria but there's nothing I can see in that soil. it might as well be moon rock. Apart from the couch grass".
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I got my husband to clean out the bird boxes and turn the compost heap while I had a cup of tea in the dry :lol:
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Washed out the last of my pots and containers, sat down half way up the garden with a cup of tea, and wondered how I could ever get crows to visit when the magpies seem to be owning the trees over the back fence. Hmm...
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Husband (with my company) got 4 boot loads of horse manure to the allotment this week. He's taken out about 10 loads of soil. He's excavating to find out what was buried in there.
if it wasn't freezing I'd have told him to put half a load onto the garden. But I'm worried the temperature (2C) will kill the worms.
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Put a nice bit of compost onto the bed where the garlic is going to be transplanted to soon and then foolishly turned the heap. Bit sore from that, nice hot bath shortly!
The good news is that most of the heap is usuable compost now so over the next few weeks I'll get it out onto the beds.
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We've got a shovel and some trugs coming in the post maybe arriving today so Husband can fill buckets with the stable manure and then tip them into the trugs in the boot. Drive to the allotment then empty them into the wheelbarrow at the plot. We might be able to do 2 runs in a morning rather than the 1 we are doing. Quicker than filling small bags that can be easily carried. It's less than an hour for him to fill the boot in our current inefficient manner.
Ugh me for not having the confidence to ask will they move it if we pay them.
I hope the council gets back to us, do they need samples or we need to dispose of the contaminated soil especially?
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A pile of soil conditioner and wood ash added a couple of days ago before this rain arrived!
Its a start.
Cheers
Aled
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Raked the soil, added to compost and moved the shed.
Finished prepping a bed ready to plant out new raspberry canes tomorrow hopefully.
This is what I've been waiting to do but my usual go-to, one-man-band nursery has been closed every time I've turned up. So I carried on to the local garden centre and got scared by the price of their canes so didn't buy.
For comparison when I've asked him previously how much for raspberry canes he's said £3 for a bundle of 4 which is very fair - going to the garden centre and they're £15 for pot grown (or bare root stuffed in a pot probably)!
So no fruit canes in my soon to be fruit patch yet even though now would be a great time for planting bare root ones.
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Collected three bags of seaweed and used one to mulch around the garlic. I also harvested leeks and parsnips and weeded out some couch grass. OH had a walk around the plot and supervised the kids on the trampoline.
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Yesterday, collected another boot of manure. Dug our plants out of the reallocated plot and heeled them into the replacement. Rounded up the bamboo canes and chicken wire also. Then put the dangerous rusty tools back in their shed. We still have the rusty broken saw to get out of the corner of our shed.
Today due to wind we're digging out a scalped gooseberry so they don't accuse of injuring them when they trip over it, retrieving more plants and then moving to the side the boards and random flag stones we were using as border edging and paths amongst the weeds and hidden hazards. Yes, the plot was a bit of a hazard. Hazards like posts with nails, grass /nettle/fireweed hidden boards/ flags/ broken tiles/rusty tools/sticks/ wire and bricks etc. A relative of the plot neglecters was in the building trade and dumped stuff in random places and plants grew over them. If I've time the two black berries will go in side by side on the top plot.
Hours later I have realised I forgot to post this, so update.
We got the gooseberry and rest of our plants out and heeled in. Bright spark here forgot the ribosomal powder and fruit feed so the big gooseberry and friends from having limbs buried are just heeled in. Fork is now on it's way out. The pair of Karaka Blacks didn't make it in, but we've figured out where to place them. Looking over the plot we've decided where to put them so that's an asap job. Tomorrow the Jostaberry is going to live with Youngest's teacher so that's one less to plant. Most of the boards were lifted, rusty saw in their shed, just the tiles left. The second composter is out of the garage and up to the allotment but it's in our locked shed until we get the top plot weeded enough to get a heap to hold it in place.
We checked on the rotavator and spotted that the thief broke their trug so I hope we don't get blamed for it.
The plot plants like the gooseberries will go into the top part of the bottom plot with a lot of manure and the bought ones, in the newest plot.
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Run the hoe through the mulch as the weeds are growing! And started to clear around the fruit bushes.
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Dumped a couple of loads of compost onto one of the beds and then dug up my feeble parsnips. They've run deep but are very narrow shouldered.
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Four bags of seaweed collected and spread.
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Pruned the autumn raspberries, chopped them into manageable pieces & put in the wheelbarrow to bring home tomorrow for shredding,weeded part of the bed that wasn’t frozen, harvested parsnips & leeks, cleared up some sunflower stems that were still standing, they’ll get chopped into transportable pieces to bring home to be shredded.
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Added some more kitchen waste to the compost heap, then sprog and I decided it was for too cold to do anything and we went home. The ground was still frozen at 3pm on our site.
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Got the Glen Lyon aka 1/3 of the bare root raspberries planted in a new made but unfinished bed. That is 3 sides 1.9m wide, 2.4m long with planks in, the grass removed and Growmore, remin and manure forked in. The ribosomal powder was just put in the holes with the plants. It was previously a potato bed and had been recently forked over so we got loads done. We also got loads of little potatoes out of it. It's amazing the difference between the soil in the two plots. I think Husband quite liked being able to make such fast progress.
Border is 1.9 wide and so far 2.4m long, the open end will be extended over the next week to 7.5m approx-planks dependant, we'll put the end on the bed once all the varieties are planted. Doing a variety at a time in alphabetical order. So from bottom-top Lyon, Erika (4x pots), Doll and Ample. 10x of each.
Karaka Black, still not been planted.
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Yesterday was another 2 hours of clearing up last years debris, it’s starting to look a lot better already. I trundled the barrow Home ready to shred the prunings & return to the compost bins, plus I contacted the manure lady & ordered some bags of well rotted, for the beds & some fresh to add to the bins.
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plus I contacted the manure lady
I need a manure lady!
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Today was a manure run with subsequent dump of it on the raspberry bed. There was a bit of a bed extension -1 board put in and more boards measured to go in. But no plants put in. Time constraints.
Tomorrow.... Erika and maybe Glen Doll since we do have quite a bit of manure there.
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In the garden I shredded the trundled wheel barrow load of prunings from the allotment plus the Christmas tree, then trundled it all to the plot, picked some veg for dinner, came home to make the dinner before going back to refill the wheel barrow with more prunings & trundling it back to shred tomorrow & repeat :lol:
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plus I contacted the manure lady
I need a manure lady!
:lol: :lol: she has stables with race horses 10 minutes from my house! :)
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Took a couple of bottles of warm water to the plot, mixed them in a bucket with some Jeyes fluid and scrubbed the outside of the polytunnel which is a bit manky. We don't have the water activated until March so I couldn't rinse it down today, but at least some of the gunk is off it for now.
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We planted a further 14 of the raspberries, so that's 2 more varieties planted. 4x Erika and 10x Glen Doll. Total of 24 planted and just 10x bare root plants of one left variety now.
We got the bed extended but only half as far as the plants go which is a bit of a cheat. The bed is totally dug over and edged for 4 pairs of plants. The remaining 3 pairs have a strip where they'll be dug and manured.
So tomorrow we'll edge the end, do the middle of the bed and hopefully finish it all off. So that includes planting the last 10 plants.
Forgot to add remin, will do that tomorrow.
Friday will be probably doing the middle of the bed, planting the Honeyberries and heeled in gooseberries.
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An hour at home shredding yesterday’s prunings, then a bit of pruning in the garden, but it was too damp to shred it, then trundled the shreddings to the plot & added them to the compost bin. Then I dug out 4 barrow loads of finished compos5 & mulched the asparagus bed. ‘ Did ‘ the chickens & cam3 Home to put my tools away, to be spotted by our little grandson coming back from the shed, shouting “Nee,nee (granny) & waving madly at my through the lounge window . What a welcome home :lol:
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Nothing in yesterday but got that bed almost done.
Today got the raspberries finished. So that's all 34 planted. The part of the raspberry bed we wanted to do is finished except the middle strip which we'll dig out and feed for peas in the summer. We have to prioritise and putting plants is comes first.
Then we got the Honeyberries in. Turns out one of the 5 was 2 plants severely intertwined. I got some of the blackcurrants, but not the blackberry pruned.
