I've managed to harvest something! I will have some results for 2012!

So I took the plunge and emptied the tub of potatoes that I'd been growing in the greenhouse, not a brilliant amount but at least there were a few decent sized spuds, which I have since had some for my tea.  The variety was Rocket  and I managed to get a grand sum of 778g of potatoes.  I'd forgotten to change the setting to lbs, but this is about 1.7lb of spuds.  I even took a picture....

I might have a go at digging up one of the plants at the plot tomorrow, they have flowers on them and it was 11 weeks ago that I planted them.

I've also made a little more progress on the bottle house, there is still the back panels to fill, I'll most likely have one finished off tomorrow, I might even put in some of my tomatoes tomorrow whilst I'm at the allotment as they are getting pretty big now and really need to be in their final positions, so here is what it is looking like at the moment.

I think I have wooly aphid

My apple tree has got a white fungal almost foam type substance on it, its sticky to the touch. I've googled it and I think it's something called wooly aphid, can anyone confirm....

If it is wooly aphid would I have to move it away from the other trees I have in buckets?

Walk around the Plot with Samson & Delilah's Lottie Antics (June 2012 update)

So after my tales of woe yesterday and feeling rather sorry for myself, for which I apologise, lets face it you don't pop over to hear  me moan; you visit because ya wanna know what's going on.  Well let me show you, June video update, hope you enjoy

June 2012 update

Yet More Rain on the Way!!

Well folks, I'm beginning to believe that this year is a non starter.  I look at some blogs and they're miles and miles ahead of me, their plants flourishing whilst mine are very slow to make any growth, well except the broad beans, they're doing pretty good.  Yet other blogs look like they're having the same slow start to me, I wonder if they are thinking along the same lines, make do and start again next year?

Today we are at the summer solstice, yet funnily enough we haven't had any summer to speak of, tonight the skies were dark when at the same time on other nights they have been bright and the night quite light and we are in reality now heading towards darker nights and towards autumn and winter.  Gosh somebody shoot me, I'm so pessimistic, I'm really beginning to get annoyed with the whole weather situation.  I took a fortnight leave over Easter and it rained, I took another week for the Jubilee celebrations/half term and it rained.... it's generally dry Monday through Wednesday and then it rains for the rest of the week, well this is quite exasperating when you work all week and only get the weekend to make any progress on the plot.  How are others feeling?

Ok, cheer up, look at the positives... Broad Beans - Yeah, Potatoes - Yeah, Strawberries - Yeah and even a couple of Gooseberries - Yeah, and a big YEAH to the bottle house!!!

I've done a video for you, this months tour, when I've managed to upload it onto YouTube i'll post it for you so you can see it... Here's a picture of how the bottle house is looking.

A Roof!!!

Welcome to Carrie and erickett124, it's nice that you have found me and I hope you find my journey interesting enough to stick around.

SO today I have done some more work on the bottle house... I have the roof complete now and am starting to fill in the sides.  Here is how it's looking.

A Roof in Place

A Bright n Early Start ...

Today I was on the allotment for 9am, I wanted to get the grass on the surrounding area cut down with the strimmer, the council haven't been into our section at all this year and it was getting ridiculous, every time you went to the water tap you got soaked (after it had rained), you couldn't walk around the area without getting the bottom of your trouser legs wet, and this isn't good when you have to go every morning before work to feed the chickens, as I do.  Getting to the bee hives was a joke, the grass was nearing 3-4 ft tall.  Anyhow, I decided enough was enough and strimmed it down, it took an absolute age, and was back breaking.  The stimmer is a petrol one that is used by the likes of the council, and professional gardeners, it was bought (second hand) using some of the grant money we attained last year.  It cut through the grass like a knife through hot butter.  I only managed to get one side of the area done (the side my plot is on LOL) and will finish off the other side another day as I wanted to get things done on my plot also.

So in between the strimming, I sowed some more carrots, not many of my first batch have come through, I did do them some time ago before the soil had warmed up and then we had all that rain for April and most of May so in reality most of the seeds were either waterlogged or washed away.  I've made myself a 'carrot' template, I took the idea from 'Annie's Granny' of Annie's Kitchen Garden, hope she doesn't mind.  Granny makes seed mats, but to be honest with you I don't have the time or patience to make these so I made my own version.........

 My Carrot Template

 Close Up of Sowing Holes

Carrots from 1st Batch Coming Through

The template measures just under 4ft by 3ft (if I remember rightly) and each of the holes have been drilled so they are 3" apart.  It gives you 165 sowing stations.  All I need do is place it on top of the soil and sprinkle some seeds into each hole, lift up the template and then scatter over some compost and water.  It saves (hopefully) the need to thin them out so much.  I also sowed some more broad beans and another 3 rows of peas, from my 1st lot of peas only 2 germinated, that's 2 peas from about 160, what did I do wrong?????? 

All in all a tiring day, I left just after 4 totally shattered, I've now got my feet up catching up on some blogs, watching Spain v Italy on the Euro's.  About to have some tea, and a nice hot bath.  It's back to work tomorrow, how nice! NOT...

