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!
We had an afternoon at Longleat on Saturday - it was so lovely sitting in the Sun watching the air displays that we didn’t go and see any of the animals 🙄
The Glow
We stayed for the evening fireworks and hot air balloon glow. We really enjoyed it and we were lucky with the weather staying dry for the day.
Unfortunately it was too windy to see the sky filled with hot air balloons, which was why I’d originally booked the tickets for the ‘Icons of the sky’ event, but the planes were more pleasing than I’d expected. This enormous battery balloon was proving difficult to handle at ground level.
I don’t remember all the planes but they all spent time doing displays with some amazing looping, zooming, twisting and diving. My camera couldn’t handle the speed of most of them so no photos of spitfires, gyrocopters or mustangs (if that’s a plane).
Here are a few pics.
Tiger moth bi-planes
Motorised gliders doing aerobatics
I really enjoyed seeing the parachutists come down from a Dornier bomber. Perfect landings by all!
My favourites were these motorised gliders covered in lights taking to the skies after sunset to do their aerobatics to music whilst shooting fireworks at each other - it was amazing! My photos don’t quite capture the excitement! But I’ll be keeping my eyes peeled for another display by Airborne Pyrotechnics.
Between the flights there were other things to entertain like drummers, food and these, err, robot-rabbit-girls. Not something you see every day!
Anyway, back to reality.
Before our day out I finally got the leeks planted after some decent rainfall for a couple of days. I couldn’t find a suitable pole to make holes so just dug them in order for the leeks to be ‘puddled in’.
I took the dried dwarf beans home and podded them. They were bought as plants so we didn’t know the variety. I was expecting to see white beans so looked them up. They seem to be Tendergreen dwarf French beans. They were tasty so I’m saving them to sow next year as they’re supposedly more suitable as green beans than for drying. The reddish beans were a few Jacob’s Cattle - I’ve added them to the storage pot I already have of them. It wasn’t a good year for our beans.
I’m hoping to eat our first peppers this week - this one is huge, but still has a bit more reddening to do…
It looks like it’ll be dry today and it’s warm so I hope to get to the allotment later though time is moving faster than me. I’ll leave you with this fabulous Norman Greenbaum song - haven’t heard this for so long. Enjoy!
The last week has thrown all kinds of weather at us including frost, gales, rain and even hail. In between the showers, and sheltered from the wind, the Sun has provided some welcome warmth. The English countryside really is looking its best with shiny new green leaves and lush grass.
Nights have gone cold, down to -3° outside the polytunnel so we’ve kept the potatoes covered and the remaining perennials in pots are covered with enviromesh. The pumpkin on Plot3 is also wrapped in fleece and the tomatoes and other seedlings remain protected in the polytunnel.
I did forget to protect 6 French marigolds which I bought at a plant sale - 3 of those caught the frost so I’ll have to plant some other flowers along that front edge - I have calendula seedlings so they should be okay. The leek seedlings have finally appeared and the Oasis turnips germinated within a week. I helped out at the HAHA plant stall at the Hungerford Food & Artisan market last Sunday where I had donated some rudbeckia and other perennials. It was so cold but surprisingly busy and I was pleased to find an aubergine plant to buy.
Luckily Saturday afternoon was warm and dry as Jamie and I attended the Newbury Spring Festival parade. We bought camping chairs as all the benches were occupied and Jamie needed to sit - sitting in chairs in Newbury’s Main Street! Our younger selves would have died of shame, but we’re over that now 😊
It was enjoyable watching all the people and listening to the music waiting for the band mistress to arrive - just look at her!
And apart from daily plot visits we’ve had a couple of trips out into the countryside - a lovely spot for lunch on the ridgeway, Court Hill Centre where we had a clear view of the Oxfordshire countryside around us.
And yesterday we had a marvellous afternoon tea at Littlecote House to celebrate Ivan’s 92nd(!) birthday.
We had a lovely time. Jamie and I haven’t been to Littlecote House for a few years and it’s interesting to be able to wander freely round the 16th century building.
The site has changed a bit since I first visited on a school trip about 50 years ago. It’s been extended to include new buildings as it’s a Warner Holidays hotel - but it seems to have been tastefully done and the grounds are so beautiful.
The weather was sunshine and showers all afternoon - we had to hide at one point as the wind was so strong, and cold.
