24 January 2010 - Earth Stood Hard as Iron

We've been through one of the coldest winters for 30 years (they say). These pictures were taken on 7 January. From 17 December to 18 January, effectively a whole month of snow, frost, ice and below freezing. It's just not what happens these days in winter. Apart from the inconvenience, moaning and groaning and general annoyance (not to mention cold), it also meant that it was too inclement to do anything meaningful at the plot for some time other than try and find snow-covered harvest. Which is a shame because January is quite a nice time to pootle about on the plot, doing structural things and such.

Yet again, the Pagoda stood firm where others buckled (the photo shows a view from inside). We think it's got something to do with the windbreak provided by the hedge behind us. Apart from the magnificent workmanship obviously.

What we have done is to organise our plan for the growing year ahead, putting seeds into alphabetical order, etc, in their new water-tight container, compiling the spreadsheet and so forth. We are definitely going to try to be more sustainable this year, within limits. The new seeds have arrived from T&M and represent a new start to our growing endeavours. And we have added celery, shallots and First Earlies to the list (we forgot to order these). First Earlies are the faithful Arran Pilot, purchased from Homebase. They look to be good healthy seed potatoes - much better than the ones we had last year, if memory serves. Jan and Pat are going to try celery too - so we can learn together. (Long-term readers will recall that we grew celery in our first year but that's because we were too scared to say no when they were proffered at the Garden Trading Hut. These will be grown from seed and started in the greenhouse.)

Another issue we need to address is how far we talk about the greenhouse in this blog. Do we only discuss those issues related to the plants that end up on the plot? Or are we extending the franchise to our garden, where (we hope) to be growing various peppers, aubergine, tomatoes, cucumber and melon? It might be all too much information. Maybe we should retain some mystery and privacy.

Anyhoo. Today was the first day for ages that we went to the plot and did some developmental things. Firstly, we planted our garlic in bed 5 - 44 cloves of Marco and (I think) 55 cloves of our very own Solent White (prizewinning ahem) harvest from last year - just under 100. We think we overdid it last year and have planted the cloves closer together. 4 cloves of elephant garlic have been put on the bank. We look anxiously under the pile of compost for the rhubarb. No sign at all. Hmmm.

Secondly, we dug bed 6 (which has overwintering green manure) ready for its new existence as a carrot/parsnip bed. We also dug up all the remaining (tiny) carrots from the current bed and have enriched the soil with leaf mould and chicken manure for the strawberries which will be moved soon. (Oh and last weekend, apart from harvest, we bought some strawberries back in pots to grow in the greenhouse for that special early crop. Everyone will hate us.)

We are very disappointed in the kale which seemed to have been attacked and have pulled it up. Do not buy this variety of seed again. What a shame - it was such a star turn last year. The leeks are fantastic and the chard is having a little think about things but will no doubt get going again. We are going to be entering the hungry gap soon, and with no sprouting broccoli or kale, we are a little under vegg-ed. But we'll be OK with our stored potatoes, squash, frozen veg and garlic.

The Arran Pilots (14) are in their egg boxes cosy in the greenhouse. Avanti!!

(We find this blog to be very useful to check back on when we did things or if we have forgotten how much/what we planted. It's not just to entertain our public. As we enter the third growing year, we are building a unique record of cultivation for posterity. Wotever.)

3 January 2010 - Happy New Decade Folks!

Happy New Year and Decade to All Our Readers! We hope that your year and decade will be productive and fruitful - and that ours will be rewarded by less slugs and more crops. We post a celebratory picture of our pumpkin's dramatic demise at Mr B's bonfire party event.

Since we last posted, we went on a trip to Canada to celebrate N's mum's birthday with all the family. Great fun to see everyone. We gave a jar of our chutney to N's mum and sister respectively as a reminder of the plot. So the allotment was never far from our minds. After we returned at the end of November, winter had well and truly struck and indeed has not let up much since. All we have done in the last few weeks is to tidy the last summer plants away (RIP the noble Autumn Broccoli only yesterday), harvest (leeks, chard, cabbage and kale) and stroke our chins a lot about the plan for next year.

