At last - some sowing!

Finally, we've sown something - nothing too exciting yet, we're not risking it after the late (late May) frosts we had last year.
So, Jamie sowed 12 broad beans (Suttons), where the Aqua Dulce died, and put their protective cloches on straightaway to stop the mice getting fed before us. We always put a handful of seed compost at the bottom of each hole before dropping the bean in.
We'll get more broad beans sown later in the year too as they're so tasty.

Plastic bottle cloches

And I sowed 3 small rows of salad crops in the raised bed: corn salad (2 year old seed so not sure how good that will be), radish (Dragon F1 Hybrid) and mixed lettuce (I've bought 2 bags of salad leaf from Tescos recently and I really begrudge doing it!!).
This cloche is covered with a green plastic cover and it's quite dark but the salad seems to do ok in there.

The intention is that I'll sow additional rows of each item in about 3 weeks so there'll be a bit of succession growing - though I recall saying that last year and it didn't work out right.

Digging

Jamie did a lot of digging over the last week and has finished the potato quarter - hooray!

Potato quarter

And yesterday he dug a little patch, adding some sand, for spring onions and silverskin onions. Hoops at the ready for enviromesh.

I cleared the area by the bench, took the crazy mint pot home and transplanted the out-of-control sage at the end of plot 8A - just because it would be a shame to throw it away. So I tidied up the herbs and have a pot waiting for par-cel and need another big pot for basil. I split the chives up and have planted them directly into the ground with quite a lot of room for spreading. We're going to sow coriander directly into the ground by the carrot and parsnip trenches.

Herb garden looking a little sad, but it'll be fine...



Another beautiful day!

And it really was, so we spent hours on the plot again along with many other allotment holders. I was intending to sow some salad seeds but instead we spent the time moving the carrot trench along to reduce wasted space in that quarter. It seemed like it wouldn't be too much of a chore, but phew! it was hot work. It'll be worth it though - we'll get a few more broad beans in there now. We mixed in John Innes seed compost to give it good drainage.

We had a few visitors to the plot today. There were quite a few butterflies around and we uncovered several  Angle Shades moth caterpillars, chafer grubs and lots of worms.
I also found this bumblebee, it was cleaning itself and I noticed it had mites on it - if only I'd known (and had a child's paintbrush handy!!) I could have helped her by wiping them off - see this article.

Oh and the little cat came to see us for the first time this year!

He's welcome on our plot and hasn't proved to be a problem to us - may have helped with the mouse problems in the past, but I was happier to see a bit of distance between our plot and this male pheasant!


A beautiful looking enemy!

The last of the carrots I pulled didn't look too great, so I composted them - so no more soup for a few months - I was too tired to make it when I got home anyway!

What a lovely weekend :-)

Faffing on the plot

We did some work on our plot in the afternoon. Jamie has dug half of the potato quarter - it's hard work with lots of roots, but it looks pretty good now.
I cleared the cabbage frame and did a bit of digging but mainly faffed about as I was too tired after the stone-work in the morning - what a wimp :-)

Pyromaniac

I did enjoy burning weeds and anything else I could find in the communal incinerator on our plot - it's the first stuff we've burned rather than composting or taking home for the bin. We spread the ashes on the potato plot, but there weren't many.
I cleared the chard (and burned it of course!).Previous years we've seen chard survive the winter, even when it was really snowy, but the -11° took it's toll this year so I'll sow afresh.

Also have decided to try growing salsify this year. We've had good and bad reports on it but may as well give it a try and it seems we'll have space.
The weather was lovely, warm and sunny and so nice to see lots of other busy allotmenteers. We (Jamie would say I!) spent a lot of time chatting and looking at the birds. We saw buzzards and kites overhead and also a kestrel plus our usual visitors. It really was a beautiful day.

I know it's not a very good pic, but it's a buzzard

Chain Gang - or should I say working party!

We had a lovely day at the allotment. We were there from about 10:30 and didn't leave till after 4pm. It was such a beautiful day and the first weekend this year when the carpark was really quite busy!

