Torrential Rain!

Well with this unending rain we've had this last week I haven't been able to get up to the allotment, and well that can only mean one thing... *drum roll*... weeds! - and lots of them!

However it has meant that everything else is now recovering after the heat wave. Having transplanted the squash and cucumber, they didn't react that well, especially with the heat, and some of the leaves had burnt and turned brown, however with this latest influx of rain new shoots have now appeared, so it seems all is not lost!



My onions are doing really well... the stems are now really thick and healthy, although not much sign of a bulb yet, fingers crossed! - for future I need to leave more room for potatoes - they're starting to encroach, this is because the rain has pushed the potatoes outwards not upwards.


As you can see I culled a bit and that patch on the left is where the rows vanished. My potatoes are looking very healthy!

Here you can see the full extent of the encroachment, I would also leave more room between the potato rows in future - it'll make harvesting easier.

These were the plants that I was donated, and when I first got them it was the incredibly hot patch and they didn't look as if they were going to survive, but they have flourished and are now outgrowing the net I have placed over them - mum's been away for a week and now she's back I'll get her help at putting a bigger net up - trying to do it on your own is impossible! The same goes for the peas, I can't believe how well they've grown!!

This is the healthiest of the squashes I transplanted (1 of 3) although you can see the burnt leaf there, but you can see the new shoot just above the string in the middle - apparently squashes do really well.

This is the only cucumber I got out of a whole row - doesn't help being a newbie and not knowing what you're looking for. Next year - everything is being started in biodegradable pots!! It's doing okay, not as well as I'd like though.

Again this is the only courgette I got from a whole row, I did have more but the weeds strangled them, again you can see the burnt leaf due to the heat, but it's working hard at getting there. As you can see weeds like growing close to my crops. That one didn't last long!


My parsnips are doing well - there are quite a few of them, and they're doing better than I was expecting them to - so yeah *fingers crossed* that they keep doing as well!

I had planted some garlic and they are doing very well, considering I got it off the market and it just sprouted I couldn't have asked for better.

The other side of my plot is beckoning as the weeds are huge now on that side, so I'll strim it and cover it in black plastic, probably till next year now (how depressing is that considering it's only June/almost July).

Desiree

Well the potatoes are doing really well! As you can see they keep doubling in size, and the flowers as unattractive as they are - are looking great! I've harvested some, one off each plant, which worked quite well. They're Desiree so you can cook them practically anyway. So far I've roasted and baked some - lovely. Given some to two friends, and the one I saw today said she "delicious" so that's always a good start :-)



The onions as well are looking fantastic and really healthy - the actual bulbs are tiny, but that'll come later (I hope)... there are about 50 I think.


I couldn't believe how well these brassicas had grown since I was last up there... with the rain they've done really well and have actually outgrown the netting, but until mum gets back from holiday I'm not going to attempt cutting anymore - it was hard enough the first time on my own! So yes the brussel sprouts and cabbages are doing well - although as I was given them I have no idea which are which at the moment :-S


You might notice quite a difference from the last few pics I've taken. That's because I went on a bit of a cull. The rows next to the potatoes were really covered in weeds, so I rescued what I could, which out of three rows ended up with 1 cucumber and 1 courgette, and moved them to the far left row, which the rest is garlic. Also in the 2nd row to the left is parsnips and now squash, which apparently none of them like being transplanted as they all looked weeping the day after :-(. In that patch I've now spread some wild flowers.


Okay ignore the weeds, but the peas are looking fantastic, although I need to retie the string as it looks drab. It won't be too long before I start encouraging the peas where to grow - again they need renetting... and they have been weeded!!!


The overview of the plot - it lets you see just quite how well the potatoes are doing!

If only one could eat weeds...

Well having not been up to the allotment in a week due to exams I find the allotment a foot high in weeds. One person said "Don't see them as weeds see them as green manure"... except for it's mainly bind weed, which unless I want even more of the things then I'm not going to compost.

Yes that field of green you can see is indeed half of my plot... eek! Only a week ago that was one or two weeds, if only we could eat weeds then the world's population would never go hungry again! I'm going to have to strim it - when indeed someone with a key to the main shed turns up, and then cover it with black plastic, luckily at the moment there is nothing I particularly want to plant bar some corn flowers which I can put down at anytime.