Apart from the house and hotel, Littlecote is famous for its Roman villa, with an exceptional restored mosaic. It’s really special to see though we only had a quick stop yesterday after a long afternoon of walking and eating.
At home we are noticing a lot of nature in our small courtyard at the moment - sparrows, blue tits and blackbirds have nearby nests and one evening we experienced hedgehogs performing a mating ritual which was surprisingly loud until they were distracted by a bemused cat! And we have a Tree bumblebeenest in our porch - they are very active and it’s interesting watching them go to and fro. The most we’ve seen together is 7. They won’t be causing any damage and will die off in a couple of months.
We’ll go to the allotment later though it’s still rather cold and damp with more rain forecast. I’d like to do some potting on and planting though there’s still a couple more nights at risk from frost.
The song is provided by The Beverley Sisters - a golden oldie, my mum had the single with the Skye Boat Song on the B-side - I do love it. Enjoy ☺️ but it may bring a tear to your eye.
We’ve had some glorious sunny weather and the wind finally died down so we had a little taste of Summer. Particularly welcome on Saturday when we took the train to Reading and enjoyed an afternoon in the presence of the huge (31 foot) Maiwand Lion in Forbury Gardens. The Reading Vegan Fiestawas really well-attended and a great place for people-watching.. It was so hot we had to seek shade on occasion but it was a fun, if exhausting, day.
It’s so nice to attend events knowing that all the food on offer is suitable for us, as vegetarians. We stuck with our favourite Vegan Street Diner hot dogs - they’re just too tasty to turn down and had the longest queue of all the food stalls!
Showing off my new hat
On Saturday morning I had the latest Covid jab - have lost count now, but it’s still worth having the vaccine even though Covid is no longer in the news. After that I nipped to the allotment to check all was ok. We didn’t zip up the polytunnel because no frost was forecast - uh-oh … our happy tomatoes were no longer happy…
The temperature in the polytunnel had dropped to -3.1°. One of the tiny pepper seedlings had also been frost-burned and the first leaves that we spotted in the potato row had been caught too. I wishfully thought there was a chance that the tomatoes may recover but by the evening….
These are different varieties from what we originally bought and are grafted plants: Rubylicious, Honeycomb and Crimson Plum. We’ll take more care this time …
Over the last week I dug a second compost-filled hole for a courgette on Plot7. We sowed butternut squash and courgette seeds under the grow light at home - the Atena Polka yellow courgettes germinated but we’re still waiting for the butternut. The chard and beetroot seedlings are just appearing in their modules in the polytunnel and I sowed the Snowstar leek seeds outside. I sowed the whole packet as any we don’t grow on or give away can be used like spring onions. We’ve also sown some broad beans in pots in the polytunnel for planting out next month, hopefully.
I potted on the remaining perennials - it seems that the Geum and Coreopsis plants may not have made it, but there are 40 surviving plants so more than enough for us and a future plant sale.
We cleaned out the Bokashi compost bin; the solid waste was put in the bottom of one of the squash holes and we have a bottle of liquid fertiliser. It smells SO bad it must be good stuff!!
The apple has blossomed - so pretty - I wonder if it will fruit this year 🤔 The pear and cherry now have leaves, I need to check whether there’s any evidence of fruit on them - here’s a nice little video of a pear from flower to fruit, so I know what to look for on the pear tree.
I’m (so far) keeping on top of weeding ‘the orchard’. It’s rather satisfying to clear the clumps of bindweed when it dares to emerge through the mulch.
So now it’s Monday morning again and I’d better get moving to open up the polytunnel. It is very pleasant to visit the plot early (-ish) in the morning and just sit quietly watching the birds.
The apt song title is provided by Blink 182 and obviously refers to our tomato shenanigans.
I've been jam-making this morning! It doesn’t happen often.
It’s made with one of our Fig Leaf gourds (aka Shark’s Fin melon, aka Black Seed squash, aka Alcayota), a spaghetti squash. Funny to put a whole big squash in the oven, but that’s the start of the process and makes breaking through the skin slightly easier.
I mostly followed this recipe but didn’t add walnuts and zested a whole orange as well as adding a slice. It seems to be extremely sweet with half as much sugar as pulp (I got ~500g from this squash).