We were somewhat hacked off to find that the shoebox we kept our seed collection in had got damp. So we threw the lot out and K spent an hour ordering on-line (around £120 worth - ouch) - including potatoes and garlic. We have kept pumpkin, squash, runner bean and climbing bean seeds from last year but have had to start from scratch for everything else. So what did we order?

Garlic : Elephant Garlic - 12 cloves - Spring Planting
Garlic : Spring Planting - 4 large bulbs (to be supplemented by some of our existing harvest)
Aubergine : Black Enorma F1 - 1 packet
Basil : Basilico Genovese (Ocimum minimum) - 1 packet
Bean : Climbing : Borlotto Lingua di Fuoco ( Firetongue) - 1 packet
Bean : Dwarf French Bean : Purple Teepee - 1 packet
Borage : Hardy Annual Herb - 1 packet
Brassica : Petit Posy Mix™ - 1 packet
Cabbage : Savoy January King - 1 packet
Cabbage : Spring : Advantage F1 - 1 packet
Carrot : Autumn King 2 - 1 packet
Carrot : Carrot Fly Free Collection - 3 packets - 1 of each
Calabrese : Aquiles F1 Hybrid (Summer-Autumn) - 1 packet
Chili Pepper : Meek and Mild (Poblana type - Mildly Hot) - 1 packet
Chili Pepper : Collection - 3 packets - 1 of each
Courgette : Soleil F1 Hybrid - 1 packet
Courgette : Defender F1 Hybrid - 1 packet
Cucumber : Cucino F1 Hybrid - 1 packet
Rocket : Apollo - 1 packet
Oregano - 1 packet
Kale : Scarlet - 1 packet
Leaf Beet : Duo - 2 packets - 1 of each
Leek : Autumn Giant 2 - Porvite - 1 packet
Lettuce : Culinary Collection : Nice 'n' Spicy - 1 packet
Lettuce : Green Hearting Mixed - 1 packet
Mangetout Pea : Oregon Sugar Pod - 1 packet
Melon : Tigger - 1 packet
Onion : Bunching/Spring : Performer - 1 packet
Onion : Red Baron - 1 packet
Pak Choy : Purple F1 Hybrid - 1 packet
Parsnip : Gladiator F1 - 1 packet
Pea : Garden : Kelvedon Wonder - 1 packet
Pepper : Chili/Moderate : Padron (The Tapas Pepper) - 1 packet
Pepper : Sweet : Gypsy F1 - 1 packet
Radish : Flamboyant Sabina (Cylindrical) - 1 packet
Spinach : Palco F1 - Organic - 1 packet
Squash : Winter : Festival F1 Hybrid - 1 packet
Sweetcorn : Honey Bantam Bicolour (30) F1 - 1 packet
Tomato : Balconi Collection - 2 packets - 1 of each
Tomato : Ailsa Craig - 1 packet
Tomato : Blight Resistant Duo - 2 packets - 1 of each
Sweet Potato : Twin Pack (T65 & Beauregard Improved) - 10 slips - 5 of each
Potato : Sarpo Mira - 20 tuber pack
Potato : Orla - 10 tuber pack
Onion Set Santero
Potato Blue Danube

You did ask.

I see now that we have omitted celery which we wanted to have another go at properly this year. You will also note that we have included peppers, cucumber, aubergine and melon as well as tomatoes for the greenhouse - this will be our first growing year with the benefit of the greenhouse. Indeed, we already have mange tout, red cabbage, pansy, spinach and sweet pea seedlings in the greenhouse, shivering away. So plenty going on.

I rather like the end of Christmas and the beginning of the new year. Although we cannot perceive it yet, the sun is setting later - spring will come despite the current cold weather. Why it is being referred to as a "cold snap' by weather forecasters beats me - it is far from being snappy. We've had snow, frost and below freezing temperatures over the last two and a half weeks, and it isn't even February.

The new year means getting your seeds, shed and plans sorted out, and your tools cleaned and sharpened. It means looking back at the things that went wrong as well as celebrating the achievements (which reminds me - I have to complete the harvest spreadsheet - no, seriously). It touches me that every meal we still have something from the plot (potatoes, garlic, squash) - and yesterday brought back a full carrier bag of produce (leeks, carrots, cabbage, kale, chard). Even during the winter, we can eat fresh veg and if we fancy a touch of summer, we have some locked up in the freezer. What's not to love about having an allotment?