Weather - 4 Year Cycle (I blame the Olympics!) & an Update

I love looking back over people's blogs, specially new ones that I've found, reading what they've been up to and looking at how they've done, or haven't done.  Anyhow, I found this blog and I was reading it, but I had to double check the date, were we in 2012?  No it was actually in 2008 but the weather was very typical of how it has been this season, e.g. April - cold start, warming up towards the end of the month.  May - Lovely warm start with highs of 22.5 degrees Celsius, but wait....it ended with days of rain and temperatures dropping to around 13 degrees... is this all sounding familiar?  June - again typically colder than average temperatures and the result for that year was a cold summer, with temperatures only reaching late teens, not a very good year for growing by all accounts. So, is this what we have to look forward to; a cold summer?  Oh and by the way, they had an Olympics that year too... so I'm blaming it on the Olympics, roll on another 4 years, LOL.

Back to the present day then, I have put on another four roof panels on the bottle house, it is starting to come together.  I'm going to have to sort out some kind of support for the middle supports of the roof.  With the weight of the panels on the back side it is pulling on the middle supports and tilting to one side.  When I have put up the two panels on the front facing side, I have had to put these in the middle positions with a hope to counteract the weight on the supports, once I have the final two in position I will assess it more, but I think to be on the safe side I'll have to sort something out, else I may come down one day and the roof will be in next doors allotment, I don't think they'll be too pleased about that.  Here is a quick picture of how it is coming on.

Six Roof Panels Attached

I've put up my bean supports, and direct planted some French Beans and some Runner Beans.  I have done this down one side of each set of supports, I have also sowed (have I spelt that right?) some Runner Beans in pots in the greenhouse, I will plant out these along the other side of the structure.  Hopefully this will give me differing cropping times, we'll see.  Additionally,  I sowed some Borlotti (French) Beans in the greenhouse, these are to go on the other side of the direct planted ones, these will be left on the plant for picking at the end of the season and drying for stews etc in the winter.  When I pull up my Garlic and Shallots towards the end of the month, I will plant another crop of French Beans, dwarf varieties in the bed which they vacate.  I may even try some in the little polytunnel I have (this isn't ready yet, area still to be dug over and cover put on).

Bean Frames

I've direct sowed some more parsnips.  My first batch which I pre-chitted at home and planted into peat pots were quite successful and these have been planted out and looking quite nice.  Thinking it was going well I tried to do the same again, but only about two seeds germinated, so I tried again, this time none of the seeds germinated.  I've given it one more chance using some free seeds which I got with a magazine only a couple of weeks ago, so the seeds would be viable you'd think.  I've put two/three seeds per station and will thin (hopefully) to one per station if and when they germinate.  I'm not sure with parsnip seeds, they say you have to use fresh each year, but I got the seeds last year but hadn't opened them, they had a sow  by date of 2013 so I thought they'd be OK, but apparently not.  I had hoped to plant out my brassica plants, but the rain came and boy did it come.  I'd dodged the rain all day yesterday and again this morning, but when I returned after some lunch the rain gods were not playing... 

More Work on the Bottle House

So today I spent my diamond jubilee EXTRA HOLIDAY (thanks Lizzie) working on another two sections of the bottle house roof.  The sections measure 4ft x 4ft (don't know if I've mentioned that in another post), and are composed of 2" x 2" wood, treated, there are 11 rows of bottles each row is composed of 5 bottles (1 whole and 4 with the bottoms cut off), so each roof section needs 55 bottles in total.  There are 8 roof sections and therefore the roof needs a total of 440 bottles (wow!).  Each  bottle needs it's label taken off and washed out, it takes some time just to prep them believe me.

Sad that I am, I timed myself making one of the roof sections, it took me just over an hour to put it together (this doesn't include the bottle prep).  I take 4 lengths of wood, and cut out a small section at each end so that I can fit them together to create a frame.  Each corner has two pilot holes drilled and two 45mm screws inserted to hold them together.  Now for the fun part, each of the 'whole' bottles has a small pilot hole drilled in the bottom, and then they are drilled with a 10mm bit, this creates a hole just large enough for a standard 6ft garden cane to be inserted.  The fun bit is trying to keep hold of the bottle to create the hole without it spinning round on the drill (this takes some practice LOL).

I insert a cane (for the roof I am using some that a friend's Dad grew, slightly thinner than standard canes) into the 'whole' bottle and fix this to the bottom of the frame.  I then put on 4 'bottom-less' bottles and fix the top of the cane to the top of the frame.  Simple.  Repeat another 10 times and then you have your roof section.

 4ft length with section removed

 Lengths all screwed together to create frame

 1st cane attached, this is in the middle of the frame

Finished article!

Working on the Bottle-House

Back at the allotment this afternoon, i'm concentrating on trying to get the bottle-house sorted ready for the tomatoes, chilli's/peppers, aubergines and cucumbers to be planted in it.  I've now completed all the beds (four) with a pebble path going down the middle.  I have also started to build the roof, I've put up two panels so far.  These are taking just a little bit longer than I thought would, but i'll carry on regardless.  I am determined to have it completed by the end of the month.

Four Raised Beds 

 Two Roof Panels Fitted

So Far......

How daft did I feel..... I'd built the roof panels (each measured 4ft x 4ft), fixed on the bottles, and went to put them in the boot of the car to take to the allotment.  Opened the boot, lifted the panel and doh! they were too big, how did I manage that!  So I had to take the side bars off so that they had a bit of flexibility so I could maneuver them into the boot... had a quick look around, was there anyone watching.... I hope not!