Hurrah us. I am so sore and actually I'm about wrecked. 2 hours until co-codamol time.
So what to do now, we have loads of cuttings and heeled in Gooseberries and Strawberries. The kids will have to lump it and come up with us for an hour while we put them, in all their spikey glory at the back of the plot.
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Today the kids made a huge muddy puddle and two muddy puddle children. There was potatoes involved and a lot of playing hunt the 'tayto and loss of wellies. They also helped us plant 6 gooseberries in the bottom plot, in the top plot 2 Jostaberries, 1 karaka black blackberry, 3 pink currants, 1 red currant and 1x maybe black currant. oh and 3 strawberries.
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Scrounged some free wood from Facebook Marketplace.
Collected and spread three bags of seaweed.
Harvested parsnips and leeks.
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Sowed Carolina Reaper chilies.
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Dropped off some more offerings to the compost Gods. I was just preparing to plant out the pot raised garlic when the heavens opened and as I'd travelled with no coat I decided to head home. Sod's law as I got out of the car the rain stopped for the day :mad:
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Yesterday we planted Chester in a pot in the garden.
Today we dug in one post and reinforced another post which was being held in place by the wire. There wasn't any actual contact between it and the ground so we put in a new one which we'll zip tie in place tomorrow. Zip ties are in my pocket. We then dug 6x 1.5 foot square, 2 feet deep holes for the rhubarb with plenty of manure and some Growmore. We cleared all the grass from in between. We found strawberries and planted amongst the raspberries. We should chuck them.
3 gooseberries planted in the bottom plot. One maybe dead. We weren't sure.
Tomorrow we'll plant those crowns and repeat at the back for the gooseberries.
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Today we planted the rhubarb in the holes we prepared yesterday.
I put the zip ties in my pocket yesterday so the post we buried was attached to the post that is attached to the chicken wire so it doesn't knock the other one over.
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Today we planted 3 potted gooseberries, 1 gooseberry cutting, covered some partially dug ground that's a mat of grass roots over with black plastic. Found some chicken wire closhes.
We got the biggest and most thorny on in. Right in front of the thornless gooseberry. It was a cutting from the weed covered gooseberry so it's fan shaped and all the buds point in one direction. So we're treating it like an espalier. Genius.
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Today we planted
Potted plants
1x Hinnonmaki green
1x Hinnonmaki red
Cuttings
4x Worcesterberries. I trimmed the bottom since they hadn't rooted so it has fresh wood to start from. I'll get more cuttings so we can fill the back.
Moved
The pax espalier so it wasn't in the middle of the Worcesterberries.
Cut a buried branch off the Pax/Captivator -the almost thornless plant we took out of the other plot. It has a big root system and should get started asap now it's not 2 inches from it's parent.
Got home, new fork arrived within an hour. Hurrah!
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Today we got in the 3 Junnifer red currants and a Ben Lomond black currant cutting that I took last year and has rooted nicely. Husband tried his new fork out and loves it. The long handle helps a lot. The sod was full of those long, tough grass roots. Monday if it's not raining we'll cover the area with the fruit canes with cardboard and put sod on top of it. Hopefully kill the grass off. We've a box mountain that's 6 foot tall.
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Pruned the vines, berries, apple tree and pear tree.
I also got a letter from the council stating I need to, 'remove the children's play equipment or further action will be taken.' :mad:
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Made a replacement shed door yesterday, planted some blackthorn hedge this afternoon to form another natural border. Lots of jobs to be done.
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Finally got the garlic out of their pots and into the ground.
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Finally transported the shreddings from our sons new garden to the allotment,plus the water butt he doesn’t want. Tipped it all out into the big open pile until I get the compost bins turned & sorted, then it will all go in the 5 bins when I get some fresh manure to get it started. Cleaned out & fed the chickens, then barrowed 3 loads of finished compost onto the rhubarb bed.
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Turned a bit of compost, tidied the fruit bushes and did some strimming :ohmy:.
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Today we extended the bed by 2x2 meters and are 1 plant away from linking up with the Honeyberries.
Put cardboard and manure around some of the gooseberries and
Planted
2 redcurrant cuttings
one blackcurrant cutting I took last year with a nice rootball that was camping out with the raspberries.
Moved and planted a very sad 5 years old blackcurrant that failed to thrive in the bottom plot
We brought our kitchen scraps up and hid under all the grass in the compost heap.
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Dug over a bit of bed, edged more path with wood and got the garlic in. The ground isn't ideal, but it's better than it was and they definitely won't grow in my rucksack so I've given them a bit of a chance.
I then stared at my shed a bit and wondered how Instagram allotmenteers have such lovely sheds.
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I then stared at my shed a bit and wondered how Instagram allotmenteers have such lovely sheds.
I'm pretty sure it's because they don't actually do any gardening as well as owning said sheds! :)
I spent some time looking at potting shed ideas (some on instagram) before realising that none of them would last 5 minutes in the gale currently blowing out there! So I looked at seed catalogues instead.
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Spent a couple of happy hours in the sunshine, some of it was spent weeding part of the strawberry bed, some chatting & some cleaning the chickens out, all of it was thoroughly enjoyed even though it was cold.
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Lifted out out the salsify and bunged them in the compost. They're tasty enough, but they're a pain to dig out and prepare. Covered another bed a with a few barrowfulls of compost.
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We are 1.5m square off of having finished behind the blackcurrants-the established row.
All the spiky Worcesterberries along the back fence are in. Alternating with Jostaberries, to keep things out and wind break above the spikes.
The gooseberry row in front of the fence was taken to the back right with 2 gooseberries and an blackcurrant cutting planted in there. The back left needs 1.5m square dug out. The gooseberrry in the bottom plot had hardly any rootball for a 5 year old plant. Again not enough roots to fill a 2L pot. Cardboard and manure and that section is finished.
One more redcurrant in the redcurrant row and black currant cutting. My side twinged and I snapped a bit off a damaged black currant so we stuck it in beside a gooseberry. It was damaged already, you could see the rotted bit. 1.25m square in the redcurrant needs done before that pair of rows are done.
I really need to put up a photograph. Our little birdy friend wasn't about, the larks were silent. We realise why when the cat caught a mouse and wandered by with it.
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There are instagram sheds? I wonder where I can buy one of those...
Not strictly speaking on the plot, but in the garden at least. I think I have finally managed to pen the chickens so they stay in their half, and started tidying up spare pots and so on ready for getting things sown. Got the trays out To wash for chitting potatoes, which I’ll do later on and put an early sowing of carrots and salad in the bottom of the mini greenhouses (largely because they blow over if there is nothing heavy in them to hold them down, but you never know, they might grow)
Ordered compost, but none to be had for a month, so will need to see if I can find another bulk supplier.
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Dug the last part of the gooseberry area. Put in 2 gooseberry cuttings I found in pots in the garden. They have a while to put out roots before I trim the bottom-one looked like it had tiny brown hairs so it could be roots. We did the last of the redcurrant area but didn't put anything in, too cramped. Started on the final strip.
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A beautiful day today, after a very cold start. Couldn’t get up to the plot, as I had the electrician in, but I did sneak out to the garden and do a bit of tidying up in the sunshine. Need to get some wood-preserver in for the old bookshelves which are soon-to-be raised beds tomorrow.
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I went to go to the plot but first knocked on the lady's door who owns the garden and ended up sitting and having a chat for an hour and half!
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What a surprise nobody been working down at their plot today - perhaps tomorrow to check on damage!
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Got to the plot, stepped out of the car, the heavens opened. Checked the polytunnel was intact and then fled home!
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Moved one of my chopped water barrel containers to a better location and then sowed up some broad beans in pots in the tunnel.
The variety were Syrian Black broad beans provided in the 2018 seed circle by Whitehill, so I'll shamelessly take this opportunity to plug this years seed circle, link below come and join the Dark Side! :D
https://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=131650.0
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Turned the heap, bit of tidying and sowed some more broad beans in loo rolls.
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5 rows of peas went in today straight into the ground, with the kids doing around half of them - their first visit this year! So around 300 peas on, 200 Early Onward (never tried before) and 100 or so unknown Spanish ones I've had I think for 3-4 years now. I soaked them all last night, all the Early Onward (fresh seeds) sunk to the bottom, my spanish ones about 1/3 flotated with the rest sinking. I was going to do an experiment and sow the row half and half to see what happened, but as I turned out I had more than I thought so planted all the ones that sunk. I might try something with the 'floaters' tomorrow to see if ones that float are less likely to come up.
