Merry Christmas!

Will be at the plot picking sprouts and leeks tomorrow but don't expect to be blogging, so Merry Christmas!

 

Weather and Birdlife

Not sure if that's a pigeon or kestrel

At the beginning of last week the weather was really cold (-4°) with beautiful frosted trees, but unfortunately I didn't get a chance to get to the site to take any photos. Since Friday it's been rainy and temperatures have been a balmy 8°. Not good - we want the weeds and bad pests to die off, which they won't do if it stays moderately warm :-(

There had just been a torrential downpour when we got to the plot this afternoon after posting Christmas cards - look at all that rainfall since last Sunday!! Shame it hasn't been cold enough for snow - I could have had a snow day from work :-)

The ground was really soggy and everything looked saturated, including our garlic bed...
There were lots of birds about; robins, blue tits, blackbirds, pigeons and pheasants (eating the tops off people's unprotected brassicas). We've noticed that there are no berries left on the hedge, apart from a few rosehips. I was hoping to see some redwings as I saw a whole flock of them eating berries along the A4 the other day - beautiful looking birds. I'd never seen them before but they're apparently a common Winter visitor.

Herbs (and weeds) are the only things growing on this part of the plot

 

To the allotment via the Christmassy High Street

We popped up the allotment to add some kitchen waste to the compost bin. No-one else around as it was already beginning to get dark. We left the walk up till later in the afternoon so that we could enjoy Hungerford's Christmas lights - they are so fabulous, with christmas trees on every lampost and shop!


High Street in all its Christmas glory!



Whilst on the plot we checked how the few growing things are doing - it didn't take long!:
No sign of the garlic yet - maybe rotted as it's so wet :(
Leeks are looking pretty good. The ones under enviromesh (Oarsman F1) are certainly happier than the ones out in the open (though we're not sure what variety these are). I hope they continue to grow over the next two weeks because they're having a starring role in our Christmas meal - leek and chestnut filo parcels. Mmm, they sound soooo good!!

Happy protected leeks

Fairly happy unprotected leeks

The broad beans are still there - still very small but the mouse hasn't nibbled them yet. Suprisingly, given that we found this hoard under our storage area!! That's all our marigold seeds!

All nice and dry under a plastic cover!

Back home via more Christmas lights over the canal. Lovely! And all ready for Hungerford Victorian Extravaganza on Friday 14th December 2012.

Sprouts for dinner

Time really is flying - December now and it feels like it! Brrrr, lowest temp over the last week has been -5°. All the water on the site is frozen and the ground is solid though squelchy on top because of the torrential rain we had before the last few days of frost.
We weren't the only ones on the site; the cat was stalking something and was a bit indignant at being disturbed! Not too sure where he lives but he thinks he owns the site as he's been around since day1 - there's another tabby who's been around recently though so he's got competion!

Our poor broad beans probably shouldn't have chosen last week to pop their little heads up :-(
Far too cold for them to start growing at this point, we think. They look a bit yellow at the moment...

We picked sprouts to have with dinner - Jamie picked the poorest quality ones but they tasted delish!

 

After the wind and rain

Jamie visited the plot to check if it was still there after the amazing wind and rain yesterday. He was the only person there - not too surprisingly!

There wasn't much devastation; a lot of leaning structures, compost lids scattered around the site, fleece and netting stuck to the rabbit fencing and our pots had blown across the plot.

Of course, our sprout cage didn't hold up too well - it is always the first casualty! It's a bit broken and the netting tried to escape but couldn't get away from the last bricks holding it down :-)

The sprouts had to be secured upright again but none of them snapped so that's a good thing!
With more wind and rain predicted for the weekend I think we'll need to be armed with cable ties - if the sprouts are out in the open for too long the pesky pigeons will pinch our Christmas lunch!!

Clearing & Burning

It's been grey, misty but mild today. There were a few of us on the site - all with the same plan; to clear the ground and make it ready for Winter.
We spent a few hours clearing  and Jamie did some digging. We managed to get a fire going in the incinerator. We burned the remains of the sweet peas and peas and anything else we could find! The ashes were later dug into an empty space where the potatoes will grow next year - they generally like a bit of potash (not too much though or it can cause scab).