The joys of being blond and fair skinned means I get burnt very easily, I've only just got rid of the burn lines from the last time... not going to happen again! And the sunglasses is to stop hayfever, not a good thing to have on an allotment when you're pulling up weeds...


This is the little herb garden I have, I have a ceramic pot I need to plant the rosemary in. Slugs and snails love herb gardens be forewarned, and the easiest thing as nasty as it is is slug pellets, does the job very very easily!



My potatoes are doing fantastically well, they're really strong plants... this is the Desiree type so a main crop, which is okay, just takes a little while longer for them to grow, next to them on the left out of the picture is another row half the height which I planted later on so as to get a stunted harvest time...That green patch infront of the chairs isn't my plot... well the front foot is but the bit in front of that isn't... it's where everyone parks their cars... and that red and blue monstrosity is the shed for the local garden volunteers (we back onto the downs) but my shed will soon be blocking it on those paving slabs :D


The latest addition, as of today is that bench, we've had it for years at our old house and now it has a new home... the fun of getting that up to the allotment in my little Peugeot (albeit I can't drive yet haha... ) was most interesting, we had tied the boot down with string which snapped half way to the allotment... fun fun fun!! I'm planning on putting the cornflowers just in front of it.


That's my plot, with the neighbors plot... their plot puts everyone else's to shame, seriously raised beds, and all so neat and trim, but they do have 4 plots dotted around the area so you'd expect them to be pros. Those rows of greenery are where I've planted things and don't know what I'm looking for, so waiting for some sign of normality, so far no luck :(

The dog with her bright pink bowl... looks garish I know but in the middle of a plot it's easy for both us and her to find.

As you can see the weeds really took hold, at the front it's meant to be Beetroot, Squash and Brussel Sprouts... yeah no joy... well that's not quite true, they're doing well.



The left side before weeding...


The right side after weeding. I filled 6 bin bags today with weeds, and hardly seem to have made a dent... joys eh! Well I'll update you again soon.

Intro

Hey,

Well I'm Alex and I took on an allotment about 6 months ago now. The plot I got given was originally the dumping area for everyone else's weeds and general rubbish, so there was a lot of clearing to be done, I thought I had got ontop of it ok, and was doing well... I'd dug it all over,
pulling out the weeds I could get hold of.



Then I went on holiday for a week, and when I came back, lets just say all the soil you can see above was as green as the grass patch is. In the end mum and I agreed we needed to have it rotavated to do it properly, however we did dig over the top right part ourselves so that we could get planting before it was too late. So it started off looking like:

The two mounded piles on the left being potatoes. However sadly the weeds grew up again around the other rows and I had to abandon them. However the potatoes started to grow really well, which wasn't quite as depressing as it could have been.

Then I planted up onions to the right of the potato mounds, and to the left is spring onions, courgettes, cucumbers, and parsnips. With another row of potatoes in between to allow for a scattered harvest. The thing with courgettes and cucumbers is that when they first germinate you can't easily tell them apart from weeds, so those rows are very weedy, and I'm just waiting for them to grow a bit larger to tell them apart.

Then I started to clear the bit of land below this, I needed to plant the squash and the beetroot which I did, as well as planting some carrots to germinate in the pots at the top.

Time was ticking on, so a friend of mine kindly gave me some bamboo canes, and I set about putting up the bamboo teepees for the runner beans and sweet peas, I've got 5 canes of each. Below this I made a mini tent shape out of sticks I found and these will be for the peas. The weather on the day I did this was unbearable sun and humidity and I now have lovely lines on my arms where my top stopped, although they're just starting to fade at last!!
The onions are now growing incredibly well as are the potatoes, it's really nice to get up there and see these rows of bushy potatoes and the onions in their neat little lines, really gives you a feeling of self achievement, having seen what it looked like initially.

People at the allotment are great, and so keen to give you tips and just generally talk about life, it's nice to go up there and get away from everything. Then there is the occasional chat with people to give your back a break from trying to pull up all the blasted weeds. The guy opposite me has said I can borrow his hose whenever I need to, which saves about 45 minutes in watering. And the guy next to him with two plots gave me 10 brussel sprouts and cabbage to plant, and a tray of leeks to grow up, which was great, as otherwise it would have been far too late to plant them. Things are really taking shape and it's brilliant!!