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Seed sowing, giant winter leeks and giving shallot seeds a try. Put a new door on the shed and finished some raised bed woodwork preparation. Thawed out for an hour afterwards.
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Well I have just sown two rows of carrots... early even for here but whats to lose?
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Went to the plot around the corner to plant out broad beans and it started to rain so went home and sowed lettuce, coriander, radish and spring onions in soil blocks in a tray. They'll go straight out into a cold frame as soon as they show their heads.
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I went to the plot, moved a massive pile of rubbish and built a compost bin. The garlic and onions are coming on strong.
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I've been putting the germinated beans outside as they show their heads this week along with lettuce and salad under cover.
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Had a couple of hours free this morning. Weeded a couple of beds (still more to do) and added a few more loads of woodchips to the paths.
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we usually have a day of Thursdays we go to our local village market today bacon rolls and buy our home made cakes and a visit to our local garden centre to see what there bought back from the auctions many plants at the rite price needless to say my other half has field day
we have been very busy this week replacing our potting shed roof also sowing seed in the greenhouse there's plenty to do hopefully it will drying up so we can start down the allotments next week we went down the allotment last week to get some bushes out to re-plant on our friends farm good job he took his mini digger to get them out because the ground was still very wet and when we re-planed them in his field it to was like planting a paddy field
so its back to normal garden duties tomorrow greenhouse seed sowing also on the list is replacing the poly tunnel sheet together with new staging replacing the doors as a gardener you know there's always something to do on the allotments and gardens
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I got hold of some unwanted second hand guttering today. I have a 45 gallon drum doing nothing so will fit the guttering to the potting shed and start properly harvesting rainwater this year.
;)
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I turned up at the plot hoping to weed and compost the beds but I spotted that site's water supply was back on so I cleaned the outside of the polytunnel with the hosepipe and a brush.
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Planted out the first sowing of broad beans today and during the week I moved the germinated salad out to the cold frame.
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Went for it and put the potatoes in. Ground was fairly dry - my plot is at the top of a hill and drains very well so doesn't really gather standing water.
Maris peer, rocket, kestrel, markies and maris piper. Will make sure they are earthed up to protect from frosts. Forecasts look nice and dry for the next few weeks too.
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Brave man I hope all goes well with them. I probably won't put mine in until sometime in April. We had a bit of a frost last year end of May unusual but it can cause havoc . Living and gardening in France can lull you into a sense of false security :(
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Got a full day in :ohmy: but the ground is still a tad to wet to dig.
Steralised the greenhouses, taken some cuttings from volunteer raspberry plants to root up.
I have sown hurrah, the first tray of beetroot is now underway, first batch of radish and put the celeriac seed in a tray to pre-chit. Transplanted basil seedlings from the germinater. Spring has sprung.
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after a mostly dry day yesterday the ground had started to dry out then it rained quit heavy here overnight and was still raining in the morning when it stopped about mid morning we decided to bring some onion and cauliflower plants that had been overwintering in the greenhouse outside in the cold frame
hadn't been out an hour when down it came again :mad:so i said I'm calling it a day there's always another day when it mite actually be fine for a complete day looks like we going to need plenty to do on the home garden because of the restrictions on the over seventies going out i just hope we can get to the allotments that's a mile away by car and tractor :unsure:
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It's been tipping it down most of today, so I got my toms and sweet peppers sown at home. Due to the ground being so wet, I may have to resort to weedkiller this year to clear the beds :(
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Late start I guess but today I sowed my first spring onions, lettuce and radish. Always lovely when we start to eat those early crops. Watered my germinated Chillies and tomatoes that I potted on recently. Feels today as if things are starting to move. Nice to be in the garden and forget all the troubles for a little while
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Sowed sweet chilies, lettuce and spring onions.
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Sowed cucumber and first sowing of courgettes (three varieties) in the incubator today. These will go into large plastic pots (the big Growmore size) and stay in the green house until the frosts are over. Sowed dwarf beans these will go out in the allotment when up. The dwarf beans are easy enough to protect with poly tunnel cloches and fleece if necessary. All happening now.
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Red Onions went in to join the shallots which were planted about three or four weeks ago (now beginning to show) and the garlic which has been in since November and is about foot high.
Dug six trenches for potatoes and chucked some chicken manure pellets in them. Will probably plant spuds towards end of the month.
Also dug a trench for asparagus which is a new project.
At the weekend, in a rare dry spell, I put in the 8' support posts to a depth of 2' for my project of a couple of cordon rows of apple and pear trees - a fruit hedge in time hopefully. The trees will hopefully arrive very soon.
I got the adjoining half plot to mine this year following the sad and sudden death of my neighbouring plotholder a few months ago. Trying to do some things which take up a bit more space than I could have done with the half plot.
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Weeded and hoed round all then onions, garlic, shallots and elephant garlic. Gave them a good feed of Growmore. Hopefully they will really push on now. I like to get the onions at least out quite early so I can get another crop in the ground. Prepped a bed where I'll make a seed bed for the leeks which I'll sow this weekend hopefully. Then it started to drizzle a bit so I came home. If it stops I'll get up there again this afternoon.
Good luck to all
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Not reached the plot today but started preparing at home. Planted out some lettuce in pots. Also sowed some more lettuce, broad beans and beetroot in conservatory. Sowed some outdoor tomatoes yesterday in heat after local garden centre ran out of plants.
Week end is looking good for a visit to the plot dry here. I need to catch up ready to put out my overdue onion sets.
Good luck to all
HH
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Planted double row of broad beans,rotovated potato patch and planted one short row of 13 winston spuds. :D
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Dug over a couple of beds and planted some shallots. Noticed a neighbour planting out onions so think I will do that tomorrow. Looks like spring has finally arrived. Given the current problems it makes more sense than ever to maximise output from allotment.
I haven’t planted any spuds out yet but I’m conscious that the current restrictions on movement may become tighter. ( Especially as I will be 70 next month and therefore deemed vulnerable, though I’m not sure I will feel any different!)
Cheers HH
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Not on the plot but in the garden.
Used the new tools to tackle the wild lower and scruffy areas then I weeded a bit. The grass is sitting to let the insects vacate it before we take it up the plot to be composted.
Got some seeds in the propagator or sunny windowsill and potatoes on to chit. We still have a permafrost up at the plot and it's -2 so while plants are starting to grow, nothing will be planted outside.
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Finally got a couple of hours down the plot this afternoon. Tipped a few more loads of compost onto a couple of the long beds and then pricked out the chillies, aubergines and the sungold tomatoes as they're a bit ahead of the other toms.
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Today we dug over 1/6 of what is left in the plot while playing hunt the 'tayto. We filled about 2 & 1/2 Litre pots, we'll chit these and replant them. Some are already growing. We put in 3 potted rhubarbs that were going into the garden here. But since thefts at the plot will increase we decided to plant them up there and put something else in the garden. Husband watered what is already in and didn't bicker at all.
Think the later was the most impressive thing.
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Spuds and onion sets now in. Cleared buttercup-infested strawberry bed. Fed mealworms to robins and fat balls to tits. Drank tea in the sunshine with my wife.
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Planted up 4 bags with potatoes at home. Planning to plant more in a few days but holding back as it could be cool at night next week.
Stay safe HH
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Sprog came with me to exercise. We sowed some radishes and turnips in the polytunnel and then realised I'd forgotten the shed key so we couldn't get the spades to add more compost to the beds! I hope the weather is as good tomorrow as today so we can get the job done in tomorrow afternoon.
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Not the plot, in the garden, I weeded, planted some narcissus I got on sale for 12p, because perennials, then I trimmed the autumn raspberries from the living point up.
I used the 3 tine cultivator to rip some of the moss out of the front garden up until I got sore. Then after a lie down I have either done some awesome grafting of the old tree scions which have been lying in the fridge until they went all shrivelled, or mutilated the apple tree at the back of the garden with manky cuttings I got in October.
