Big catch up!

Hard to know where to start in terms of recent plantings and plantings out, cropping, greenhouse activities!

Cropping: we've started eating Arran Pilot first early potatoes - large crop of good sized potatoes and such a good flavour. Definitely one to grow next year.

The red chard we picked last week was really good and we're expecting a steady crop through the summer and beyond. We had our first meal using broad beans today and are very pleased.

Strawberries have been lovely and look set to give more fruit for at least another week, overlapping with the raspberries which will soon come into their own. Along with blackcurrants, the fruit hedge, tayberries, Worcester berries and others which we need to check names of!

The rhubarb was first off the locks and we had several cuttings of stems and froze what we couldn't eat immediately. 

The asparagus was somewhat disappointing except we have to realise that the roots were disturbed when we made the move from Windsor Avenue to Victoria Road. It looks like we'll have to wait a year until we can really crop the asparagus again, so we need to keep the raised beds weed free, manured and generally well-tended. 

Up and coming: peas of several varieties have really grown well this year and we look forward to enjoying them - peas, sugar snaps, climbing French peas .....

The Cobra climbing French beans are finally growing quite vigorously so we expect good things from them sooner rather than later.

The beetroot are forming nicely so won't be too long now. The variety of Action F1 should be eaten small so we will - and try also to re-sow over the coming weeks and months.

The courgette plants - Romanesco and Gold Rush - are growing well so should provide eatable fruits within the next ten days. Similarly, the cucumber plants look very healthy so we'll keep an eye on those.

The squash plant needs to be accompanied by the two remaining plants in the greenhouse so that we can be sure of a big crop of Hunter F1 butter nut squash - which incidentally have really good keeping qualities.

The netting seems very effective over the cabbage, sprouts, kale and purple sprouting. Hopefully we can look forward to good crops of each of them.

 The sweet corn plants are now very well established and showing definite promise. Combined with the mixture of heavy rain and hot sunshine that we've experienced over the past 4-6 weeks I would say that conditions are excellent for that, and virtually everything else.

In the greenhouse: the 5 Gardeners' Delight tomato plants are thriving (as are the 4 plants in the allotment) but the 3 free plug plants we got through Gardeners World magazine are extremely leggy, after arriving in a very straggly and distressed state. They may not last the course.

However, the 3 chilli plants we got in the same deal are now thriving and good companions to the Prairie Fire and Ring o' Fire plants which were grown from seed.  I'm hoping for good things on the chilli front this year - and a couple of new ristras too!

The sweet potato plugs really need to be planted on into a potato bag in the green house - an urgent job for this week/weekend.

The salad trays continue to grow well and provide cut and come again salad leaf. The successional sowing has improved greatly.

More planting in pots and trays - maybe soon in the plot

Although I planted some more potatoes yetsreday - Estima - and all the yellow onions that had been started off in pots in the greenhouse - with the soil still likely to be rather too cold for much direct planting, today I planted the French Marigolds, some mixed salad leaf, coriander and parsley in trays.

I also sorted out what might be possible to plant direct into the allotment plot tomorrow - including chard, two varieties of peas and beetroot. It's probably not worth over-sowing in case germination is poor but in general it's warmed up a lot recently and looks set to be fair for a few more days to come too.

Following an article in the Gardeners World magazine I have put some parsnip seed on wet kitchen paper with the hope that what they call 'viable' seed will produce a small shoot within a week and then it will be possible to plant them direct into the soil right away.  They are notorious for being hard to get to germinate so it's definitely worth a try.

Busy time is starting

Just before we went to Sweden I planted 2 types of early potatoes - Arran Pilot nearest the polytunnel, and a row of Swift next to it.  I bought some more Charlotte so there will soon be 1 row of Estima and maybe 4 rows of Charlotte to complete the potato planting this season.

I also planted the pre-rooted garlic and this will be followed soon by the red onion sets and the yellow ones. They all look very well rooted and the shoots are up to inches high now.

Currently in the greenhouse are the broad beans (10 + 7 germinated out of 20) and they can go in the ground very soon now. I'll make sure they're better supported this year.