Canadian blog

Weird. Blogging about the allotment but sitting in Canada. It's an experiment.

25 October 2009 - A little catching up to do

Well dear Reader - no doubt some of you will have despaired of ever hearing from us again. It has been too long, and time has flown on by in ever increasing haste, tempus fugit. We now see gold and red trees, leaves being blown here and there and ... yes, the autumn heatwave is about to descend. Temperatures of around 20 deg C are forecast for this week. Not sure whether this is a good or a bad thing, especially as we now have harvested all our squash, and Fat Boy, who needed his very own transport home. Well, Keats did describe autumn as "close bosom friend of the maturing sun" so I guess it's OK.

Mostly the work has been to take down the trappings of summer (bean poles etc), lift spent plants (corn, the final courgette and rather sadly nasturtiums, etc), generally tidy the facility areas and make the most of the now definitely diminishing produce. Where once we could hardly stagger home with the produce we could pick in a week, it is now down to the odd cabbage or bit of broccoli, a handful of chard and of course the ever dependable raspberries. We dug up the maincrop potatoes a couple of weeks back - quite a lot of damaged tubers (slugs) and tiny holes, but we think there's enough to keep us going for a good long while.

As is normal this time of year, we have also of course been looking to the future, and have now added to the red over-wintering onions (Electric) with some yellow ones (Sokyu??). So we should have 100 onions come May time. Today we sowed a couple of rows of overwintering peas in bed 2 (Meteor) which should be ready in May too. We have saved some pods from the beans with the hope that they will serve again next year (very good practice, btw - sustainable growing and all that).

As is also becoming normal for us tenders of the soil, we have spent some time huming and ha-ing over next year's Grand Plan for the plot. Crop rotation we are beginning to discover is a bit of a pain. You are meant to follow the same pattern - Brassicas, Others, Roots. Only trouble is that we have an odd number of beds and frankly we don't want to eat that many brassicas - there is much more in Others we like to eat (corn, garlic, onions, peas, beans, etc). So there is some fudging about what is going where, though we have kept as far as possible to the pure aspiration of the three groups. It doesn't help that the horticultural authorities seem to differ as to what goes into the groups, though the definitions of Brassica seem pretty consistent. We have diligently manured and now covered the beds that are going to sleep for a few months. The plan will be shared with you in due course.

We wonder about how to use the bank next year. Quite honestly we weren't overwhelmed with the potatoes, a lot of which had tiny holes in. They are lovely to eat of course. Potatoes were a good bet as the rabbits don't like 'em and anything else we put there will be vulnerable. We are considering really going for it on the bank and clearing it of weeds which makes it very difficult to cultivate, and properly composting etc. N envisages squash and beans on the bank. I'm more cautious, given its proximity to wildlife.

So, our end of year report looks something like this:

GOOD GUYS Garlic, beans, courgettes, corn, strawberries, raspberries, broccoli, chard, last year leeks, this year leeks, cabbage, squash, last year kale, potatoes
COULD DO BETTER Shallots, onions, apples, peas, parsnips, this year kale (though there is still time), potatoes, blueberries, loganberry

Ever onward in the quest for excellence!

30 September 2009 - Harvest shmarvest

A busy couple of weeks on the plot, aided by beautiful autumnal weather and punctuated by energetic communal effort on reinforcing our site with Council-donated fencing. Hard work from the various willing volunteers with just a bit left to do. We at last have made a noticeable impact on protecting our site - by ourselves.

N took some pictures last week of an artistic bent so they will be appearing in their own gallery in a separate posting. Meanwhile, we have been consuming broccoli (yes, still - even though most are now uprooted), cabbage (white and red and they are huge), beans, beans and more beans, courgettes, raspberries galore, corn (yummy when eaten raw - how sad that we have only just discovered this), parsnips, onions, tomatoes, chard, carrots and of course, potatoes. It is truly astonishing how much produce one small plot can supply.

