I swear that veg is growing...

Blimey!

This rain is certainly increasing the amount of foliage on the plot. As you can see below the potato bed is now a sea of green leaves and small flowers. A very promising sign indeed, the cabbages, well, they are certainly flying along and the lettuces don't seem to stop.

It definately looks like an allotment now doesn't it. Onions and potatoes in the foreground then beans and brasiccas just beyond.


We'll start at the back and move forewards in today's blog post.

In the soft fruit area there is plenty of growth amongst the raspberries which now present a huge green canvas of lushious leaves, with the not so glorious bindweed wrapped around it of course!

Our grape vine has finally started to get a shift on too. Everybody has a vine on our site and they all started off as cuttings from my plot neighbours single vine he purchased 31 years ago when he first got his plot. Everybody's elses have been running wild for the last month or so, however mine hadn't even broken out of it's winter dormancy, until now! The weeds on our site really are rampant due to 5 or more years of neglect. I have put some black tarpaulin over the grape vine area and cut a hole for the vine. This should supress the weeds and give the vine more of a chance. Here is what the area currently looks like, it is certainly  a work in progress!

Just in front of this area we now have 5 pumpkin plants. 2 hundredweight and 3 smaller Jack O'Lanterns. Amy and I are having a competition to see who can grow the biggest one! They were planted on top of heaps consisting of a mix of horse manure, farm manure, multipurpose compost and top soil. I've got a few tricks up my sleeve to make sure I'm the winner...

The thing I am most pleased about is the brassicas. I am the envy of the whole site. My cabbages are hearting already and my brocolli have heads! Unbelievable, I've never grown a good brassica in my life, I hope my luck has changed and we'll be enjoying some delicious greens in the future....

You might have noticed my home made net tunnels before, they are fantastic at keeping pests out and also shading the crops from the blazing soon. They also allow perfect ventilation on moisture to enter. They are a real secret weapon..

They're not massive weeds between them either, they are actually rows of fast growing Cos Lettuce, to allow us to maximise our space!

Opposite the brassica bed is our bean bed. Our broad bean plants are starting to produce a few bean pods now and the dwarf french beans have germinated plentifully. I also managed to get my runner beans in today at last. They are a real staple for all allotments, plots don't look the same without them!

With the amont of horsemuck I put in their trench I really do expect a good harvest from them!

Here is a picture of the potato sea. Lots of foliage, let's hope there are some good tubers underneath..

Elsewhere, I was very glad to see Monty cover dealing with bolting onions on last Friday's gardener's world. Many of mine had repented the recent weather conditions and decided to bolt, thankfully I've now nipped them in the bud so there is still some hope.. I hope!

Although the allotment is being stocked well, there is still plenty in the mini greenhouses including kale, red cabbage, savoy cabbage, more lettuce, sweetcorn and french climbing beans. They'll all be making their way out in to the ground over the coming weeks...

Final installment of this update, is a suprising advancement. Remember those 19p Asparagus crows I bought from a large supermarket chain...

Only 2 more years to go and I might be able to taste some. At least they're growing! Best 19p I've ever spent, that is for sure!

Enjoy the rest of your week. If their is a break in the rain make sure you are in your garden or on your allotment!!

Martin





In the summer..

Seeing as I am not a first time vegetable grower, I can take huge quantities of optimism from freshly dug soil and the increasing daylight hours we are getting at the moment. But if you are a first time vegetable grower it can be difficult to generate such high hopes so early on. I think this is why a lot of people who take on allotments don't last even the first year. The first few months are a lot of hard work, the hardest work you will ever have to do on your plot and there is almost zero reward apart from dull, brown, soil. If it's going to be this hard, then why bother, especially when it comes to April and all it seems to do is rain, rain and well.. rain!

Amy had a little bit of experience with growing vegetables last year, but we did start late and we did buy plants from garden centres, so after planting our courgettes out we were harvesting them in 4 weeks. When you have to plant the seeds yourself in February, March and April and drag yourself up to the allotment on the rainiest of rainy days to water the seedlings in the greenhouse it can be quite a chore to focus on the long term goals.

The most frequently uttered phrase when we are at the allotment is 'in the summer...'. I have to remind Amy that in the summer we won't be looking at patches of bare earth and puddles on the patio, but in fact there will be runner bean plants towering over us, potatoes being earthed up weekly, pumpkins enjoying the beer and sun as much as we are, and sausages sizzling away on the mini barbeque. But snap out of it Martin! We are still looking at bare patches of land right now. But wait, should that be we were looking at bare patches of earth yesterday, but today something has changed. Yep, there is another weed, but what is this? The emergence of the first pea shoot, the onions have started to grow, wait that rhubarb can be picked today. Bring on the custard!

The vegetable section of the allotment (80% of the whole allotment) has been split up in to 4 large beds for alliums, potatoes, legumes and brassicas which will work on a classic rotational basis (sort of). There are also smaller beds for courgettes, sweetcorn, root vegetables, asparagus and pumpkins.

Approaching from the shed the bed on the right is for courgettes and is covered by carpet to keep the weeds off until we need the area,(I'll be doing a post sharing my courgette growing secrets in a week or so). Next the bed on the left is covered with fleece and has potatoes underneath, none have poked through yet, but I'm sure it won't be long, we planted them on Good Friday. On the right the allium bed is really taking off with 2 rows of shallots, 3 rows of red onions, 2 rows of brown onions, 1 row of perpetual onions and 2 rows of garlic...

Moving on up the lottie, the next bed on the right is currently covered in very well rotted horse muck which I need to dig in ready for the brassicas. I was in such a dilemma regards how to prepare my brassica bed, every book and every website conflicts with one another, so I trusted the oldest book I had, so fingers crossed!

The bed on the left is for the legumes. We started some broad beans off in an old grow bag at my Grandad's house and we have transfered them up to the allotment now they are big enough. We've planted a second lot of broad beans directly in to the soil to offer a successional crop..

The new bamboo structure for the runner beans is a big sign that good things are ahead...

Peas have also gone in to the ground and I've put the pea sticks in all ready to hide emerging pea shoots from pigeons, penguins and mice.

At the top of the allotment is one big wide bed, which is going to be 3 smaller beds for sweetcorn, pumpkins and root crops respectively. I just need to source some wood to make the bed divides, but that might not be done until the end of May or the beginning of June. It looks a bit messy, plenty more preperation needed before the end of the month..

So, although I keep saying 'in the summer..' the first rewarding signs of growth and the first harvest of raddish are already upon us. Looking back, there is life all over the plot. Broad beans, peas, potatoes, onions, shallots and garlic are all growing well in the ground. I can't wait for Amy to see what the allotment will look like in the summer, it's going to be spectacular. I promise!

Visit us again soon to see our amazing new soft fruit area!

Thanks again!

Martin