Introducing.......Plot 51b

As promised a couple of weeks ago, an update on where I am with the 'new' half plot. You can see what it looked like when TK and me took it on a couple of years ago here. I guess I really started working on it last summer. I had previously tackled an area at the top end of the plot with the vague notion of having a polytunnel. One of the storms put paid to that notion when I saw another one on the site flattened for the second time....our allotment site is on the edge of town with farmland bordering on two sides so it's very open and the wind really races through when it blows!

As the plot was in quite a poor state, the worst weed to deal with has been couch grass and really the best way of dealing with this is to literally remove every root; and when every spadeful you dig up is just a mass of couch grass root system, you know it's going to take a while to make sense of a plot. Before long though I'd dug one bed which equated to about a quarter of the plot. I decided this would be a bed for currant bushes as I loved a blackcurrant cordial I'd made from the berries from my father's garden.

Blackcurrant bed

One bush was inherited on the plot but needed relocating for a second time; this time I made sure I cleared the rootball completely, When we had moved it the first time, in our innocence we just dug it up and replanted it with the result that the poor bush was being smothered by grasses.

A purchase of a proper bush, Ben Nevis, from the now defunct Edible Garden Show, a bargain buy of another variety called Ben Ojebyn and cuttings which had rooted filled the bed nicely. I just need to create some kind of fruit cage to protect them now!

Next job was to try and limit the out of control raspberries to one section, so I've made a bed in the middle of the plot so that I can contain them more. There does seem to be a rogue plant in the bed which I think is a thornless blackberry. It has flower buds forming for the first time this year so hopefully we'll know more soon!

The raspberry bed with the possible thornless blackberry in the foreground

There will be a flower bed but this area is pretty much overgrown still. I did cover it with cardboard to keep the weeds down, but many of them have grown through it as it breaks down.....

At the top of the plot is the lovely shed we inherited from another plotholder. The area next to it is where a couple of fruit trees will go together with the thornless blackberry. The plan is to train it as a cordon along wires between two fence posts. I'm in the process of creating this area at the moment. I'm also planning on erecting that short length of chestnut paling between two of the posts to act as a wind break of sorts. One of the fruit trees is a small pear tree called Little Sweetie from Blackmoor Nursery. It won't ever get bigger than 5ft odd and as it blossoms so much earlier, I figured the more protection I can give it on our open site the better. The other fruit tree is a Victoria Plum, also from Blackmoor. Thank you Santa!

So still very much a work in progress (aren't all allotments?!) but it's starting to take shape.

Plot 51b - April 2017

A New Year and All That..........

It dawned on me this morning that seeing as a new growing season will be upon us before we know it, we've kind of had it easy working on the allotment so far. These first six months have just been about the digging. Ok we managed a small harvest this year, hell we managed to survive on our own grown potatoes for four of those six months! But there hasn't really been any pressure to grow anything.

 

But with the new year just around the corner, we now need to plan ahead and make sure we plant things at the right time.

 

It starts getting serious from now on.....well not serious but it will be important to do things  at the right time. We sowed some spring cabbage seeds a couple of months too late in the hope of growing them over the winter, but at the moment they are still tiny seedlings. We'll plant them out on the plot but I have a feeling they won't amount to much. Time will tell I guess.

 

Father Christmas very kindly brought us a new spade and a composter. Thought he would have given us some seeds too but glad that he didn't as I really wanted to pick the varieties ourselves.

Seed potatoes will be available soon. Think we will have a couple of rows of main crop next year and just one of earlies.

 

So next plan of action will be to plant the spring cabbages out, erect the composter and prepare the bed for the potatoes.

It's been difficult finding the time to fit the allotment in the last week or so and the weather has been quite stormy too, but here's hoping we can get back into a routine in  the new year.

 

Can't wait!

Getting there..............slowly!

Its been a while since I've found a bit of time to post an update on our progress but I can at last say almost all of the plot has now been dug over and that for the first time it is more weed free than full of weeds........

I am realising that even though we have got rid of the worst of the weeds, they keep coming back and Bed 2 that was weed free is green again, mainly because I have neglected to keep on top of the weeds while I continued digging over the other beds.

Although now that the colder weather is here, the weeds are at least taking longer to grow back so hopefully we can put that to rights over the winter months!

 

So from the top of the plot this is where we are now.

 

Bed 1

This had potatoes in this year and I'm really pleased with our harvest.

 

We had been digging up the earlies for a short while. These were the Duke of York variety and they've been ok but I wouldn't grow them again. I think we left them in the ground a bit too long. Still we did get just under 5kg of them from one row.
We also have a row of main crop potatoes, Picasso and these have been really good. A nice tasty potato that has been good for everything. Nearly 8kg from this row.

And we haven't bought any potatoes since the end of August!

 

Bed 2

This has had runner beans, strawberries, carrots and beetroot in it this year. A mixed bag  I know but we have used this bed just so we could have a harvest this year.

We're going to dig up the strawberries and plant new ones in the perennial bed, mainly because they are completely overgrown with grass.

And we had just enough runner beans with just a handful in the freezer. The carrots were small but perfectly formed and we picked most of the beetroot when they were small too. The last of these have been pickled and will be ready in a week.

This bed still has the Swiss chard in it. Never eaten it before so we'll give it a go but we'll probably just dig the plants up when we go over this bed again which is completely green!

 

Bed 3

I finally finished digging this bed yesterday. I had hoped to have had it done by the end of October before the colder weather started but alas we hit a snag. There had been a bit of raised ground in the middle of this bed and when I got to it, I found out why. First off it was where a previous plot owner had decided to have a bonfire.........except a lot of it hadn't burnt properly so there were piles and piles of un-burnt magazines, chunks of wood, you name it. Having dug that out, I hit the next problem............carpet. Yes actual carpet. Not the matting you use to keep weeds down but actual proper carpet. It started in the middle of the plot and went on and on. It took me ages just to find the edges........it went right to the edge of the plot.

