Oh, What a Night

I’m happy (Jamie less so!) that courgettes are on the menu - still managing to pick small at the moment - along with shallots and our first two tiny tomatoes.

Other tomatoes are reddening now following that Rubylicious example.

Also in the polytunnel, tiny baby peppers have started to form and the aubergine has some surprisingly spiky flowers, which will hopefully produce a few fruits.

The hollyhocks are looking lovely towering over our weedy Plot8. They don’t mind the lack of water, but the weeds are helping to keep the soil damp on that plot

I really love this pale pink flower, but there are also some deep purple ones.

We've just entered our third heatwave of the year - our poor plants are gasping, as am I trying to water everything, but even watering at the roots isn’t really providing enough for happy plants.  

Look at that 😔 Not the lush growth we hope to see at this time of year and the potato haulms are definitely looking past their best - we’re rather concerned whether there will actually be any tubers in that dry soil. We’ve sown a few dwarf beans (Purple teepee) in that front area and I re-planted some lettuce seedlings but I think they may have frazzled. And we finally planted our mini-cucumber out - that’s in a big pot on Plot3 to grow up the bean tunnel.

In between watering it’s nice to sit and watch the bees and plentiful butterflies.

We’ve had another session on the roundabout. Unfortunately our previous work encouraged dormant borage seeds to grow. Normally I’d like a borage-covered roundabout but it was swamping all the perennials so 5 of us spent a few hours carefully pulling out all the borage seedlings - such a shame really.

The ground is rather bare again and would also benefit from a downpour but hopefully the regular watering (thanks to Nia and Kate) will be enough to encourage more flowers. The Britain in Bloom judging is imminent but surely they’ll take the weather into account… and it’s only the second year that Hungerford has been involved.

I really like the Bug Hotel sign that the team have made at the entrance to Hungerford.

Anyway, I really must get up the plot to water before it gets too hot again, it’s meant to reach 29° today. But before I go…

The Mexico v England World Cup match was delayed by an hour - to 2am on Monday (yesterday) morning. It was so worth being awake for. After England took a somewhat unexpected 2-goal lead in the first half, the rest of the match was as stressful as any other England match, particularly after England were down to 10 men. Both teams had penalties and at 2-3 after 60 minutes England heroically defended our goal for the remainder of the game, which included 11 agonising minutes of ‘stoppage time’. Ohhh, the relief and joy when the final whistle blew and England are through to the quarter finals 🥳 Such an amazing match 👏👏🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿

And that is the perfect opportunity for Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons, with a little poetic licence for the title - December, 1963 (Oh, What A Night).

Everybody’s Got to Learn Sometime

Small Tortoiseshell butterfly

So pleased that we returned home to warm, at times sweltering, weather. The hoverflies, butterflies, bees and other insects are very busy and finally the ladybirds have re-appeared. The rain that fell in our 2 week absence, plus watering by Neal (thanks Neal 👍), has encouraged some good growth - this is the difference in the peppers and aubergine. We had spare pepper plants so we now have several growing in pots as well as leaving some on the Spares shelf for other plotholders.

The tomato plants are looking hopeful for future harvests.

And the pumpkin is growing at high speed, with several viable fruits growing.

The yellow courgette has bright yellow leaves, which is normally a sign of lacking nutrients. We watered it with Epson salts and the new growth is green again. It has a few tiny courgettes at the moment - hope they continue to grow.

Our sweetcorn, sown the day before we went away, have germinated. Not many sunflowers have appeared amongst the sweetcorn but there are a few around the outside and the marigolds have bushed out nicely. The beans that I sowed (Borlotti, Jacob’s Cattle and Gigantes) have been a failure, with just one plant from each. I’ve re-sowed soaked beans now to see if they work better. Luckily the runner bean, dwarf bean plants and broad beans are looking happier.

I pulled the garlic yesterday - some good big cloves and other smaller ones. Can’t believe it’s the Summer solstice already! 

Since being back, I’ve weeded all of Plot7 and it looks much better for it, but I do need to sow a few more veggies there is still a lot of bare earth to welcome the weeds back into. I’ve left plenty of snapdragon and redcurrant tomato seedlings so they can provide a bit of colour and tiny toms. 

The trouble is… if you look the other direction…

Ugh, most of that is Nigella that’s gone to seed and all being choked by bindweed 😫 I’ve weeded round all the growing areas and started chopping down that weedy area to try and get it under control - at least the hollyhocks are looking great and may detract from the weeds once they bloom! In the meantime this creeping red thyme in the herb bed is providing the brightest spot of colour and the hoverflies love it.