We are beginning to do the autumn clearing bit by bit. It's odd how one day is broadly summer and the next - just by a hint - declares the beginning of the end. The courgettes have slowed down and are covered with downy mildew. We have cleared away one of the squash plants and its fruits for storage. The other is going great guns and has produced 12 offspring. One lot of beans is finished and we'll leave them up to get pods for next year. We've left the maincrops in the ground still but one of the beds is half empty and covered with good manure. On the right is a picture of one of our compost heaps with the leeks on top that we left to flower. When we pulled them up they had little bulb thingies at the bottom.

We're very pleased with the late sowing of runner beans which have been prodigious and the lovely apples about to be harvested. A triumph of hope over adversity. Also with the emergence of spring cabbage seedlings in - where else - the carrot bed, which we think we will make into the strawberry bed next year, as they are hard to weed in the Pagoda. We have cleaned and prepared the seed bed to accommodate overwintering onions - a red variety - and we are doing these as sets for the first time as an experiment. And, just to keep us on our toes, the old strawberry patch we think will be the new seedbed. This means we won't have to run the gauntlet of the raspberries to get to the seedlings next year - currently I have scratches all up my arms as they are very prickly.

What is so good about our plot is that there is always an answer to the question "where shall we put X". Often we come up with something quite unexpected (see above paragraph). Why should the seedbed always be the seedbed? Why can't the strawberries move? N is contemplating making a new carrot bed at the top where we now have green manure, rye grass. We are lords of this plot and we can decide - always observing where possible the primary laws of crop rotation.

While the summer crops are beginning to doze, the winter crops are beginning to look more feisty. The leeks are definitely improved as are the kale and winter cabbages. We think that we should be able to leave the few carrots in situ until needed, a lesson sadly learned with our parsnips, which have not stored well. It is at this stage that we realise that our winter crops do not include brussels sprouts which N loves with his Christmas dinner. We shall have to barter.

On the home preservation front, we have made another lot of chutney and pickled red cabbage. The neighbours have kindly donated some apples from their enormous tree so we will no doubt make some chutney - that's Christmas sorted then. The garlic is all plaited and neat and tidy looking, and has already received commendation in addition to the mighty victory in the Show. We endeavour to use our produce as much as possible, for example, in a beautiful minestrone soup or braised red cabbage and apple. Mostly we manage to keep on top of it and nothing is wasted which is the main thing.

12 September 2009 – Dig for Victory!

The 2009 St Stephen's Gardening Club Show drawn to a close, leaving us contemplating a strategy for next year.

We entered seven categories:

• parsnips - our finest three from those we dug on the weekend
• courgettes (zucchini) - three of our yellow variety
• garlic – our five best, out of 180 or so bulbs harvested this year. Entered in the 'Any Other Vegetable' category; it seems to us that garlic deserves its own category, but we think the categories must be those hand down by the Royal Horticultural Society
• jam – which K boiled down from several pounds of strawberries
  
• tomatoes – five of our greenhouse variety – in the Novice category, Novice entry being an option for those who have not previously won a Novice category
• raspberries – 12 on a plate, again Novice
• hand-knitted garment – K's birthday jumper for her sister, borrowed back for the show.

No doubt you'll be anxious to hear the results. On tenterhooks, I imagine.

Parsnips: overshadowed by other entries. Not even the courtesy of a Post-It Note. Ours were thicker, the winners were longer. To each his own.

Courgettes: we knew our three weren't very precisely matched in size, but we thought they seemed fresher, more exciting than their fellow entries. Result: Third Prize. No shame there.









Garlic: the competition included a giant pumpkin, sweetcorn and several squashes - eight entries overall, so the most competition. Result: First Prize. "Yes, we can!"















Jam: No prize, but a Post-It Note saying: "tastes good but a little stiff". Again, it must be pointed out, to each his own.














Tomatoes: First Prize! K's twice-daily watering has paid off! Now that we have the greenhouse, ready for a full season next year, nothing can stop us from Tomato Supremacy.














Raspberries: A respectable Second Prize.
















Hand-knitted garment: Third Prize. We feel the judges have a weakness for frou-frou over Vision and Execution.


We feel that The Future Belongs to Us. We're ready to take on the Big Boys. Bring on next year's show.