And what was worse it had at least 6 inches of soil on top of it and weeds, like mallow, growing through it in places.

 

It was an absolute nightmare and just as I was starting to feel like I was never going to get it up, I had a breakthrough! I was also having to pull it up in bits as it was so large I was never going to be able to lift it in one go.
We then had a stroke of luck as the site had a skip so that a spare plot could be cleared and the manager of the site very kindly took all that horrible carpet and put it in the skip for me!

So having cleared the carpet I was then able to dig the second half of this bed which seems to have taken an eternity!

 

Bed 4

The mesh tunnels arrived in September and so we planted the onions; one row of Shakespeare and one of Troy.

 

 

They took a while to get going, over a month, but are now firmly established.

 

We've planted a second batch with another row of Shakespeare and one of Senshu Yellow we swapped with a friend. These are just starting to sprout now. Its amazing that despite being covered they have still been pushed up in places, must be worms!
As you can see we also have some scaffolding boards for paths now too.

 

Perennial Bed

This is going to be TK's bed as he wants to grow things that keep on growing basically. So he has the rhubarb which was looking really healthy........

 

 

Until we had the storm that never was a few weeks ago.........

 

 

When it took a bit of a beating.

 

We've moved the blackcurrant bush next to it and will move the redcurrant bush in the next week or so.

Then we'll make a new strawberry bed and also prepare a section for some asparagus which I ordered online for delivery next spring.

 

He'll have a bit of space left which we might use for herbs.

 

And the only other news is we have some manure to spread out on a couple of the beds..........four barrows' full for starters.

 

 

So all in all not bad for our first six months!

 

Progess at last!

We really seem to have managed to make good progress with the digging over the last month. The perennial bed is dug, although weeds, particularly couch grass, pops up again just as quickly. It seems to be called twitch grass by other plot holders. It can be a bit disheartening to go over to the allotment and find a lot of it looking green again and not in a good way

I finished digging Bed 4 yesterday. This will hold legumes next year and onions. I bought some onion sets from the shed shop last Sunday. Two varieties: Shakespeare and Troy. All these little beauties for the princely sum of £1!

 

We actually have too many Shakespeare so we're going to swap some with a friend.

As soon as the micro mesh tunnels arrive we'll get these planted. They'll need protecting from the pigeons.

 

So I've started digging Bed 3 which technically is the last bed we need to dig over. Its also the worst. However Bed 2 which we planted some things in is looking a bit weedy again but hopefully it won't take as long to go over it a second time.

 

The parsnips that were already growing in the potato bed (Bed 1) have continued to grow. Some did die back but a few have green leaves still. We pulled one up the other week to see what it looked like and hey presto! We had a parsnip!

 

The runner beans are still going but slowing down. I did have to freeze some the other day though as there were too many for me in one day.

 

We pulled a couple of carrots the other evening and although small, it was reassuring to see they were nice and straight!

 

 

TK complained yesterday that I am making to many homemade things which is bizarre as he likes to help making them! This year we have made strawberry jam and raspberry jam. I used the raspberry jam to make this Gainsborough tart which is something my nana used to make. It has a coconut top

 

 

And yesterday I made millionaires shortbread

 

 

Yum!

Slow Progress

So its been more than a month since I posted. Its been a really busy month with work both the editing and my fabric business so progress on the plot has been a little slow. Before that, believe it or not, it was just too hot for digging; we had temperatures around 30 degrees for several weeks!

I need to take my camera or TK's iPod down to the plot with me to take some photos as my iPhone thinks I don't have any room on it to take photos.

 

So what's been happening this last month?

 

The potatoes are well and truly established. I'm hoping the first earlies will be ready at the beginning of September, although a couple of plants might be ready already.

The first sowing of beetroot and carrots have been thinned and are doing well. Although the second sowing of carrots hasn't germinated much for some reason.

The runner beans have reached the top of the wigwam and the first beans are already 3 or 4 inches long.

We acquired some Swiss chard from a neighbouring plot owner which is just starting to settle in.

 

But the big news was the raspberries. We picked over 6lbs in the end despite the canes needing thinning out and generally needing taking care of. We made some jam with them.

 

Today I finally reached the other side at the bottom of the plot! It feels like I have been digging that section for ages. It was a bit demoralising to come back from a few days away to find it looking quite green again the other day, but a bit of hoeing has sorted that out!

We are now going to make the bottom of the plot a perennial bed. It already has the rhubarb. We will move the two currant bushes down there and I thought we would also put some asparagus in . Rather excitingly, we think we have a small asparagus plant growing in the raspberries!

 

So next post will be a picture post showing our progress, hopefully.

 

Lucky Lucky

We have just been so incredibly lucky with our plot so far. Thanks to the previous plot owners we have been able to harvest and enjoy quite a few things so far without too much sweat and tears on our part.
We are currently trying to keep up with the strawberries. This was our pick the other day!

 

We also have a couple of currant bushes which now the fruit are ripening we can see they are blackcurrants. However the big surprise was that the other bush was a redcurrant!

We picked some fruit the other day but the birds seem to have pinched quite a few since

The bindweed is already starting to come back but the other growth we noticed just a week after sowing......is the beetroot. Can't beat the taste of fresh beetroot!

 

We still have a lot of work to do. Some of the weeds are very high now and have deep roots, but while the days are long, spending an hour or so digging over the ground is actually one of my favourite pastimes at the moment