For the first 2 hours we were part of a small work party to clear stones away from the rabbit fencing. It seemed a good idea when HAHA (Hungerford Allotment Holders Association) came up with it, as somewhere to put the piles of stones that we dug up from our plots - but more than a year on and the stones were pushing against the fence and likely to cause damage. Not too sure what the final plan is, but by the end of our work there was a clear space between the stones and the fence.

AND Sue provided us with drinks and lovely flapjacks so it was a very pleasant way to spend the morning!

Brrr so cold

It's been really rainy/sleety and even snowy today so we weren't intending to visit the allotment but had to go and save our raspberries which would have been drowning if they stayed where we left them!

So, we ventured out in the cold, cold rain. One other person had braved the weather to pick some produce.
The raspberries are bagged up in earth now rather than being flooded in our wheelbarrow.
Of course, quite soon after we'd finished doing this the sun came out and the site looked beautiful but we were quite cold enough and went home!

Last of the sprouts

It's March already and it was a lovely sunny morning, luckily we avoided the heavy rain showers.

I picked the last reasonable-looking sprouts before pulling the stalks and adding what I could to the compost bin - the stalks are really too thick to compost, if they're not shredded, so they usually end up in our green bin for the Council to deal with.

The onions and shallots haven't started sprouting yet (well, it's only been a week), but the raspberry plants look happy and buds are still growing on the transplanted ones.

Jamie was digging more of the potato quarter and I cleared the netting so we can completely work that quarter ready for our spuds in April - time seems to be slipping away rather ...

Found this Ruby Tiger Moth caterpillar sheltering in the thyme - they hibernate so it's probably been there all winter.

Insects and Invertebrates

Allotment holders weren't the only things out and about enjoying the sunshine! The birds were singing happily, we could hear a woodpecker in the trees nearby and we found various insects and invertebrates, especially when we were digging up the raspberry plants.

Ladybird sitting in the sage

It's a bit early for ladybirds to come out of hibernation but probably good for them to take advantage of the sun's warmth while it can.

Chafer Grub

Leather jacket - crane fly larva

These two larvae generally are only a real problem for lawns, so aren't too much of a pest to our veggies. We have grass paths throughout the allotment site so these are likely to be quite happy nibbling grass roots rather than our produce - that said, if we find them they still get winged into the hedge :-)

Transplanting Raspberries & Strawberries

When we took over Plot 8A in 2010 we inherited some raspberry plants which have been steadily spreading, including into the next door plot. Last year I marked some plants which I knew were Autumn-fruiting and had produced some delicious fruits.

Before

So, today was the day to actually move them to where we want them and finally clear the weeds and couch grass from the end of 8A - the only bit of our plots which has never been dug (by us).

After

They took a lot of digging and we're pretty sure there will be raspberries in that corner for ever more!

But, I got the 5 canes I wanted and they're now in the opposite corner. I planted them in a trench full of compost from our bin. There was some debate with fellow plotholders so I left them tall and will cut them back when they've settled into their new home in a couple of weeks.

Plenty of canes for fellow plotholders - Jane and Malcolm had first pick for their plots but we'll let other people know if there are any remaining plants.



Jane let me take some of her brother-in-law's strawberries so I potted three plants up in the wooden planter. I put stones over the earth to attempt to help moisture retention - not sure if strawbs will be happy with that but we'll see....

We only want enough to have some to nibble while we're at the plot in the summer.

Onions and Shallots

What a beautiful warm and sunny day! The minimum temp since last weekend was -5° but it really felt like Spring today and the number of allotment holders on site reflected this!

We hoed the alliums quarter and then planted

16 Golden Gourmet shallots and
34 Santero onions - which are meant to be downy mildew resistant.
They're all spaced about 15cm apart - onions in 2 rows; shallots in 3 rows, with a bit of space under the cage for our leek seedlings (which we haven't sown yet)

In an attempt stop the pesky onion/leek moth we've covered both patches with enviromesh coverings - though the cloche looks like it may be a bit ineffective as the sides aren't flush to the ground.

Jamie dug over some of the potato quarter but it was hard work - so many roots, as it hasn't been dug that well over the last couple of years - slightly concerned that the tree is going to fall down with the amount of roots we're pulling :-)