I'm keeping the "scions" or bits that I cut off to graft/further continue my mutilation spree on the tree up the plot and add those two "scions" (off cuts, they are off cuts) and 2 more I shall have to go and take from the parent tree because that tree needs 2 pollination partners and it has none. it's also too far away for bees to pollinate it.
Yesterday I called 2 meters away from 2 pensioner families I know and told them the council are not picking up the green waste or recycling. It's been released online so many pensions who aren't "silver surfers" don't know about it.
I told both families if they kept their grass clippings and fruit/vegetable bits of their green waste we'd get rid of it on our allotment for them. But they had to keep the meat, dairy and fish out of their green waste or we wouldn't be able to take it. I hope they remember.
My seeds I got from Premier seeds are Usain Bolting it. I am rather impressed.
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Yesterday I finally got round to distributing all the bags of manure I’d got over the beds at the plot plus finished emptying the last compost bin & did the same, then I turned compost bin 1 in to no.2 layering with fresh manure & Chicken pellets, I even managed to add some of the waste pile from the last bed into bin no.1. Came home at 6.30 rather pooped. Oh & tidied the tea shed so I could stop tripping over stuff. Chicken shed will be more of an effort though lol
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More yesterday work.
I treated a community Bramley tree for canker, it's almost ringed and I had to take 4 branches off of it so I have no idea if it'll live, but it has longer that if I left it alone. Half of the trees in the mini orchard have it and most of them, have it on their trunks. But this was the worst. So I'll have to boil the canker blanket and take into more of them once the blisters heal up a bit. In the interim I'll take the loppers and remove the bits on the branches. Must boil the tools.
Today I'm not sure what else I will do, other than put the pink banana squashes into bigger, individual pots. Good job I got the narcissus planted. New pots, right there.
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Double dug the channel tunnel! Well that is what it feels like, knees are hurting, shoulders hurting but thankfully the back is fine so I must have the technique sorted.
The plot is now way ahead of where it would be in a normal year. Tomorrows job is to lift the remainder of the leeks so I can prep and freeze them.
Just counting the days now until I sow my sowing for most of the autumn stuff.
Beetroots popping up, Celeriac all up, Basil and Asian Basil coming along nicely as is Toms, Cape Goosberry and Tomatillo's.
Planning an easy day tomorrow.
stay safe peeps
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Well I have been putting some cauliflower and broccoli in. I have also planted up some of my spuds, the weather is going to be a wee bit colder over the next 10 days but they will probably not be through by then. We have been getting some lovely sunny dry weather although not too warm at about 16C so with lock down everyday has been a gardening day recently. I have also made another three 1.5m x 3m raised beds and have been prep'ing the soil in them with manure and compost.
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Sowed various brassicas in plug modules, celeriac & celery in trays and Sunflowers in pots.
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Sowed onion sets and shallots. Did some strimming and mowing until mower started to fall apart.
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Just back from plot where I sowed some broad beans in raised bed.
Pretty cold but not sure if we are still going to be allowed to continue going to plot.
Cheers HH
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Today I didn't get 6x chicken manure because I didn't realise the restrictions put on the garden centre. Tomorrow.
Today I went past the pensioner neighbours nearby and told them that if they kept their fruit, veg and grass clippings aside, we'd take them and compost them. The council won't lift the green waste so a lot of people aren't sure what to do with this stuff and we're helping in a way that we can. But if there is fish, meat or dairy we're giving it back to them as we don't want rats. It went down well, and it's something we can do, one person said no and all but one person was happy for the offer. They were suspicious. But there is a past history involving a crazy neighbour shouting at us how we weren't allowed to let our children learn to ride their bikes on our own road. Crazy neighbour can sort themselves out.
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Some of the seed potatoes went in today.
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Spent Sat & Sunday mornings digging over one of the old chaps allotments as he is stuck indoors at his daughters. Will have his plot all ship shape and spuds planted for him by next weekend and have started sowing extra seeds as he is not able to that either..
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Quick visit to plot to sprinkle some growmore onto the asparagus bed. In the past this has been a luxury crop looks like it will be a mainstay instead this year.
Cheers HH
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I trimmed the smaller branches off the pear, apple, cherry and plum trees community orchard near the In Laws to get rid of canker. All bar one which I need someone to pull down within lopper reach.
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Cleaned and steralised all the pots and trays and took photos :)
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We added 12 cuttings onto the apple tree. We're not sure how much of it is the scion part of the tree and how much is root stock.
Played spot the rhubarb and marked them, 2 are missing, 4 are sprouted. Added 6x chicken manure to the raspberry bed, back fruit area of the plot, gooseberry bed and blackberries. Husband watered most of that as I could pull rather large dandelions out of the soil no problem.
Dug over another small area and weeded the raspberry bed.
I also bought some over plants needing planted out so I can get the pots. 12p per pot as opposed to not enough pots. Also as a bonus they are yellow or pink or blue or white. So I can put the "yellow beak" in the yellow ones and the cherry bombs in the pink (colour designated by one of the children).
Children are in the bath.
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Quick visit to water the various seedlings. Everything going ok so far, I need to pot on some of the toms though pretty soon!
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Planted all the potatoes, cleared another bed, finished removing all last years strings from the bean frame (munty), tidied up a lot, bashed my finger between 2 slabs, boy that hurt :(
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At home today planted the rest of my early spuds in bags I now have 13 bags so hopefully should get a reasonable crop. Also sowed some radish and lettuce into an old tomato bag from last year. It looks like the weather is going to warm up again soon though it has been pretty dry here recently.
HH
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For the seventh day running my wife and I went to the plot to get things ready for this year's planting. Mainly digging over and removing the weeds - there's a lot of them. We notice each day how few people there are on the site - there's about 30 allotments and each day only two or three folk there, today nobody at all. We think this is a great opportunity to get things a lot more shipshape than in previous years. Hope the good weather here in Bucks continues.
And we're hoping that the mail order firms will continue to send the stuff we've ordered - esp as we heard that garden centres are to close. Not that I'd like to go to any kind of shop - we're both in the vulnerable category so it's strictly home delivery and mail order for us.
The council has posted a notice on the gate saying we're allowed to use the allots, provided 2 metres etc. Hope it stays that way!
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Cleared the salad beds and put some compost on them. Cleared an area ready for potatoes.
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Took the plunge and planted both the early container spuds and the main crop. I'm delighted at how good the soil is now in my beds compared to the claggy clay I had when I took on the plot :)
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Sowed Chantennay carrots, spring onions and beetroot in containers.
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What a day in the garden! Sun all day and so warm too. I finished making up my raised no dig beds I now have sixteen in total at 1.5m x 3m so I have called a halt. I have enough materials to make up some beds for my new polytunnel and one for the existing tunnel for winter salad stuff and I have a big space left for my outdoor tomatoes. We are into a nice run of growing weather now with daytime temps of around 20C but will be getting rain mixed in there as well so I regard that as perfect for seed germination and getting things growing. This lockdown lark certainly gets you working in the garden :lol:
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Planted out salad and coriander. Them went home and started to decorate the hall so I can spend more time at plot guilt free.
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Planted out some beetroot seedlings at home and sowed some rather old carrot seeds in tape. Not sure whether the carrots will germinate but if not I will put something else in the tub. Fingers crossed if they do germinate the dreaded carrot fly won’t find them here at home instead of at the plot. Hope we don’t get told we can’t exercise away from home ( ie at the plot ) but if we do I have some plans for veg in the garden.
HH
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Visit to plot to see if any signs of life yet. Asparagus not showing yet but managed to collect some more rhubarb. We really need to have some rain here I reckon to start things growing properly. Good walk to plot though for my “exercise” session.
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Today it's been really windy so we've been working on the garden because we haven't had any proper rain other than the odd light hail shower since Storm Ciara. 30mph+ wind blown dust is not your friend up a plot when you've got 2 kids.
So we doubled the width of a border out the back, weeded and topped it up. Fed, weeded and watered the rhubarb. Planted 2 sage, 2 rosemary and a parsley, planted lots of onions in an open tray, some cabbages and salad.
I potted up one of the mulberries-we need more 30cm pots. I also potted up the little beak chillies and tomatoes and sowed more of the little beaks and the patio fire chillies which are showing no life at all. Manured most of the plants. Trimmed currants, boiled the canker kit. Later I'll add some more scions to the tree out the back.
