Allotment Catch up - Early October

After having nearly four weeks away from the allotment due to a combination of holidays, illness and bad weather I wasn't looking forwards to my visit earlier this month.

I was expecting caterpillar munched brassicas, slug munched lettuce and courgettes and drowned everything else, but I am please to say that although there was some damage, it was nowhere near as bad as I was anticipating.

The torrential downpours had washed away every slug pellet, so there were quite a few fat slugs enjoying the fruits of my labours.  They soon got the sharp end of a trowel and were flung onto the manure pile.



Onions hanging on - just !





In bed 1 the square of 15 onions had suffered some slug damage, with about four whose tops had been munched but the rest seem to have been left alone.



Big lettuce pressing against the netting



In the next picture you can see just how well the lettuce are coming on - when I planted them I thought they were the sort where you harvest the outer leaves as and when you need them, and that they didn't form a heart, but every one is now a huge, full-hearted lettuce that are very sweet tasting.

One problem with all the rain we have been having is that the very outer leaves which have been touching the soil had started to rot on the plant, but I soon whipped those off.



Brussels, PSB and Kale



The brassicas also under the netting in bed 1 are still growing strongly - there have been a few caterpillars on them due to the flimsy construction of the netting and cage, but nothing major so I am hoping for great things from them later this year/early next.



Before removing the finished courgette plants



The peas at the top of bed 1 had withered so I pulled them out, and the courgettes had been badly attacked by the slugs, so they came out too.

The turnips planted from seed are starting to bulk up a little - the largest was about 2 inches across, and some of the spinach is also doing well, but a lot of it has been swamped by the cabbages in the next squares so was still pretty spindly.  A lesson to be learned for next year here, don't include brassicas in a square foot bed unless they are all similar size plants or they will overwhelm their neighbours.



Pak Choi doing well



The pak choi planted from seed have done fantastically well, so I harvested a couple for our tea, and very nice they were too.

Some of them were also having trouble with the huge cabbages next door, so I did a little trimming of the lower, larger cabbage leaves to give the pak choi a bit more light, which will hopefully allow them to grow a bit more.





The star of bed 1 so far has got to be the french beans.  I have had four small harvests from them already and all four plants are still loaded with flowers.  I just hope that the frosts keep off and we have enough sun to be able to harvest the rest as they have an unbelievable flavour.









Lots of Bean Pods




The Mammoth pumpkin hasn't really lived up to its name despite an early showing - the one remaining fruit hasn't really grown very much since the last time I measured it.



Mammoth Pumpkin



The Jack 'o' Lantern, however, has nearly doubled in size.



Jack 'O' Lantern



I just hope that at least one of them will toughen up enugh to be carved for our Halloween Party on Oct 27th!





Top of bed 2





At the top of bed 2 the Savoy cabbages are doing well despite their somewhat shakey start and are pretty much the same size as those in bed 1.

I had to remove the two cherry tomato bushes as they had signs of blight, but I have left the chillis in place - the plan is to trim them and try to overwinter by wrapping in fleece with the surrounding brassicas also providing some shelter.

In the space left by the tomatoes I have planted some of the kale that was pigeoned, slugged and caterpillared back in July as they appeared to be staging some kind of come back.

I also planted three Kohl Rabi that had been sitting at home and should really have been in the ground by now.



Bottom of bed 2



At the bottom of bed 2 the donated rhubarb is growing fantastically well - all my rhubarb at home is starting to die down ready for winter but these two are still going great guns.

The transplanted turnips have taken well, but aren't as far along as the ones left behind in bed 1.

The radish at the botton right of the picture have started to form bulbs, but they aren't much more than pea-sized right now.

The chard and perpetual spinach are flourishing, but some of the slug-munched onions appear to have been too far gone to save.

I have also started to plant into bed 3 as I had to bring out all the remaining brassicas from home, plus those munched on earlier but still with full hearts.

The whole of bed 3 now contains spring cabbage, curly cale, brussel sprouts and purple sprouting broccoli.

I think the next thing to do is to get beds 4 and 5 ready using the lasagne method.

This isn't as I planned, but I need to get some onion sets and some garlic in and the way the weather is closing in as we head through Autumn I doubt that I will have enough time to double dig as I had wanted.

Seven Week Itch?

It is now exactly seven weeks since I signed up for my allotment, and so much has happened since then.