Burn, burn, burn!

We've cleared a lot of the calendula - still loads more to clear but at least we can see and use our wobbly path again now to get to the compost bins! We took two bagfuls of green waste home - seedheads and weeds which we don't want to sow next year.

Cleared all round the seat and compost bins

All the non-seed parts of the calendula went into the compost bins - we chopped the stems into smaller sections so that they'll compost down a bit quicker. Jamie mixed the fresh stuff in with the already-rotting compost. Both bins are pretty much full now but hopefully it will rot down a bit before we clear the next area of calendula!

Preparing the sprout plot

Jamie started to prepare this year's legume quarter for the brassicas (particularly sprouts) next year. He cleared the area of the marigolds; pulled the remains of bean plants; dug it really well and then added some chicken pellet manure. We'll pile bags of manure on it to make the ground nice and hard for when the sprouts go in.

Talking of sprouts, he also staked our leaning plants. The sprouts look pretty good, but Jamie said there were a lot of slugs and snails in the cage.
I got to the plot just in time for lunch  :-) and took him a lovely meat-free pasty from the fabulous Cornish Pasty shop in Newbury.

This is the rhubarb under it's Winter protection (should stop it getting too wet) - this will also help us remember where it is, as all the leaves have died off and there's no trace of it above ground!

Oh dear, no parsnips for Christmas!

We had a visit to the plot this morning. We needed to add some kitchen waste to the compost bins and I ripped up an Amazon delivery box to add too. There was no-one else on site, it wasn't too chilly and no rain, but the ground is still pretty claggy.

Jamie decided it was time to check whether we're going to have parsnips for Christmas dinner.
So, we pulled one up today - looked a good size....

...but it was rotten. Squashy at both ends and where we snapped the end off you can see that the central core is white surrounded with rotted nip :-(
It's not too surprising given the state of the parsnip bed - the hand is pointing at an apparently growing top:

A sad soggy parsnip bed

The leafy tops started to die back in September when I pulled a nice parsnip. Since then, the tops have disappeared completely; a couple have started to show some re-growth, which isn't a good sign. It would seem that we should have pulled them before the tops died back completely - the wet probably seeped down through the top where the leaves were no longer there to protect the root.
So, it's a second year with no home-grown parsnips for our Christmas lunch - doh!

Today, planning not working!

As expected, not much happening on the plot. We really need to do some tidying - hopefully we'll get a chance to do that next week.
I did put the remains of the courgette and Bush Delicata squash plants into the compost bin(!). I've got squash for my dinner tonight - stuffing made with chestnuts, parsley, sage and cheese. Yum


Jamie's checking the leeks

There's still no sign of garlic shoots or broad beans popping up. The temperature reached -3° last night and today was again warm and sunny.
Our sprouts need some support! Two of the plants have serious leaning issues so we'll have to get into the cage and straighten them up if poss. Also need to take those yellow leaves off to stop disease and mould getting to them.

This end of Plot7 doesn't look too bad, quite nicely cleared but the other quarters need work and a good dig over before it gets really cold. Not to mention Plot 8...!

 

A walk past the plot (and the last 3 years)

We went for a walk over Freemans Marsh in the sun this afternoon. There were a few moorhen on the river and a beautiful swan but we didn't see anything else of interest. The ground was very soggy (well, it is the marsh :-)) but not as bad as we've seen it before - I managed to keep my socks dry and wasn't wearing wellies!

We were going to walk past the allotments but saw Malcolm so went in and chatted to him for a good while. The ground is rather wet for digging and the weeds continue to grow in our absence!
There were quite a few fellow plotholders around and I couldn't face talking to them all so we decided against walking down to our plot (shame, I wish we had now) - I guess that's the drawback of having such a friendly site  :-)

As I was lazy, here are pics from around this date over the history of our plot (unfortunately not from the same vantage point!!)


This week in 2011



This week in 2010

This week in 2009