So we've been busy all afternoon and the kids have been outside playing since 10 and are still out.
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I did some weeding today.
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Lovely day today, did a bit of weeding and tidying up. Managed to sow a few different mixes of salad leaves, spinach, pak choi, Chinese cabbage, syboes and a few flowering plants.
Spoke to the farmer while out for our daily dog walk and he's going to deliver a few tractor loads of well rotted manure tomorrow - social distancing will be observed!
Ended the day with a giant bonfire to get rid of all the old wood and fallen branches, of course we had to toast a few marshmallows!
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Today we dug 4mx2m part of the plot and planted the last of the perennial sorrel seeds, the last of our beetroot seeds, some onion seeds and sets. Husband watered a lot because it's like dust. We've emptied the small water butt (May) and into one of the big ones ("June") which is worrying, it's April. The soil was no effort to dig it's so dry.
We took up the kitchen waste and as much of the garden waste would fit in the boot. One 75Ltrug, a box, big "builder's" bucket and standard sized small bucket and applied to the compost heap. Husband partially emptied the older of the 2 composter until it wasn't fully rotted and put the kitchen stuff on top. Eldest was really good and helped us dig over and plant. Raspberries were weeded also and applied shouting at the children.
Husband just shifted the big plastic planter onto the gravel to hope and avoid slugs other than whatever is inside. So add manure to the compost that's in there and plant salad leaves. Maybe I'll add my beetroot seedlings to it.
I forgot the possibly Jostaberry plant but remembered the rosemary which is planted at the end of the raspberries.
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Well another day in the garden and again a joy... ye cannae complain when you are forced into something that ye like da'in :lol:
I transplanted some kohl rabbi modules and made a new automatic watering harness for that bed. The did some work on the other raised beds readying them for planing out.
The tomatoes have been singled into good sized pots and I have done the sweet peppers too. I have loads of other tomatoes coming through but these will be given away to neighbours who will may them . More to be done tomorrow with planting some different onion varieties out... thanks god for gardens we would be up the wall without out them :)
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Sowed carrots and parsnips. Pricked out the tomato seedlings into their own pots in the polytunnel.
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Uncovered another raised bed. Dug it over roughly to distribute the manure I'd loaded onto it before I covered it last autumn and then sowed my onion sets. My husband rabbit proofed the last of my raised beds in readiness for my beans.
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potted on some cauli's...put all my little babies (toms/peppers) out in the warm sunshine....a few more sowings of courgettes/celery/squash. my allowed hour of exercise was spent at the plot sowing carrots whilst mr goose strimmed the paths.
hating being on lockdown and furlough, but SO thankful for my outside space and sunshine right now.
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Yesterday I sowed herbs, beetroot and tomatoes. I went to sow some courgette and cucumbers and found out I hadn't bought any!
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Spending the day cat proofing my new raised beds... they just think " what a nice big litter tray" :lol: then after that I really must get the brush cutter out and go round the edges of the main garden which are jungle like in places :D if there is time I may make a watering harness up for one of the beds. lovely day here just having a cuppa.
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Put some debris netting around spud bed to keep cats out. Had a hoe and my daughter watered the pots.
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Watering beds early am on the plot.
Pleased to see asparagus is coming up soon.
HH
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We finished digging over and planting up the plot.
That is all our potatoes in as well. Watered some plants and we finally admitted to wanting to do something stupid and going to do it. Husband did he Goose step paces to figure out where it was and we went looking for the little missing rhubarb. A massive clump of grass had been upended over him so the little leaf bud was white and easily spotted several inches down. So He's dug out, chicken manure around the bottom, watered and replanted so he's just underneath the surface.
We are filthy.
Modify to add, it took over 5 hours.
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Planted out broad beans and assessed the toms and peppers which have been scorched by the hot sun as they were under double cover. Not looking good for most of them :(
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Just spent the last hour tilling the roots bed to a nice fine tilth ready to grow nice n straight root veggies.
A bit of hoeing now the weeds have awoken.
tinkering in the greenhouses.
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Transferred the leeks to a nice deep flower trough and left them under debris netting until I plant them out next month.
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Yesterday I did some weeding and prepped an area for parsnips and the tub for carrots. Too windy to sow them.
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Weeded and sowed parsnips and carrots.
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Planting tonight!!
Cheers
Aled
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Sowed 5 rows of parsnips & 4 of carrots :D (5ft rows). Put the first part of the munty frame (posts) up. Sorted out some hoops for netting the parsnips & carrots & took the netting off last years brassicas cage ready to move it to this years bed.
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I've been filling some big deep planters, that i made from unwanted roof purlins, with a mixture of soil, sand and peat to provide a hopefully good growing medium for carrots and parsnips. They have a couple of inches of broken brick in the bottom to help drainage and stand about 20 inches high. Trimmed hedges and kept on top of weeds during the bank holiday weekend. Also tended the overwintered onions, garlic and shallots, loosening the soil around them, weeding and top dressing. Last job of the long weekend was turning and topping up compost bins which i am hoping the warmer weather will have helped to 'cook' so that i can use this to prepare soil for beans and peas soon. The plot is proving to be an excellent opportunity to get outside in the evenings and switch off, while i work from home during the day.
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Thoroughly dug a bed over, about 7 x8 feet area, opened a compost bin up and added about 2/3 of it to the bed, sieving it all. Plan for tomorrow is to add the rest of the bin to the bed and give it a good rake in.
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Finished emptying the compost bin, had to water it to try and shift ants. Planted onions, spring onions, sowed parsnips and more onion and spring onion seeds. Watered everything.
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Sowed a variety of beans in pots in the polytunnel including the 'Greek Gigante' beans that were part of last year's Seed Circle donated by newshoot. Link below for anyone interested in this years Circle.
https://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=131650.0
Shameless plugging as always :)
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Dug a bed over ready for the last maincrop potatoes, raised the height of a enviromesh barrier over some carrots to provide space for the tops to develop. Weeding is a daily job as is watering. Sowed more coriander seeds in pots in the potting shed. Made a large planter and growing frame for the wifes sweet peas.
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Planted all the maincrop potatoes - Cara, setanta and sarpo Mira. Planted out a load of carrot seedlings, that i started in a tall pot, into a deep raised bed. Ready for starting beans and peas soon.
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Just a thanks for everyone that updates, for those like me that need a nudge to be doing the right things at the right times after a bit of research of course! Please keep up the good work!! ;)
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Planted potatoes, Kerrs Pink and Markies. Weeding for a couple of hours as well.
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Sprog and I enjoyed a rainy walk to the plot to sprinkle some slug pellets around the salad crops and the brassicas in pots.
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Today, nothing. It's been wet and cold all day. Which makes me even gladder that I managed to get to the plot yesterday between about 5.30 pm and 8.30 pm, my first after-sunset stay of British Summer Time this year. We'd lost the warmth of most April days this year, but the wet had not quite arrived. I managed to dig out 3 trenches for 3 rows of climbing beans in soil I'd surface-cleaned and rotavated the previous day, and sow a mixture of last year's end-of-season dried pods, and new beans bought cheaply over the winter. Also, at home in the evening, I hunted around on the internet for more salad and carrot seeds - no bargains to be found now, apparently. Is everyone else finding that seeds are in very short supply, and not cheap, everywhere....?
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Last couple of evenings, I've sown dwarf French beans and peas in the potting shed, managed to get some tomato and chilli plants so spent an hour rearranging the potting shed so i can grow the tomatoes at the far end. Applied pelleted chicken manure to fertilize overwintered onions and garlic. We've had some rain which softened the ground too so tilled up a couple of beds nice and fine with a rake. Expecting to be doing some weeding this weekend amongst other things. Take care all.
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Rotovated and dug dug dug.
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Hoed the empty beds and started weeding the woodchip paths. Got as much up as possible but I'm going to have to finish them with weedkiller.
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I have most things in the ground now. Put in a lot more garlic and onions last night. Somebody said that putting them around the edges of the beds keeps the slugs off. Well, we eat a lot of them, so even if it does not work it is not a loss. Put some horseradish seedlings between the potato plants. Supposed to frighten off the Colorado beetle. The missus put in all the red peppers and tomato plants this week, but they are predicting frost for next week, so that was perhaps premature.