I started out with loads of ideas, plenty of book and internet knowledge but very little in the way of practical skills or experience in how to create and manage a full sized plot.  In fact, it wouldn't have been an exageration to say that my learning curve was pretty much vertical in those first few weeks.

So, what have I learned in this short space of time?

 Pigeons like to eat anything green.  They made short work of the Savoy cabbage that I planted in bed 2, but fortunately I was able to get them covered over quick enough so that they have been able to make quite a dramatic recovery.



Covered bed

I also learned that even if some of your seedlings have been left alone by the pigeons, you can't rely on them always being left alone.  I had put all the spare seedlings to one side, on top of the pile of wood and they hadn't been attacked so I made the mistake of not making sure the netting was over them.  The pigeons found them and totally decimated them, including my three patty pans.

Len, one of the old hands on the allotment, told me that the pigeons prefer to land and walk to their food, which has explained why nothing in my square foot bed has been touched, as the network of strings marking out the squares must have put them off.

The hardest lesson so far is that there is always another pest on the plot ready to carry on where one has finished.



The mauled remnants of my seedlings



After the pigeons had taken most of the seedlings on the wood pile I covered them with netting and planned to plant the survivors on my next visit.

Two days later when I came to look at them I found them crawling with slugs that had taken almost everything that the pigeons had left behind.  They had even got into my onions and cored them out.  I am still hopeful that one or two may survive despite the mauling they have had, but I have moved everything to the front of bed 2, surounded by slug pellets and protected by netting, where they should have been from the start.

Purple Milan Turnip Seedlings

It hasn't all been bad, though.

Most of the planst sown direct have germinated, and are showing strongly.  The ones that surprised me the most were the turnips - first to show with almost 100% germination they are going strong.



Chard going wild



Some of the transplanted seedlings have also done really well, with the chard and leef beet being the most vigorous.

Lots of Leaf Beet

The plan was to keep them under control by regular harvests of the young leaves by my son Will, but he hasn't been to the plot for a couple of weeks so they have got a little bit out of control.  I am going to have to pick and freeze a lot of leaves over the next few days.

Lettuce doing well

The All Year Round lettuce which I didn't have much hope for when it was planted out is flourishing.  A couple of the more sickly plants didn't make it, but out of 16 plants I have 11 strong plants putting out lots of great tasting leaves.

I have taken a few leaves to have for the next day's dinner a few times now, and I am impressed by the flavour.  Definitely one to grow again, I think.

Courgettes Nice de la Ronde and All Green Bush

The two courgettes that I did manage to get into the ground are also doing OK, but nowhere near as good as the chard, lettuce and leaf beet.

There have been a couple of flowers on both, but so far only males until I looked this morning and found a couple of female flowers ready to open, one on each plant so I might get courgettes this year after all!

Brussel Sprouts and Purple Sprouting Broccoli

  Under the netting the brassicas are coming along nicely, most of the brussels, PSB and curly Kale are all about 18 inches tall now, apart from one brussel that has yet to grow past five inches tall!

The plant itself looks healthy enough, it is just a midget compared to the others.  Hopefully it will catch up soon.



Recovering Savoy Cabbages

 In bed 2 I have the Savoy cabbage that were attacked by the pigeons.  Fortunately they all seem to have survived and have put on quite a bit of new leaf this week.

They are still quite a bit behind the three I planted into bed 1, though.

Step dad Ken is still convinced that bed 2 will do best for cabbage.  Personally I think it will be a close thing but I hope bed 1 wins so I can say 'Told You So'



Nearly Ripe Cherry Tomato

 

More Tomatoes Ripening

 Another transplant into bed 2 were my cherry tomatoes from home.

These had outgrown their pots and desperately needed planting out, and have done really well so far, with three  fruit from each this week.  A bit more sun and I will have plenty more ready.

Jack O'Lantern Male Flower

Stars of the show for me so far must be the two pumpkins.



Jack O'Lantern Vine

 I have never tried to grow anything like these before, and now they have got themselves established you can almost watch them growing.

A set Fruit?

Mammoth Vine

Both plants have now got what looks to be two fruit that have set, and with the current climate of sunshine and downpours it couldn't be better growing weather.

Mammoth Fruit

Once they start to get a little larger I will have to make sure that they are supported off the ground to try and keep them rot and slug free.

The first fruit from the Mammoth that I hoped had set hasn't changed size at all, so it may be better to cut it off and leave the other two to grow, but I will probably wait to make sure first.