It’s meant to be good with cheese which I need to put to the test… And a fig leaf gourd isn’t just for jam - this one was a good substitute for our lack of pumpkins!
I like the glowing reptile-type skin. I had a bad throat so Halloween was a bit of a subdued celebration plus we had to eat all the treats because no-one came to call 😊
We went to Newbury Racecourse the next day for the fireworks - it was fabulous! Though the 9km of walking was more than we would have liked, especially Jamie.
The fireworks will continue for at least another week. We enjoyed watching some from our doorstep last night and have a bonfire event later this week which we’re looking forward to.
We’ve even had a little visit to the plot to pick some leeks - the hedge, full of sloes and hawthorn berries in that low sunshine was so beautiful. The nasturtiums have re-flowered and the cosmos, verbena and nicotiana are all still in flower.
That was the plan for the leeks - a delicious cheesy leek pasta with veggie lardons. Unfortunately the leeks came from Tescos - this is how our leeks look….
That is the damage caused by the allium leaf miner. And this is its pupa. This pest has only been in the country since 2002 but it seems to be particularly busy this year from what I’ve read.
All those leeks need to be pulled (not composted on site) and the onions and garlic planted next to them may succumb too - though leeks tend to be the prime target apparently. I shall have to keep a close eye on this patch. So annoying - leeks are such a useful veg to grow.
Oh well, just another pest to be aware of…
We joined a HAHA versus Hungerford Twinning Association skittles evening on Friday which was a lot of fun. It was the first re-match since Covid and HAHA retained the cup. Yay!
The title song is of course provided by the late great Bob Marley - ah, what a song - singalong now 😊
We had a trip to a local vineyard yesterday with plot-buddies Linda and Ivan. The Winding Wood Vineyard is a rare thing in Britain - it creates organic sparkling wine using biodynamic practices.
The tour was interesting and gave Ivan a few ideas for his grapevines at the allotment - one half of the vineyard is growing the same variety of Pinot Noir grapes as he is. Interesting that they use horsetail-tea to spray the leaves against aphids/fungus - we can help with that! They also use willow-bark and yarrow flowerheads and china-clay against mildew. They don’t do any watering - even this year - as vines have 5m roots. But they have a fancy heating system to avoid frost damage at vital stages - Ivan will need to stick with fleecing.
I wanted this photo of the ripening grapes in row 23 when Linda snapped me 😊
The Winding Wood’s 2500 Pinot noir and Chardonnay vines are 13years old, so about twice as old as Ivan’s.
Winding Wood Vineyard - Chardonnay vines
These are Ivan’s 10 vines - I just know we’re going to find him stripping back leaves next time we see him on site!
Ivan’s are larger than the grapes at the vineyard, which I think were intentionally smaller but about the same state of ripeness. Harvesting will be likely. Be mid-September or October.
It was a very pleasant couple of hours in a beautiful quiet location, so peaceful. And very interesting to see their techniques for growing organically - I think I want to dig out my biodynamic gardening book…
Meanwhile, on the allotment I’ve cleared three areas - the over-Wintering broad beans will go where I pulled the leek flowers up. Look how dry it is! I disposed of the leek seed heads and composted the stems.
The sweetcorn patch has been cleared, apart from a few snapdragons, to get a bit more light to the Jacob’s Cattle dwarf beans which are drying on the plants - I’ll move them into the polytunnel before it’s due to rain. Last year my drying beans got such a drenching they went mouldy on the plants so couldn’t be saved.
Harvests have mostly been tomatoes now. All three of our varieties have produced plenty of fruits - I may need to make some passata to store.
Cocktail Crush, Black Moon, Redcurrant
I had fried veg which included radishes and radish pods - the radishes were really tasty, like a peppery turnip.
It’s a bank holiday weekend and we also get Tuesday off - yay - and the Sun is shining so I should get off my butt. Have a good weekend all. The song is provided by Empire of the Sun.
Between the flights there were other things to entertain like drummers, food and these, err, robot-rabbit-girls. Not something you see every day!
My favourites were these motorised gliders covered in lights taking to the skies after sunset to do their aerobatics to music whilst shooting fireworks at each other - it was amazing! My photos don’t quite capture the excitement! But I’ll be keeping my eyes peeled for another display by Airborne Pyrotechnics.
