Clearing up for the winter

Well, I've not blogged much this year! Doesn't mean I haven't been allotmenting, probably just too busy. Sorry folks! Anyway, I had quite a productive year, but the long dry spell in early summer proved a challenge. My potato crop was smaller, my sweetcorn minute and the fruit non-existant, except for raspberries which were very happy.

The big success for this year was tomatoes. I didn't let them dry out and was rewarded with thousands of decent sized toms, the principle borghese mini plum toms were fantastic and I'll do those again. But the shirley, moneymaker, gardeners delight all did brilliantly as well. The only downside was they all ripened in a 3 week space - normally they start in June and go on to November (but generally are quite small).

Squash was a big disappointment - only 4 and one was got by woodlice/slugs and the only butternut squash vanished.

I've now started the autumn/winter clear-up - there's some green manure in, I've got broad beans and garlic to plant and there's parsnip and various brassicas to harvest in the next couple of months. The rest of the beds will be cleared and manured.

Plums, tomatoes, beetroot and bindweed.

Just back from my hols (Iceland - fantastic place) to find a bumper crop of plums, tomatoes and beetroot, not to mention cauliflowers, courgettes, potatoes....

I'm really pleased with my plum tree - it's about 3-4 years old and last year gave me 4 delicious czar plums. This year, well, the photo hopefully shows that my toddler tree has produced so far a whopping 1.5kg of ripe plums with more on the way.

I also have a dozen beetroot, a bowl of cherry toms as well as golden sunrise yellow toms, some marmande as well as others that I can't remember the name of.

I was delighted with the cauliflowers - I've grown them under enviromesh (a fine mesh-net thing) after a couple of years of inedible catepilliary cauliflowers I've finally won - this year have had 4 cauliflowers so far with no wiggley things inside.

I think I've done well in just under 3 weeks. Many thanks go to my allotment neighbour Shirley and my brother Jamie for watering my greenhouse whilst I was away.

Unfortunately I've come back to a plot that is not only full of produce but overrun with bindweed. I've pulled up a sack of it already and there is still more to go.

Now to find plum and beetroot recipes.

Poppies

I think it's fair to say that I have a poppy problem! Every bed, in the paving, everywhere there are big pink poppies. I can hardly see the plot or what's growing on it for poppies. I usually let a few grow but this year I've been a bit preoccupied selling my home and trying to buy somewhere so I've only rushed down to water the greenhouse. I haven't carefully thinned the poppy seedlings down to a managable number and have been over run! I'm not sure if you can see that from the photograph.

It's not bad though, there are plenty of bees and other pollinators, my crops are all doing well (have a regular supply of strawberries for Elizabeth as well as raspberries, gooseberries and soon the blueberries start cropping.

My sweetcorn is doing well, and the interplanting with beans and squash seems to be working this year. The three free roses are fantastic and I've had cut flowers with loads left on the plant for the insects for a month now.

My greenhouse is overflowing with tomato plants and it's a mammoth task potting them all on and more importantly finding pots!

I was also pleased to see the broad beans are thriving despite the odd bit of blackfly. And more pleased to see that there were loads of ladybirds, ladybird larvae etc feasting on the blackfly - its year three and my no chemical principles seem to be paying off.

My next big challenge is how to keep the greenhouse watered whilst I'm in Iceland. Think I need to beg a few favours - they should be able to help themselves to the first crop of tomatoes that will ripen in the next week or two.

Time flies

It seems like absolutely ages since I last spent time at my plot! I've made the dash down there to water the greenhouse but not much else in the last few weeks (my weekends have been taken up with visits to relatives, friends and my Hut).

Absence however has this remarkable power - the allotment goes wild. I now have metre-high poppy plants everywhere (the first one is in flower, a lovely large pink bloom). The weeds are also huge (despite pulling them up everytime I see one - how do they escape!).

On the plus side I do have lots of fruit this year - a bumper crop of pears, apples and plums (see pic) and it doesn't look too bad on the cherry and gooseberry front either.

In the greenhouse things are going well - I had over 100 tomato plants of different varieties but have managed to give many away (hurray!) and potted on the others. Still many toms in pots they have outgrown but will hopefully get to those this weekend. There are quite a few toms already on the plants - some the size of golf balls!

I've finally managed to grow carrots - after my third attempt at sowing seeds. Wonder what I did wrong. And I've only got about 4 parsnip plants after sowing nearly 3 packets of seeds!!!

I've also planted out sweetcorn and squash as well as beans (trying the 'three sisters' again this year).

Harvesting-wise I've had a continuous but small supply of strawberries (they rarely make it off the plot), a few early onions, asparagus and lettuce. The cherries are ripening and I guess the garlic will need lifting soon.

First tomato plants in place

It may seem a bit early but I have planted my first tomato plants into their summer positions in the greenhouse! I planted the seeds on the 4th March, potted them on a couple of weeks ago and then this Sunday planned to pot them on again. Only they were so big I decided just to put them into big pots in 'final growing position' complete with watering system. So there are three, foot tall, tomato plants starting the chain of plants that will eventually form a double later around the perimeter of my greenhouse.

I reckon I'll probably get around 24 tomato plants, 2 cucumbers and 2 melon in there. Then on the bottom shelf of my staging I'll have sacks with sweet potatoes growing (if I get the slips... maybe too late already).

On Sunday I (well my lovely friend) cleared another bed ready for the three sisters - sweetcorn, climbing beans and squash. I pulled up the remnants of the purple sprouting broccoli plants to make way for potatoes and to give the broad beans room to grow.

The last of the leeks have also been harvested and mostly given away as I'm a bit fed up with eating leeks.

Tonight after watering, I sneaked in planting a few seeds: lettuce, beetroot, broccoli, and can't remember the rest!

I need to plant another load of carrots and onions as well as try adding some more parnips seeds into the rows as only 4 have germinated so far. Not sure why.