Thursday 9 August 2012

Hot and Blighty!

We went to the plot after work as it's been a really hot day and was a lovely sunny evening. We found this mutant calendula - interesting look for a flower!
We had to cut down all the potato haulms (foliage) due to blight sweeping across the site - not at all surprising given the amount of water we've had this year and it's been very humid over the last couple of days - hopefully our tubers are mostly ok, but blighted spuds won't store. We stuck sticks in so we don't forget where each plant is!

Cleared spud plot
We also saw some exciting wildlife! Les and his son, Nathan, came down to our plot for a photo of the slow worm they found in their compost bins. It looked like it's tail had regrown at least once. We saw two frogs hopping round our plot.
Both of these are very welcome visitors.

A less welcome guest, but still interesting to see, was a mole! He was foraging through the grass, digging small holes for worms. Unfortunately my photo was too blurry to post.

As HEAT were on site for their weekly communal allotment evening there were drinks and biscuits provided, so we didn't leave till the sun had gone. HEAT (Hungerford Environment Action Team) really want more people to join in with their allotment - anyone who doesn't think they can handle a full allotment should come along to Marsh Lane on Thursdays at 7:30pm to talk to Suz or Catherine.

3 comments:

  1. Read this for mutant calandula:
    11. Kumar R, Jamwal VVS and Sharma A (2015). Natural occurrence of secondary capitula phenotype in Calendula officinalis L. Journal of Plant Development Sciences, 7(12): 859-862.

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    Replies
    1. Thankyou. I will try to get a copy of that article

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    2. http://jpds.co.in/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Vol.-712.pdF
      Well, it's a bit too scientific for me but interesting and more rare than I would have thought. I will pay more attention this year

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