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having a day of from the allotments today plot 1 actually got nearly up with things down there cultivated all the raised beds then planted some raised beds with onions also been laying new chippings on the paths sprayed an area that had got weeds because it had been left over from the winter as soon as the weeds die down I'm going to plough the ground half will be for squashes the other half green manure [mustard]
plot 2 had a fire burnt all the old rubbish sprayed the weeds round the fence cleaned up the cut flower beds spread a load of horse manure over one half got it all ready the plough next week then hopefully plant our potatoes in the half not manured so we are waiting on our brassicas that we are growing in the greenhouse to grow a bit more then we can plant them in the allotment RB
so had a good week down the allotments catching up on things see what next week brings :D
spending a day up the house garden today in the greenhouses and working on the poly tunnel repairs
always plenty to do not to get bored do have a nice day and you all keep safe
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Taking a few precautions in case the lower night time temperatures forecast for next week are low enough to do some damage. Covered the strawberries with scaffold netting, made a tent of the same around runner beans. Earthed up potatoes, and yes, you've guessed it, covered with scaffold netting supported on posts. Dahlias covered with old net curtains. I debated doing it, but I'd kick myself if I lost plants this late in the season because I hadn't spent a couple of hours covering them.
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Getting a bit dry now, so I gave everything a good soak.
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Planted out leeks, weeded and put some weed membrane on the paths.
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Built a raised bed for my sweetcorn for when they're ready to go out, and planted main crop spuds in an old metal trough we had spare.
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Planted out the rest of my leeks. Moved the compost bins and cut the grass.
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Snow this morning, so not much going to happen today. I really should not have planted out the tomatoes last week. The sweet peppers will survive it, but the tomatoes looked unhappy. It stayed above freezing at ground level, so they might live. You can always rely on the Ice Saints.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_Saints
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Sowed more spring onions and radishes.
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Yesterday I transported 6 Wheel barrow loads of the 3tons of compost to the allotment. I had it delivered to the drive on Monday. Thankfully most of the 3tons has gone on the garden so not much more to go today.
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I haven't posted on this thread recently, but that's not because I haven't been busy, busy, busy.
- my tomatoes are in their final resting place in growbags in the neighbour's greenhouse
- earthed up my spuds
- re-potted spinach, kale, beetroot and parsley and returned them to the cold frame
- planted out the Florence fennel into a raised bed
- sowed more runner beans to replace the ones that didn't germinate
- purple sprouting broccoli seedlings are still in the cold frame but small and weedy looking , so I might sow a few more in case they don't make it
- I'm not having much success with my cabbage seeds this year. The ones that have germinated aren't looking great
- onions, salad leaves, broad beans are in the raised beds and coming on nicely (I hope).
Phew!
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Planted out some cabbages, realised I planted my broad beans in the wrong bed :unsure: going to need to rejig my plans now. After that spent ages trying to catch up on the weeding.
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Well Ive taken the plunge and put out the toms squash and courgettes!. Runners and climbing beans out tomorrow and that just leaves the celeriac hanging around for a bit longer.
The onions and spuds seem to have survived the lower temperatures and the leeks went in earlier this week.
Unfortunately the garden has a terrible couch grass problem so this year I'm trying to go around digging it up were I can.
Hey ho just need it to rain now. its been a while :D
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Busy day today at the plot:
Put cardboard around fruit bushes and recovered with straw
Put more straw around spuds
Covered area in front of and where compost heaps were
Put posts in ground with cross bar ready for borlotti beans
Planted out beetroot
Weeded around shallots
Put weed membrane along more paths
Cooked the kids tea when I got in.
Need a sit down now.
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Weeded..
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Put up supports for peas and climbing beans, sowed the peas direct and beans in the potting shed. Filled gaps in beetroot with more seeds and weeded between shallots and garlic.
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Made up another 3 hanging baskets with strawberries, 2 with parsley. Organised the polytunnel to fit more in and shelter from the rain. Back inside I potted the Tomatoes and cucumbers into 6in pots and put them back on the windowsills.
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Put some wooden edges around the raspberry bed. Weeded.
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Built the frames for the beans at the plot and sowed sweetcorn at home.
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Moved my red pepper seedlings and one of the courgettes into the greenhouse. I'll wait a day or two before I transfer them into the grow bags as I want to give them a chance to recover from the shock of being carried outside.
The other courgette seedling has gone into the cold frame as that one is destined for an outdoor bed.
Cut the scapes (flower heads) off my garlic to give the plants a chance to divert more energy into the bulbs. I'm planning to stir fry the scapes with some spinach.
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Decided the mangetout plugs I'd bought online are too battered by their experiences in transit. They look very sad and unpromising. So I ventured to the garden centre and bought the only thing left - a tray of plugs - Early Onward peas. Don't know much about peas - can I safely plant them out on the allotment now, or should I wait till the end of May and the end of the likelihood of late frosts?
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I mildly burnt the top of my balding head (really nice weather today, where I'm at). That aside I did get a lot of stuff done. For good or bad.
- Went out and crushed roughly one fourth (?) of my total budget for the whole year on new middle sized pots for my chili plants to pot on, and then six bags of three for two John Innes mix of... oh. somebody save me. I'm never doing it again. I'm growing my own. This is only my first full year of growing, but I've already had enough. I'm growing comfrey (not going to be of use this year), getting free cow turds (?) from a friend, and trimming my pubes regularly to add to the woody side of my compost bin. I'm going out of my way not to buy any kind of potting on/seed starter BS again.
- Potted on most of my chili plants (see above), and also lots of black sesame seedlings. I'm new to the game so why not explore. Please don't judge, but I get it if you do. Sesame seeds... really? Sorry, yeah. Gotta experiment where my heart is at.
- Went to my parents house and dug up a portion of dirt from a new plot they have in mind. Almost passed out with the heat while trying to break up old brick foundations (out house). Social distancing was maintained. A silver lining in every cloud rung hard in my head: "While your here, can you just... " No!
- Back to mine, and a lot of potting up of seedlings and wondering at what time I will need to get up every morning to do the rounds. I decided I'm not sowing any more seeds - unless they are ones that you do for regular harvesting - I just cannot do that, unless I'm retired or in some kind of self inflicted lock down. Not happening.
- Lastly, I spent many minutes observing a female blackbird get a little more impatient with me for being in her space at that time of the day. Eventually, she just went for the goodies I put out at the beginning of the day. But not before she came real close to me and seemed to look me up and down. I guess I was judged today and by the look of the blackbird, I'm a terrible person! :(
_
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A short spell of therapeutic weeding after work yesterday.
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Weeded and harvested salad.
At home I potted on tomatoes and chillies.
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Glorious day, as predicted by the Irish online weather forecast site. Planted out my runner beans, dwarf french beans, spinach and some more salad leaves. The weather is expected to be good all week, so I'll gradually plant out the rest of my cold frame seedlings that are ready to go.
I have more seeds germinating indoors which won't be ready for 2 or 3 weeks.
p.s. entertaining post, garrarufa. :)
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Yesterday I put up the borlotti bean canes, weeded and broke down my old greenhouse which got damaged in the wind.
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At the council plot I:
* Planted out half dozen Little Leo sunflowers and borlotti beans but forgot to take the few extra canes I needed so they'll have to wait for tomorrow.
* Put weed membrane on more paths between beds.
*Weeded.
Around the corner I:
* Put some compost down and plated out sweetcorn.
* Watered.
* Weeded.
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Planted out the marrows and courgettes. Still a fair few squashes and pumpkin plants to go out still but weeding the beds is taking a while...
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Planted out the rest of the borlotti beans and weeded.
At home I sowed some more coriander and oriental lettuces.
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Planted out the runner, broad,borlotti,trail of tears(thanks Mr G) ying yang, & the yellow French beans, oh & some spinach seedlings I’d been given. Weeded the parsnips. Watered them all of course then went back this evening & watered them all again plus the potatoes ,parsnips, peas & spring onions.
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Marketmore cucumbers and a few Atlantic Giant Pumpkins out now. Slowly getting there!
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Mainly watered but....... I have picked, bolied and eaten the first beetroots and OMG how good do they taste!
Also picked the first batch of broad beans for tea as well.
