Catch the Sun

Well done Jamie! He's finished digging Plot 7 - the last quarter where the sweetcorn, small pumpkins and french beans will grow.

I spent the few hours on the plot enjoying the sunshine once the chilly wind had moved on. I fiddled about basically: cleaning (weeding) the greenhouse, digging some compost into the trench where the sweetpeas are going. I spent way to long creating an odd-looking structure for them - "it'll be fine once it's covered in flowers"! I pinched out the growing tip on the sweetpeas in the greenhouse - I hope they survive what's meant to be a freezing night..

I potted on my sad-looking Tigerella tomato seedlings - they're very weak. I only planted up the 9 strongest looking as I only want 1 plant anyway!

The picture above shows the row of worked-on plots leading to our plots 7 & 8 at the end of the row - it's so lovely seeing new growth appearing across the site. Lots of people are already putting their seeds in. Perhaps we'll be able to now that Jamie's finished the hard work!
Here are Doves singing the title track...

Can You Dig It?

I know I've got a separate wildlife blog, but I love this super-macro photo so much that I have to share it on here. It's a female orange tip butterfly that was in the greenhouse.

Look at that eye!

These are the butterflies which are currently most prolific on the allotment site. Earlier in the year we've had tortoiseshells and brimstones. The females actually have black tips to their wings; the males have the orange wingtips.

Anyway, back to gardening... The title is because that's what I asked Jamie yesterday. I'd finished digging the quarter which is going to be a flower plot this year but my digging technique left the plot about 2 foot higher than it should be. With a bit of 'knocking back'  by Jamie it now looks like this - much better!

Hopefully we'll soon get some of the promised rain and then I can put stepping stones across the middle and start thinking about which flowers go where... that's the plan, I wonder if it'll work this year..

Talking of flowers, I'm planning to make some chive flower vinegar again as soon as these open up - I'm hoping that will be tomorrow otherwise I may miss out on them. Chive flowers that come later in the year are never as good (I find) as the first blooms. 

A little bit of Google-fanciness to make this look more interesting than it is!

We've had some new plotholders join us over the last couple of months and we're very pleased that some of them are at our end of the site, so we have a nice big block of loved plots. So lovely to see new people enjoying the site as much as we do.

Thanks to the Mock Turtles for the soundtrack...

A Little Time

There's always something watching; normally it's magpies ..This time it's a VOLE.

I know! Enemy of the broad bean grower, but really! How cute is that? Rustling around in the neighbour's strawberry bed while Jamie was digging. I think he did well to get this photo before the little chap scurried off (the vole, not Jamie).

As long as he stays on the neighbour's plot and doesn't find my mangetout growing in the greenhouse I don't mind :-)

It's Easter holidays, so Jamie planted some of our potatoes on Thursday (13th April). We have two short rows with 4 spuds in each: 1 x Burgundy Red, 1 x Orla, 2 x Kestrel and the other row is 4 x Desiree. Our other potatoes are going into bags, which we'll try to do in the next week or so.

Sowing the chard in modules means that I can be selective for which colours I plant out on the plot. Plenty to choose from there. We're having a plant sale in June so none of these will be wasted - I only need about 3 plants but like to have one of each colour.

Music provided by The Beautiful South,  as I have a little more time before going back to work.

Sunny

Wow! What a beautiful weekend that was. It's now Monday and the temperature has dropped, but I don't mind as I'm at work (on lunch break I hasten to add!).

It was a bit too hot for digging, but I did some and Jamie finished off the patch where a compost bin was and where we are growing some sweetcorn this year on Plot 3. The plants on the left are the valerian, which has grown like crazy - it should have some nice white flowers that smell of vanilla.

I found the new packet of leek seeds that I had lost, so we now have another potful sowed - they are called Toledo. Raspberry plants are looking fresh with the buds looking promising - I never did get round to tidying up the bed as intended.

My Tigerella tomato seedlings at work are looking less than happy - our office is just too hot for them, I think. There should be at least a couple which can be transplanted in a week or so, but their stems are so weak they may not survive the move. Luckily our grafted tomato plants should be delivered soon.

We left the site last night after a lovely few hours, with armfuls of rhubarb from plotholder, Lesley - ours isn't quite ready for picking yet.
Today's song is 'Sunny' sung by Marvin Gaye, but now it's back-to-work time...

Go!

The shelves in the greenhouse are filling up. Today I sowed Duchess mixed aster and French Honeycomb marigolds in seed trays. And a pot of Oarsman leeks are there too, along with a drainpipe sown with mangetout - I found the drainpipe on a vacant plot - it's meant to make it easier to transplant the seedlings without damaging the roots.

The beetroot, salad and chard are all germinating, so the temperature must be just right for them - it was just right for me too today - hot sunshine and blue skies - delightful!

The broad beans have left the greenhouse and are now in Plot 3 - one  row looks very healthy, the other row is not so good so I've added cloches to help them through their early days... They may need replacing with a new bean popped into the ground in a couple of weeks time, we'll see...

The onions are beginning to sprout so we're keeping them watered while they develop. Today I sowed some salad onions (Apache and White Lisbon) and some Pompei silverskin-type onions into a small raised bed.

It's been very dry over the last week although there have been some frosty mornings and this morning we had a thick fog before the sun burned it off.

Aah, it felt like a Summer's day. It was nice doing lots of smaller jobs with very little digging, that may be easier if we get some rain in the week - but not when I'm on leave I hope!

Moby provides the title track...