Harvest Monday!

I just love the thought of pottering around the garden and thinking, mmm I’ll have some potatoes, some lettuce; some broad beans a couple of turnips and a bit of carrot to go with my tea and then being able to pick it straight from your garden. So that is exactly what I did yesterday and I thoroughly enjoyed every last bit of it. If you'd like to share your harvest for the week, join in over at Daphne's and show everyone what you’ve been growing.

I didn’t get to the plot on Saturday but Sunday was glorious so Caleb and I spent all afternoon there, he played with the other children and I did the work, usual story. I earthed up the potatoes, planted out some Cabbages and Cauliflower, a few more Sweetcorn - Mini Pop. I acquired some scaffolding netting and some builder’s Hessian so I’m going to make some cages for the Brassicas, the caterpillars are steadily munching their way through the turnip leaves so I’m going to have to put up some sort of defence.

I had 5 plants which I thought were Cabbage - Greyhound (I’d put in a label saying this) but as they grew, they didn’t look like Cabbages, it’s puzzled me as to what they were so I’ve not planted them yet. Whilst looking through one of my books, I noticed a picture of the leaves on a Celeriac; these were the same leaves on my little plants. So now I’m wondering if I’ve got my plants mixed up and those that I thought were Celeriac, (whose leaves had been scoffed last week) were actually some sort of Brassica (probably why the leaves had been scoffed!). So now I’m going to plant out the 5 plants tonight where I’d planted the other plants; here’s hoping they are Celeriac.

Something has been EATING my Vegetables!

I went to the allotment last night to plant up some beans and do some watering as it’s been very hot and dry here the past few days. All seemed well until I passed the end of the bed where I had planted out the Celeriac on Sunday and noticed that something was missing, it was my Celeriac plants, all that was left of them were spines. Something had made a nice tasty meal out of them all, all nine plants that I planted on Sunday. As it’s too late to sow and plant anymore, I’m now going to have to wait for another year to see what Celeriac tastes like, well home grown Celeriac, I could easily go and buy one from the shop to taste it, but that is not how I want to do it. And if things couldn’t get any worse, I turned to find that who or whatever had been tucking into my Kohl Rabi as well. All is not lost with the Kohl Rabi; I do have some small seedlings which I can plant out so hopefully I will be able to try that for the first time this year.

Kohl Rabi Eaten

All the Celeriac Eaten!

On a more positive note, I planted up more Broad beans, and whilst doing so I noticed that I had some pods growing, so now I’m waiting most excitedly for when they’ll be large enough for me to start picking them to eat. I love Broad Beans; they have to be one of my most favourite vegetables. The bees loved them also, there was a very large bumble bee flying around and doing his stuff with the flowers. I also planted out some Runner Beans and some Borlotti Beans, did a bit more weeding and finally spent a good 45 minutes watering everything with the hose.

Harvest Monday

Well I had to do it, the suspense was killing me, I pulled the first tub of Rocket potatoes at the weekend and was thankful to see some lovely sized spuds weighing in at 2lb 3oz. This is my first harvest of the year. As you can see from the picture there were a few decent sized ones and some little ones.

Went to the allotment of Friday evening and started to weed and dig over the overgrown area where the ‘Onion’ group of beds are going to go. Here is where I’ll put in the Squash, Courgette, Leeks and Marrow; the Onions are already in a bed which I built a few months back. Saturday was glorious; I was at the plot from 9.30 am right through till about 5 pm, clearing more of the area, weeding other beds and laying some more paving around various beds. Sunday was awful, it rained non-stop, but I got some planting (Lettuce, Celeriac and Celery) done on the afternoon during the lighter spells.

Brian, an elderly plotter on the main allotment area has some ducks and hens on his plot, one of the hens had become broody so he put a few duck eggs in for her to sit on, well the other day she hatched them, so me and Caleb went to see them, they were so cute, all yellow and fluffy and only a couple of days old.

Light(ish) Nights

Isn’t it wonderful now the nights are starting to get a bit lighter, there will soon be a whole hour after work that I’ll be able to get bits n pieces done at the allotment. I’m lucky that it’s only 5 minutes drive from my work, so it’s easy to pop over to do a few bits before it gets dark. Over winter this has not been feasible, but with the nights getting lighter for longer I’ll be able to get over and do bits. Another added bonus is British Summertime Begins in just 4 weeks, just think of that extra hour!

I’m planning to get over to the lottie over the weekend, didn’t manage last weekend, what with one thing and another, but I would like to get across for a couple of hours at least on Sunday. The only stumbling block is yes you’ve guessed it, its forecast snow showers here in Middlesbrough. Hopefully though this prediction won’t come true and it will be glorious weather, yes I know cloud cuckoo land.

I ordered some Gardman (Pack of 2) Reusable Potato Planters / Tubs online to plant some of the earlies in, as the potato area isn’t sorted yet. You can see from the photo below, the area just at the bottom of the picture covered in weeds, this is where the potato beds are going to go.

Once I’d ordered the planters they only took a couple of days to arrive, very fast turnaround. I’m very pleased with them, they seem more robust than some of the designs available, and they have little pouches on the sides which will be useful to fumble about and see how things are progressing.

On the seed front, the chitting spuds are chitting quite nicely, the Rocket in particular are doing very well. The Cabbage (Greyhound) is doing well, Cauliflower (AYR) are starting to come through, so are the Khol Rabi. No sign of the Onions, Celeriac, Peppers or Cucumber yet but nearly all Broad Beans are through. I’ll going to have look through my seeds at the weekend and sow some more things. I may try some tomatoes, I’ve been given a heated propagator so I’m going to keep them snug in there and see how they go.

No Further Forward at the Plot

Well I’m no further forward in getting the plot prepared for the spring, I now have the added headache of having to make two lots of (rotational) raised beds seen as though I went mad and ordered loads of potatoes and there isn’t going to be room for them in the proposed ‘root’ section. I sat down and looked at my plan of the allotment and looked where I could squeeze in another section. I’d taken Friday and today off as holiday in the hope of being able to get started on these along with some winter digging but the weather is not helping at all, it has rained, and even snowed today so things are getting further and further behind.

I bought some lime for the Brassica patch; I’d managed to get two of the three beds in this area dug over in November, so I’ll get the third done and then add lime ready for when I plant out. I’d read in one of the magazines that this is an ideal time for the lime to be added so I’ll try and get that done fairly soon. I’d also managed to get the Legume section dug over and a load of compost and manure spread, so hopefully this will be ready to go when the beans are germinated.

I’ve sown a few more veggies. I tried again with some seed onions (Bedfordshire Champion) and this time I used brand new compost, I’ve bought B&Qs cutting and sowing compost, this was the best performer in the Which magazine trials with an 83% success rate and huge seedlings so I thought that I’d give it a go. I’ve sown some more leeks (Musselburgh), some cabbage (Greyhound), cucumber (Marketmore), celeriac (Monarch) and some aubergine (mixed).