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Watered everything ::)
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Bit more weeding ahead of planting out the last squash and pumpkins. Subsoil is starting to dry out now though, going to have to do a monster watering session tomorrow.
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Plated out squashes and pumpkins, watered beans and weeded.
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Yesterday I had an assistant with me for the morning at the plot, my daughters partner who came for gardening lessons. All socially distant of course, good idea these 5ft wide beds, I knew I had them for a reason. Yes I know 5ft isn’t 2 meters, we were on opposite sides & a bit apart. :D We planted the sweetcorn,weeded the whole of that bed, weeded & swoed tge pea & bean bed, resowed peas & mangetout into the spaces, put posts & strings up for said peas, sowed 2 more rows of parsnips & carrots, watered planting’s & sowings, swept up, saw to chickens. Then I came home & after lunch sowed a load more brassicas before going back to the plot to ‘do’ tge chickens & water the strawberries &tomatoes.
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Planted out more leeks, squashes and pumpkins.
Weeded.
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Did a bit of weeding in the garden, intending to go to the allotment this afternoon - but it turned horribly cold and windy so didn't get there! I don't suppose the newly planted French beans will have like liked the last few days at all :(
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Weeded the Mother in Law's garden yesterday afternoon. In the evening I planted out courgettes and put some chicken wire over the beds to stop the cats. I've taken a real dislike to cats recently.
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OH rotovated bit more of brassica bed but ran out of petrol ;)
Weeded half of onions and shallots then gave up as soil better since rain but still very hard :(
Covered patch of weeds in middle with cardboard.
Needs covering with rabbit manure when I can get some.
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Weeding and fed the aubergines.
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Watered, planted out dwarf beans and weeded.
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Rain is continuing, but I caught the first Colorado beetle on the potatoes. That one has chewed his last leaf. Trying to get rid of the blackfly on the broad beans now.
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Planted my new Dahlias and the veg that I had sown in modules. Watered everything, harvested strawberries 🍓
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Watered the squashes and beans.
Now waiting for rain.
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Cut the paths and hoed the weeds.
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Yesterday,
all my troubles seemed so far away I finally planted out my sweetcorn and various squashes and pumpkins that were miserable in pots. My plot neighbour was unusually vexed at slug damage to one of his pumpkin plants so I donated a Sweet Dumplin pumpkin to fill in the gap.
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Set up the trampoline for the girl, weeded, planted out chilies, had a go on the trampoline and then ran for cover when it started raining.
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Weeded, took some compost over to the second plot and got the bed ready for the tomatoes which I'll plant out tomorrow.
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Took another car load of garden waste from an elderly neighbour to compost at the plot (they don't want to risk the tip).
Gave the polytunnel a water and lamented at how much weeding I need to do this week.
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Sorted out the irrigation system in the polytunnel, planted runner beans outside and strimmed around the compost areas.
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watered..watered..oh..then watered :nowink:
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Chopped the leaves off a patch of daffodils & weeded the area ready for planting some edible flower seedlings(possibly I might keep them at home) also weeded the front flower bed. Harvested strawberries,then this evening I went to ‘do’ tge chickens & planted out 2 pumpkin plants that had been left for me by J.
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watered..watered..oh..then watered :nowink:
Same here, and unless the 'possible' thunderstorms actually do arrive this evening - I'll be doing the same thing tomorrow! ::)
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Yesterday we watered the tom's, squashes, pumpkins and beans. We also did a bit of weeding and harvested soft fruit.
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Another early start at the plot, I was there at 6:15 :D More weeding, this time the asparagus & the tomatoes , then took the sideshoots off & tied them in & tied the gherkins to their canes. Came away at 8.a.m.
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Big task was FINALLY surrounding the plot with a monofilament fence to keep the deer out of my plot. Total cost of materials under £8.00 (under $10.00 U.S) for an area about 60 feet long x 30 feet wide. I'll post more about it later on, different thread.
Today, clearing weeds and undergrowth from "new ground", hopefully planting at least tomatoes, peppers. Maybe okra and squash tomorrow.
(Edited to update tasks)
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Attaching a photo showing the plot that I am clearing today and detail on my monofilament deer fence.
At least it's not too hot today, 31 C, cool for the time of year.
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Built a raised bed from a pile of scrap brick on my property, and started a second one after clearing a little more land of weeds and vines. Planted the finished bed with Serrano chilies (raised from seed), also okra and sunflowers. Planted a couple hills of Butterbush squash.
Hotter than yesterday (33 C) and very humid.
So far, no additional deer troubles.
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Completed second raised bed yesterday, more okra, cayenne peppers, squash.
This evening I will gather some pine straw mulch from places where it shouldn't be (near house), place it in the walking areas around the raised beds. I have some of that mulch reserved for when the plants are tall enough. Probably plant some of my remaining 16 tomato plants that are not in the ground yet.
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A family outing today. We: watered, harvested and did some weeding.The kids ran around the plot for a bit.
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Finished transplanting the last of the tomatoes today, so I think I'm done planting.
I also made a small wall around the base of my little magnolia tree and brought in some soil to replace some that eroded away.
After that, relaxed, had a hamburger dinner with my wife and boys, then walked to watch fireworks.
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It has been hot, hot, hot, and dry, dry, dry lately. So, my work in the plot is mostly about keeping the tomatoes, squash, peppers, okra and herbs watered as best I can. The tomatoes and peppers seem to be the happiest. Squash and okra are doing ok, but I planted late, time will tell if they yield anything. Herbs are mostly doing fine, in pots, though I don't think I will try growing dill in a pot again (I wanted some fresh dill for pickled okra).
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Pulled weeds, including way too much Hedera ivy. Tied ever-growing tomatoes to stakes. Harvested some tomatoes. Took stock of peppers (Mild Banana; Serrano Chilies; Cayenne; sweet bell peppers, all of which have fruit now). Noted the plants which need to be treated with B. thuringiensis spray tomorrow.
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Dug up my maincrop potatoes after seeing blight on the leaves, sowed a row of early carrots, a row of Spring cabbage and a row of swede. Weeded my leek bed.
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Well Sunday actually, I cut down all my greenhouse tomato plants as they were spent. :( I’d reduced the amount of plants this year as for the last couple of years I’ve had issues with mould on the stems & trusses & the same again this year, the crop has been poor as well. So whilst doing my stint at the garden club trading store I bought 2 sulphur candles to use when I finally clear everything out.
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A quick visit to get some fresh air after work, fed leeks with pelleted chicken manure, pulled some weeds, sowed a few carrot seeds in pots for hopefully another successful grow in tall pots during the autumn. It is quite mild so I've put some directly into a raised bed too.
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The carrots that I sowed a few weeks ago are growing away but the spring cabbage and swede that I sowed on the same day, although looking good last week, have all disappeared. Slugs! Finished preparing my onion bed for my Senshu Yellow later this month. Harvested a few more leeks. Will try sowing some more Spring cabbage but this time in cells to hopefully transplant later.
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Today I set up our new compost bin - it's one of those dalek things. Now we're thinking about what to put in it! Food waste from home is easy - but that about the weeds and other stuff from the allotment itself? In particular what about couch grass and bindweed?
We have had a couch grass problem ever since we started on the lottie - after the parish council helpfully rotovated the plot before we took it on. This meant they cut up all the couch grass roots and spread them over most of the allotment. I've spent the last 12 years digging out the couch, with help from glyphosate at times. But there are still couch bits on almost every bed, and bindweed roots as well. Can I compost these? or should I keep them apart from the ordinary chickweed and other annual weeds that appear all the time?
Where do I get advice on what I can tip into the dalek?
Cheers - Neville
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Today I set up our new compost bin - it's one of those dalek things. Now we're thinking about what to put in it! Food waste from home is easy - but that about the weeds and other stuff from the allotment itself? In particular what about couch grass and bindweed?
We have had a couch grass problem ever since we started on the lottie - after the parish council helpfully rotovated the plot before we took it on. This meant they cut up all the couch grass roots and spread them over most of the allotment. I've spent the last 12 years digging out the couch, with help from glyphosate at times. But there are still couch bits on almost every bed, and bindweed roots as well. Can I compost these? or should I keep them apart from the ordinary chickweed and other annual weeds that appear all the time?