Today I planted sweet corn seeds in small pots for the propagator and also a second batch of 2 types of hot chilli seeds - Ring of Fire and Prairie Fire.  The first seedlings perished through my neglect of them in the front room!

Next to plant will be sprouts and peas, in trays/pots respectively, and soon it will be time to try seeds direct in the soil. 

Planting out time begins ....

After starting various seeds (tomatoes, broad beans, chillies, salad leaf) and garlic and onion sets in pots in the greenhouse, it's nearly time to start planting things out in the ground at the allotment.

Today it will be the rooted and shooting garlic, and tomorrow will be some of the early potatoes and some rooted onion sets.

Other things will follow soon after out return from Sweden for Nick's wedding, including broad beans.

A busy and productive weekend as Spring sets in

With such wonderful weather for the whole weekend, it was lovely to spend so much time at the allotment and continue to prepare everything for sowing time.

By Sunday afternoon, the framework of the polytunnel had been reconstructed, with all the polythene sheeting removed. It looks and feels stable and should be fine to cover in mesh netting in order to protect plants from birds and butterflies.The soil is also in good condition there and is all set to use.

Meanwhile, Linda did a large amount of digging on Saturday to help prepare large parts of the vegetable patches, leaving just the potato patch to completely clear and dig, which definitely needs to be finished by the end of March at the latest.

The fruit bushes and fruit canes have all been pruned and trimmed, along with the 'fruit hedge', and Linda has also painted butterflies on the garden shed, along with our initials, to make it definitely ours.

At home, more seeds were planted in pots and trays, including sweet peas, basil, tomatoes (Gardeners Delight). Yellow onion sets (Centurion), red sets (Red Baron) and garlic (French ..... ), are also in pots in the greenhouse with the intention of getting them rooted and make the planting into the allotment easier and more sure of them becoming established.

First full season at Victoria Road

After the frustration of almost non-stop rain since Christmas, it is finally possible to start some proper planning and preparation for Spring 2014.

We have drawn up a planting scheme and bought 4 different types of seed potato which we hope we'll be able to plant before the end of March.

So far we have:

6 each of Swift, Estima, Arran Pilot (all first early or early varieties)
10 of Charlotte (a second early salad potato).

They will be planted in the patch of land behind the polytunnel, next to last year's potato plot.  In fact, depending on how preparations go, we may fully plant this whole area with potatoes.

I have already planted 2 varieties of broad bean (10 each of The Sutton and Aquadulce) in pots in the greenhouse in the hope that they can get a head start before being planted out into the allotment.

Indoors, I have planted 2 varieties of chilli (Prairie Fire and Ring of Fire - the latter being a good success last year) and in due course they will be planted up into pots for the greenhouse). They are both hot varieties.

Later on I'll plant some tomato seeds in a similar way - Gardeners Delight and one other variety - as yet unchosen!

Hopefully I'll be able to do some more digging and clearing up by Wednesday this week and get close to having everything ready.

Final cropping of the year?

After what seems like weeks and weeks of rain, today was finally a dry day. I was nervous again about what I would find at the allotment after a four week gap since my last visit.

I needn't have worried too much as things looked pretty tidy. The poly tunnel had been cleared out on my last visit, and I had done a bit of digging and clearing of the main plot too.

The squash plants had withered away but had left some fine fruits, as can be seen in the photo.

Back at the greenhouse I was able to pick the remaining chillis, (bought from the South Devon Chilli Farm) a mixture of red and green Ring of Fire, which certainly live up to their name. A single chilli gave plenty of heat in a recent chilli con carne, and will certainly add some heat to a chicken curry I'm making later today. The quantity of chillis produced this year is definitely similar to the very first time we grew them, and far better than the last couple of years. Whether it's due to a better variety, or more suitable growing conditions, it's hard to know, but I'll certainly try the exact same ones next year.

Once the weather steadies down a bit, and the soil can really start to dry out a bit, I'll go back to the allotment and try to finalise the clearing up and pre-winter digging.  With luck also, I'll get some manure spread over the plot, and cover with sheeting to suppress weeds until things start over again in the early Spring.