Water, Water, Everywhere .......

We spent some time at the plot tonight trying to figure out the best way to deal with the sodden ground that covers most of the back half of the allotment.

The plot is bordered by cinder paths, so yesterday afternoon I dug a test pit through one to see if we could persuade the water to start to flow in that direction.  The pit was about 18 inches deep.

Test Pit

This was what we saw there tonight.

This was good news as it meant that it would be possible to persuade the water to flow away from the plot.

We started off with a few shallow channels in the mud to encourage the water on the surface to flow.

This was followed by a deeper, wider channel which soon became filled with run-off.

We were unable to follow up on our discoveries as the boundary fence near to the corner of my plot is due to be replaced, and so any drainage channels that we dig would be likely to be destroyed when the contractor brings in his equipment.

On the plus side, we are going to ask if they will dig the channels for us with their equipment whilst they are there.  If you don't ask ....

Whilst we were there I took the opportunity to plant a few more specimens from home - three tomatoes and two chillis.


Two of the tomatoes are already producing fruit - I was able to harvest three red and three yellow cherry tomatoes from them.

Tomatoes and Chillis

The chillis and third tomato have come from the bedroom windowsill - I know it is probably far too late in the season to be planting these out, but as the only other option for these plants was the compost heap I am going to give them a fighting chance.



Rhubarb

I also planted up the rhubarb that Diane gave us a couple of weeks back.  It was planted into a hole that had at least six inches of manure in the bottom, and was finished off by another spade-full on top.  This is only a temporary home until we can get the water problem sorted,




Now for a quick spin round bed 1.

The lettuce are really doing well now, despite them looking rather sick when they were first planted out.  The Kale and PSB are also doing well, as are the Brussels, with the exception of one plant.  This little one looks healthy, but is only about half the size of the others - I wonder why?



Leaf Beet, Cabbage and Turnip



Flowering French Beans



The Leaf Beet, Chard and Savoy Cabbage are all coming on strongly, as are the French Beans which are now flowering.  The leaves on some of the peas continue to look a little yellow, but they now have four pods.

The majority of the seeds that Will sowed nine days ago have now come up - all the turnips and most of the pak choi, but strangely enough not all of the spinach have (apart from the ones he spilled and didn't pick up).  It may be that he planted them a bit too deep perhaps?

One bad note - the pigeons have decimated the plants that I had waiting to go in - I forgot to cover them up again when I left on Sunday, and they have eaten about 90% of the seedlings.

And then there were six ......

Another long day at the plot again this Saturday - I was on at 6.30am to put the frame together that will eventually hold the netting needed to keep the cabbage whites and pigeons off my brassicas.

A quick check on the plants I had transplanted out earlier this week revealed no slug damage at all to anything - a triumph for slug pellets.



Jack O'Lantern

Both the pumpkins have finally started to put out a vine - the Jack O'Lantern was doing well, but the Mammoth has nearly doubled in size since it was planted out and has what appear to be female fruit forming already.


Mammoth



I may have to pinch these out as they are far too close to the main stem, but I may just wait and see first....

When I planted the courgettes on Thursday evening neither had anything other than leaves, but this morning both have flower buds which I am hoping will open tomorrow.

The French Beans are doing well, with a few flowers and the peas have already got two pods forming.

Hard at work - One of them at least

I went off-site for breakfast about 8am, but was back again for around 10.30am with both step dad Ken and son Will, and we all stayed there until 6pm.

We soon had the frame for the third bed made as all that was missing was the long sides.

Part dug third bed

This bed was installed alongside the existing two and me and Will started to dig it out while Ken continued cutting the rest of the timber to make more beds.

You can see the netting frame that I had made to the left of the picture.


Part way through the afternoon Ken was given some more produce from one of my friendly plot neighbours, Diane, who came across with a handful of beetroot for him.  Thanks again Diane.


 After a lot of hard work we managed to get the final three beds in place, but weren't able to dig them, or even get them properly aligned as we had run out of both time and energy.



 As almost the last act of the day Will planted his first ever seeds - he put in 2 blocks of 9 spinach 'Matador', 2 blocks of 4 x Pak Choi and a single block of Turnip "Purple Milan".  I hope that they germinate and prove to him that he hasn't got 'black thumbs'.

These last sowings have completed the first bed which is now totally full.  Only another five beds to have a go at now.