Migrant hoverfly

I’ve been watering everything in the morning for the last couple of days and temperatures were mid 20s by 10am. Today is the start of the amber extreme heat warnings with temperatures expected to go up to 35° and maybe more 🥵 And I have a rotten cold - booo! I’ll have to go up a bit later today at least to water in the polytunnel, which is not somewhere to hang around long on a hot day!

We’ve been enjoying home-grown salad (not potatoes yet) with lettuce, sweet turnips, radish and chives plus a few small onions that I pulled whilst weeding.

We’re enjoying watching the World Cup and liking that Hungerford seems a bit more in the spirit for it this time - this is the window of one of our local tearooms (The Tutti Pole) where they always have some sort of Lego display.

And of course we have our England flag and World Cup bunting. COME ON ENGLAND 👏

Fellow plotholder, Maria, and I decided yesterday morning that it’s difficult to improve gardening skills because every year throws us something different. Oh well, we’ll keep trying 🙂 And that is the vague connection to the song title by The Korgis.

Sunny

Some beautiful warm sunny weather encouraged us to have a cream tea on the plot and look who joined us 🙂 There were also brimstone butterflies, more peacock butterflies and lots of bumblebees - a proper feel of Spring.

We’ve had a productive week. We went shopping and bought lots of seeds for the year - some gifted seeds in there too. We have a few left-overs which we didn’t bother re-buying this year.

They’re all pretty basic, nothing very exciting but hopefully that means they’re easy growers… And we’ve started sowing! There are 3 pepper seeds in each section - two types of pepper which will stay at home at least till they germinate, which may be 3 weeks.

Bequinho Red and California Wonder Peppers

If successful some of these will grow in one of the new raised beds that are now in the polytunnel. It was a lot of work clearing and tidying the polytunnel then filling the beds with layers of rotted wood chip, chicken manure and Apsley mulch - they’ll be topped off with tomato bags when we’re ready to plant.

Good timing for another warm day yesterday - 60 perennial plug plants were delivered in the morning - on sale for £10 from Dobies - they’re so teeny weeny, each seedling + pot measures at most 6cm tall!

We both found it rather therapeutic potting them on sitting in the sunshine. I was careful to label them, but I think a couple of labels got mixed up 🙄 I’m sure it’ll be obvious once they’ve grown a bit…

I don’t expect we’ll keep them all, but I’d like a new flower bed where all those pots are being stored, so will see if that plan works out. 

These are the varieties (pasted from the Dobies site as I’ll need this info later):

• Achillea millefolium 'Cerise Queen' - Easy to grow, even on poor dry soils, and ideal for wildlife gardens where it attracts butterflies and other insects. Height: 60cm (24"). Spread: 60cm (24").
• Aquilegia caerulea ‘Mrs Scott Elliot Mixed' - Nodding spurred blooms, in a range of pretty colours are carried delicately on tall wiry stems. Height: 60cm (24"). Spread: 40cm (16").
• Coreopsis 'Golden Joy' - Easy to grow, low maintenance and will grow in most soil types and environments. Height: 45cm (18"). Spread: 40cm (16").
• Delphinium ‘Dark Blue & White Bee’ - Intense dark blue flowers, each with an unusual white "bee" shape at the centre! Height: 90cm (36"). Spread: 30cm (12").
• Dianthus barbatus ‘Rockin Red’ - This new interspecific hybrid brings the strongest shade of red we’ve seen in a Sweet William. Height: 50cm (20"). Spread: 30cm (12").
• Foxglove ‘Dalmatian Mixed’ - These short lived perennials will happily seed about to create dramatic drifts and attract wildlife to their nectar rich flowers. Height: 50cm (20"). Spread: 40cm (16").
• Geum ‘Mrs J. Bradshaw’ - Well-loved and consistently popular, this variety bears flame-red, semi-double blooms on thin wiry stems. Height and spread: 60cm (24").
• Leucanthemum ‘Crazy Daisy’ - Wonderfully frilly, white, daisy-like blooms with soft buttery yellow centres that perch on upright stems. Height: 60cm (24"). Spread: 45cm (18").
• Lobelia cardinalis ‘Queen Victoria’ - Tall spikes of deep maroon foliage topped by glowing scarlet blooms bring a welcome splash of late summer colour, when many flowers have already faded. Height: 90cm (36"). Spread: 30cm (12").
• Verbena ‘Buenos Aires’ - The long lasting blooms of the stunning variety are guaranteed to attract clouds of bees and butterflies into your garden. Height: 120cm (48"). Spread: 60cm (24").