6 September 2009 - Bumper crops threaten to engulf house

Phew! We just can't keep up. There's so much to do at the moment with the harvesting, the pickling, the decisions about who to dispense to and the freezing. The overflow freezer in the attic is already nearly full. We have donated veg to various colleagues, friends, neighbours and family and still we can't keep up. Last weekend was our camping Bank Holiday and we provided the main ingredients for the camp curry.

We were visited on Friday by K's sister and godson, L, who was extremely helpful on the plot, particularly when collecting beans. He had an amusing distaste for two courgettes which I cut for him which were not quite perfect - so much so that he attempted to repatriate them under the plant of origin. I relieved him of anxiety by taking them on myself. The visitors went away with a bag full of potatoes, broccoli, beans, courgettes, the first red cabbage (albeit a bit sluggy) and raspberries. It was lovely to see them enjoying the plot.

We definitely have more varied produce this year. The challenge is to find new ways of cooking - beans beans beans and more beans. The garlic is now fully dried and cleaned and ready for the dreaded plaiting exercise. It took 4 hours to clean it all - you have to cut the bottom thingy off and scrape off the dirty top layer so that the bulb looks like it does in the shops. They don't tell you about that.

We've also had the challenge of cooking a pumpkin that we rashly purchased from another allomenteer a few weeks back. Very lovely soup (enough for several days), a pilav and lots of cooked pulp to add to the groaning freezer. And we have the gigantic monster on the bank which is looking to be our very best yet. It has been christened it Fat Boy. The picture on the left is N with our very first parsnip, dug a couple of weeks ago. This was a random seedling in one of the beds. It has an interesting structure. Imagine our joy and surprise this morning when we tentatively dug up on of the pampered parsnips to find it long and true - and eminently show-worthy. We displayed it to Jan who let out a little shriek of admiration (and no doubt envy). So the nasty thing that ate the carrots from the inside out didn't destroy our parsnips and the special treatment worked. We dug them all up and have three worthy of The Show. The others can be stored. Woo hoo. I dream of a whole bed of parsnips next year. We will take a special picture of all the produce we will put into The Show, still a closely guarded secret, so you can see our lovely parsnips then.

Other news - we've dug up most of the second earlies now. They are a bit disappointing, in that they are big and nearly all have little holes. But edible nonetheless. After watching Gardeners World, we take off the blighty foliage of the maincrops and weed the whole bed. We'll leave them in until the first frost then dig 'em up. We also harvested the rest of the onions a couple of weeks back. Most of them are like spring onions and are not what we thought they were going to be. This is where the greenhouse will help - getting a head start and starting them under glass is, we realise, the way forward for good big onions.

We ponder sowing green manure on an empty bit in one of the beds and then I realise with a shock - that we have to have a plan for next year to know what to do with the beds as they finish this year. It may be better to leave it depending on what we intend to grow. You really have to think ahead. It's already the start of autumn and you can see the first signs of it on the plot. Two of the three apples on one tree have dropped, leaving one enormous fruit. The coxes are probably ready to pick although some of them have "issues".

The butternut squash is doing fine. The fruits are hardening up and we did some trimming off the shoots that aren't going to produce anything new. The leeks are still looking a little unhappy but we remain confident that their time will come. Next year we will experiment with leeks that come into their own earlier in the year. We discover to our surprise a rogue courgette plant amongst the squash which is harbouring what can only be described as a marrow. We had our first corn last week - very nice if a tad underripe.

Beans are still coming from the main patch and the runner beans on the wigwams are really getting into their stride now, as are raspberries. We were too tired to strim today - having weeded the beds, harvested and tidied up we have just enough strength to lug home our produce, whereupon we had to make instant managerial decisions as to its fate.

One of the questions to ponder is - whether to grow more of the crops next year that last over winter (roots, potatoes, kale, cabbage, leek) and less of the more ephemeral stuff (beans, courgette). We're hopeful that the transplanted winter cabbage and kale will be OK but will they be enough to keep us going? Another question that we have been actively addressing is our consumption of meat. Without really discussing it, we have drastically reduced our meat intake - partly because we have so many other things to eat, partly because red meat is a prime contributor to global warming. It's odd to think of meat as a sort of special treat but it's surprisingly easy to get used to.

And we had our second Allotment Association barbecue this weekend too which was great fun. Doesn't time fly when you're drowning in vegetables!