Hungerford allotment blog - grow your own, harvesting and vegetarian cooking. Enjoying allotment wildlife, weather and other things that catch my attention.
Enjoying time on the Marsh Lane Allotment site in Hungerford, Berkshire.
A record of successes, failures and a handy reminder for me.
From 2017 each post title brings a song to add a little extra music to the world - enjoy!
Yes, it’s filtered, I had to because it was a bit blurry and then Photoshop offered me this and how could I refuse?! It was quite a nice photo with a distant hot air balloon.
Anyway, that was Saturday as the Sun was just slipping down behind the treeline. Jamie and I enjoyed a barbecue on site and had a couple of games of pétanque in the warm weather. The Sun is setting at 6:30 now and is rising at about 7:30 - this was the lovely sunrise sky on Saturday morning (no filter required).
They may only be short days now that we’re in October but what a lovely sunny Sunday we had. The flowers are still making the most of it on the plot. Our morning glory took a long time to flower, but look how beautiful they are now.
And my one dahlia has finally developed a flower, after the amazing dahlia year everyone else seems to have had! Oh well, it’s still pretty.
And finally a melon Mangomel had matured enough for us to eat for breakfast - it was tiny, barely a mouthful but super-sweet.
The bees, hoverflies and butterflies are really making the most of the fine weather and on Saturday we were so pleased to see a Hummingbird Hawkmoth enjoying the verbena bonariensis. The antirrhinum have got to be one of the best self-seeded flowers. So many different colours; they’ve been flowering for months and the bumblebees love them.
I planted 2 garlic bulbs, which provided 20 cloves, (Caulk White) on Friday and I’ve now planted up all the flower bulbs I ordered. I’ve put some in pots and some in the ground: various alliums, daffodils and anemones. I hope they don’t get wiped out by mice like they did last year… we’ll see what appears next Spring. A few have gone into the flower bed where I’ve cleared masses of Nigella seedlings, but never fear… they’ll be back!.
And here’s a before-and-after weeding photo at the front of Plot8. I’ve put some bulbs in front of the irises and amongst the grape hyacinths. As you can see, the irises have been trimmed back to 15cm for over-Wintering.
HAHA has a seed swap container in our communal shed, so I’ve packed up a few of our collected seeds this weekend too. Lots of beans and flowers - if plotholders don’t want them we’ll find somewhere else to share them.
Yesterday I had a meal of Yin Yang beans, curly kale (thanks to Nia), tomatoes and onion flavoured with a bit of garlic, oregano, soy, tomato puree with a little finely grated cheese on top - delish and so easy to make!
And, just one last thing - look at this potato! Is it the veggie version of ham-fisted? 😊
The song title is provided by Oasis. What a song, haven't heard that in a while but can't believe it was released 28years ago!
The potato definitely looks like a fist. Nothing wrong with editing a photo if you preseny it for its artistic merit. We've got to sort out our overgrown flower bed which I'm not looking forward to
I have quite a few perrennials in the flower bed now but I think I'll expand it as the annuals are such a good addition to make it look different each year - saying that, I may opt for zinnia again as they were so beautiful last year
An enjoyable post and good pictures.
ReplyDeleteLovely morning glories, and well done with the melon. xx
Thankyou, yes those flowers were worth the wait
DeleteThe potato definitely looks like a fist. Nothing wrong with editing a photo if you preseny it for its artistic merit. We've got to sort out our overgrown flower bed which I'm not looking forward to
ReplyDeleteI have quite a few perrennials in the flower bed now but I think I'll expand it as the annuals are such a good addition to make it look different each year - saying that, I may opt for zinnia again as they were so beautiful last year
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