Feeling rejuvenated by the Sun (but slightly regretting it today!) I also did a bit of digging and a little sowing too; 3 pots of heirloom sweetpeas - taller pots to help with their long tap roots.

And a drainpipe of Snow Wind mangetout - a drainpipe for ease of planting without damaging the roots. These are meant to be self-supporting but I intend to grow them with the sweetpeas.

There was a touch of frost last night but all those should be okay in the polytunnel. We had a little walk this morning, but it’s not as nice as the last couple of days so we didn’t go to the plot. I potted on a couple of little house plants - they’re meant to be ‘very easily maintained’, both want to dry out completely between watering and like a warmer climate (like us).  The Ceropegia Woodii aka String of Hearts should fill out and can be a lovely looking plant. Hmm, I wonder …

That’s all for now. Enjoy the lovely song by Bobby Hebb - can’t believe I’ve not used this before!

Cars Hiss by My Window

Sue Garratt wrote on her November blogpost that there hadn’t been “any weather” which was certainly true for the first couple of weeks of November with really gloomy dull days - no rain, no Sun and no wind.

It was unseasonably mild though so we enjoyed a Sunday night (it feels like night at 5pm now) picnic - the cat found the crisps 😄

The next Sunday we enjoyed some sunshine at Newbury’s Vegan market - mmm, that Vegan Street Diner hot dog is so delicious!

This last week has made up for the earlier lack of weather. We had snow flurries on Tuesday, barely settling, but pretty to look out at.

Wednesday brought a severe frost which took out the last of the delicate plants. I had to take the photo through the fence as the gate was frozen shut during our morning visit!

So very cold, brrr. Down to -4° in the polytunnel. And this ice was taken out of the birdbath on Friday morning.

And today the weather is torrential rain and windy as we feel the edge of Storm Bert. It really isn’t an allotment day but we’re having our windows replaced so we thought we’d leave the fitter to get on with it.

We have a skip on-site for the, now postponed, Work Party tomorrow so we’ve been clearing junk from our rather overgrown storage <ahem> wildlife area…

That’s where the great tits nested last year, so we won’t clear it completely (that’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it). But we’ve cleared some crates which were completely overgrown with ivy and a snail hotel. We’ve seen mice around there too which may be helping reduce the snail population.

It’s a rather colourless world now but the spindleberry was looking beautiful; such great looking berries.

And some rather exciting news - I won a book from Real Seeds! I often buy squash and bean seeds from the company that sells seeds that are sometimes a little bit different from usual suppliers.

So the song for today is provided by The Doors. The cars are hissing more quietly now! Enjoy!

November has Come

We had another picnicker join us on Sunday. The draw of the chimnea’s heat was too good to miss for the allotment cat. He was happy sitting on the bench with Ivan and me, but then Linda stood up and she lost her seat, which happened to be slightly closer to the fire 😀 What we discovered, as we cleared up for the evening, was that he’d killed a rat just behind us! At least he didn't plonk it down in front of us and put us off our cheese and wine. Last weekend we enjoyed roasted (charred) chestnuts which Ivan had foraged - delish!

We’ve finally had a few dry days though the weather has been extremely dull; we’ve been living in a cloud for at least a week. But it’s mild and I’ve only just picked the last of our outdoor tomatoes!

The tomatoes have been included in most of our lunches and were part of this delicious halloumi meal, with garlic, cavolo nero and peppers from the plot.

We've been able to clear some areas of the plots because it's been dry. I cleared up the radishes and bean plants which were surrounding the chard. And I found one borlotti bean plant - trailing along the ground 😅 I knew I'd sown some seeds somewhere and that explains why I had dwarf plants growing 'up' the tunnel 😏 I've saved some bean pods for drying but not sure if they'll be suitable for storage as they've got so wet. The yellow pods are Yin Yang beans.

The main reason for writing this post is to record that we've sown our broad beans Aquadulce. As usual they have their little cloche covers to offer some protection from mice/squirrels and maybe weather. They're planted into the soil below the mulch and, all being well, will be harvested next April/May.

The purple sprouting brocolli and brussels sprouts are the only other thing (apart from weeds) growing on that plot now. The PSB isn't looking too great but, dare I say, the little sprouts are looking pretty good...

I've completely filled our three dalek composters, but there are masses of worms, slugs and other beasties to help it degrade quite quickly. This is a Leopard Slug - amazing pattern - a good guy who deals with compost and also deals with other slugs...

On that note, I need to start work. Halloween provided us with a little celebration and the plot now has two pumpkin heads on sticks - perhaps the squirrels will get to them, but they should be out of reach of the hedgehog. Apparently pumpkins aren't good for them.

But now it's November and The Gorrilaz provide the title song.