Where do I get advice on what I can tip into the dalek?
Cheers - Neville
Right here on this website is as good any place to get started!
https://www.allotment-garden.org/composts-fertilisers/composting-making-compost/
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Planted my onion sets, Senshyu Yellow and 20 cloves of garlic, Czechmate.
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Planted lettuce, spinach, brussels sprouts yesterday for the winter garden. Tomorrow I'll plant swiss chard, snow peas and snap peas. If the rain holds off, I'll dig some drainage around a planned new raised bed.
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Today I set up our new compost bin - it's one of those dalek things. Now we're thinking about what to put in it! Food waste from home is easy - but that about the weeds and other stuff from the allotment itself? In particular what about couch grass and bindweed?
We have had a couch grass problem ever since we started on the lottie - after the parish council helpfully rotovated the plot before we took it on. This meant they cut up all the couch grass roots and spread them over most of the allotment. I've spent the last 12 years digging out the couch, with help from glyphosate at times. But there are still couch bits on almost every bed, and bindweed roots as well. Can I compost these? or should I keep them apart from the ordinary chickweed and other annual weeds that appear all the time?
Where do I get advice on what I can tip into the dalek?
Cheers - Neville
I'm curious if your community does municipal composting. These large municipal systems compost at much higher sustained temperatures than you can sustain in a dalek or compost pile on your plot (this is to kill off pathogens). Those temperatures will also kill live seeds and roots of most plants. If your community has such a system, and accepts yard waste, that is a good place to compost your weeds.
My leaves and limbs (at least some of them) go to municipal compost, and I get the finished compost for 20 dollars a truck load.
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I throw couch grass roots ( or any other perennial weed roots) onto a path and let them dry out/die off, before putting it into the compost bins - alternatively you can drown them in a bucket of water first.
Here's an old thread with another idea https://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=33334.msg399033#msg399033
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Many years ago, I had so much work to do that I neglected a section of my allotment which got covered with couch grass. I thought couch grass was dangerous. So I dug it up and left it in a pile well away from my compost heap. When I got enough time to return, to my surprise it had rotted well, so I transferred it to my compost heap where it rotted much more efficiently helped by the specialist worms and other creatures I had recruited there. Subsequently, I simply toss any couch grass directly on my compost heap - it does not need to be first either dried or heavily soaked - and the exclusion of light - whether the heap is covered or not - kills it anyway. My advice it to try this - if you are extremely doubtful and prefer the advice of people who are willing only to follow dogmatic advice rather than experiment themselves, you can always dry or wet it to kill it first.
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You’re quite the gardening rebel aren’t you Chris ::)
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I don't consider my advice dogmatic, I just speak from many years of experience. Your experience may be different, that's all.
the exclusion of light - whether the heap is covered or not - kills it anyway.
Is it not strange then, that any bits of root left underground, thus also excluded from light - continue to grow and thrive?
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having sprayed our couch grass several months ago and then sowing a crop of mustard the ground is clear of couch grass and because the ground has dried up some this week here i was able to plough both our allotment plots and another friends plot today so everything looks quite tidy now just need to dig over a couple of raised beds also have some spring cabbage plants to plant out in the beds next week weather permitting
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I don't consider my advice dogmatic
Given you offered 2 different solutions - dry out or drown, plus a link to a thread with other ideas, neither do I :)
I dry out roots of perennial weeds before they go near the compost. It is an easy way to make sure they don’t regrow.
One of my plot neighbours has a sealed bin with a base that they use. As it is totally dark and just weeds rotting together, that does kill them all, but it don’t half whiff when they open it. You can do the same in a normal compost heap, but you would have to manage it carefully. As had been pointed out before, we have readers of all levels of experience, so I could see people blithely chucking all sorts in an open heap and ending up with a right old mess.
My job today was lift all the dahlias and get them drying out in the shed, plus more clearing and weeding. The soft annual weeds have gone straight in the compost bin and the nasties are drying out nearby :)
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Sunday morning, before the rain started, planted out a batch of keepwell over wintering onions that I started from seed in September.
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well, technically yesterday...Racked up millions of damp leaves and stuffed them into bags ready to be prepared for the mulch bin.
Removed a lot of fallen branches from the trees lining the west side of the garden and stacked them ready for firewood...one of the most satisfying jobs :wacko:
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Compost, and wood ash dug into the veg patch. i don't grow winter veg so that's it closed off until the spring.
Cheers
Aled
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Walked over to the plot to get some fresh air and exercise. It was a bit of a mud fest, but I paddled around and tidied up a bit.
Harvested cabbage and chard and then walked home :)
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Trundled my trusty steed over to the plot (wheelbarrow, lol) full of the spent plants from the pots on the front. Added those to compost bin no.1 along with a bag of fresh manure. Then I took 2 barrow loads of leaves from bin 5 to the leaf mould cage.
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So I finally finished my leaf mulch cage and put the flippin' rake away thank goodness.
Now I'm onto the next piece of the jigsaw, ...raised beds. I had 5 new steel raised beds delivered and I've unpacked them to see a beautiful neat set of long-lasting beds. So what have I don't today. Screw the things together :lol: my hand and wrist are about to fall off
I will get some images sorted and post them maybe next week and give some feedback on the raised bed quality and if they would be recommended. At face value, they look and feel great, but I need to finish them off and move them into position to get a feel for their overall stability
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The last of the tomatoes and peppers finally succumbed to a hard freeze earlier this week, so today I pulled plants and piled them to go into our city compost system. (The city has a compost process that operates at a much higher temperature than my compost pile, so it's best to leave composting garden waste to them, in case there were any plant pathogens).
After clearing a couple beds, I started preparing beds for planting. There are some things that can still be planted in December here. Only seeds I got in the ground were turnips before the rain came in. I'll try more planting tomorrow.
One of my more amazing discoveries today: last spring I was clearing a lot of Nandina out of my plot.(the stuff is planted as an ornamental but becomes an invasive weed, and is toxic to birds as well). It makes woody canes, so I set some canes aside to use as plant stakes, after leaving them in a pile, leafless and rootless. They were put to use during our very hot, and sometimes dry, summer weather. As I was pulling those old stakes out today... SOME WERE SPROUTING!!! I admire the tenacity, but I'm getting rid of the stakes just the same.
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haven't been down the allotments for a couple of days took a load of horse manure Monday need to finish of a new gate I've made and put up on one plot it just needs a catch but the ground is like a WW1 battlefield also need to cut back some branches that are hanging over the allotment and catch your face when passing had permission from the farmer to carry out this work as a hedge layer for many years he's quite happy for me to do this then we should be almost finished on both plots till spring :D
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Placed additional compost into existing raised beds. Planted out some Brussels sprouts plants, started from seed a couple months ago. Also planted some radishes, spinach, lettuce, and scallions.
I'm pre-sprouting some snow peas and sugar snap peas to go into the ground when the rain, and work, allow me to over the next few days.
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Planted snow peas, no-dig style. They are all going where I had tomatoes planted during the summer. Branched tops I cut out of my bamboo are the "pea brush" that the plants will be supported on as they grow.
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Got the last of the sprouted sugar snap peas in the ground yesterday. The leaves for the snow peas are already starting to emerge from the ground.
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I just looked :) Much too wet to do anything *rolls eyes*
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Disputes my sodden ground, I did a big of investigating, after digging a hole 1m2 (I am not exaggerating) I came away with a good horseradish crop.
I then made 2 jars of overly hot horseradish and a further jar of roasted beetroot and horseradish.
I also cleared of the raspberries and blackcurrants in the freezer and added these to rum :)
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Made a new compost bin out of bits of wood I had collected. Turned over the contents of some of the dales I have as well
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I’ve been much too busy doing Christmas to contemplate doing anything for a few weeks, plus it has just been too wet even with my slabbed paths & now it is too cold, today it will be frozen as well. As soon as I can muster the energy I’m going to turn my compost again but unfortunately I’ve got a rat in bin no.1 so I need to evict that first :(
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The last day of 2020 so I spent it on the plot, with the vax's coming out thick n fast soon the holiday makers will be swarming in to town once again so I have started to build the..... Punk Bugs Hotel
https://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=133984.0 (https://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=133984.0)
Red, flowing liquid out of the body Cold tho :mad: