Sunny, then heavy shower, repeat several times. No point hoeing as it will just move the seedlings round, too damp to crawl round uprooting weeds, so into the greenhouse.
Removed all the overblown lettuce. Found two tiny melons, unthreaded and retied the melon plants to get more sunlight. Trimmed the experimental squash so it was no longer overshadowing melons, peppers and tomatoes. Weeded thoroughly, mostly spurges and sowthistle. Retied the tomatoes, trimmed some over enthusiastic side shoots, must be better next year at tying them in and feeding, still a crop of sorts.
Will need to dig out some of the topsoil from my L shaped bed and incorporate a load of manure as it seems under provided in the fertiliser department.
Monday, August 28, 2006
When the gardener is away the weeds will play...
....at mummies and daddies and produce millions of little weeedies.
Back Saturday from a week in Dorset, at Portisham, some nice looking allotments in Weymouth off Abbotsbury Road caught my eye, but I could not justify a visit when Lulworth Cove was calling. One village veg patch off the road up to Hardys Monument had a lovely raised bed, whole garden actually, with a drop down a beautiful stone wall to the stream that rushes down besides the street, fresh clean water on tap or rather bucket.
Back to my plots though. After driving home, sorting out the caravan, etc, I paid a brief visit on Saturday, weed seedlings by the ton, apparently we had heavy rain through the week we were away, the seedlings I had missed a couple of weeks ago are now mature plants in flower or early seed and the soil is warm and moist.
After girding my loins on Sunday I got stuck in, strimmed at home, along the main allotment track and round my plots. Mowed front and back lawns at home, then the main allotment track, four barrow loads into my hungry Daleks. (For any readers new to my blog, my house is a hundred yards from the entrance to my allotment site). Finished the boys toys bit by rough mowing the sides to the outside of the main gate and the carpark.
Weeded the bottom strawberry patch along plot seventeen, dug up two rows of Nicola second earlies, dead sticks for foliage, disappointing yield, both in quantity and size, but quite clean. Aslo sampled the carrots from my mini-raised bed, quite promising.
If Monday is dry I will continue with weeding and hoeing, plus get up the last two rows of Nicola, if it is wet the greenhouse desperately needs attention, bolted lettuce and a rampant squash have submerged the capsicums!
Looks like a week or two of steady weeding ahead. Quite annoying really as it was so clean, but that is the difference between continuous hot dry weather and rainy warm weather, germination happens in the later!
Back Saturday from a week in Dorset, at Portisham, some nice looking allotments in Weymouth off Abbotsbury Road caught my eye, but I could not justify a visit when Lulworth Cove was calling. One village veg patch off the road up to Hardys Monument had a lovely raised bed, whole garden actually, with a drop down a beautiful stone wall to the stream that rushes down besides the street, fresh clean water on tap or rather bucket.
Back to my plots though. After driving home, sorting out the caravan, etc, I paid a brief visit on Saturday, weed seedlings by the ton, apparently we had heavy rain through the week we were away, the seedlings I had missed a couple of weeks ago are now mature plants in flower or early seed and the soil is warm and moist.
After girding my loins on Sunday I got stuck in, strimmed at home, along the main allotment track and round my plots. Mowed front and back lawns at home, then the main allotment track, four barrow loads into my hungry Daleks. (For any readers new to my blog, my house is a hundred yards from the entrance to my allotment site). Finished the boys toys bit by rough mowing the sides to the outside of the main gate and the carpark.
Weeded the bottom strawberry patch along plot seventeen, dug up two rows of Nicola second earlies, dead sticks for foliage, disappointing yield, both in quantity and size, but quite clean. Aslo sampled the carrots from my mini-raised bed, quite promising.
If Monday is dry I will continue with weeding and hoeing, plus get up the last two rows of Nicola, if it is wet the greenhouse desperately needs attention, bolted lettuce and a rampant squash have submerged the capsicums!
Looks like a week or two of steady weeding ahead. Quite annoying really as it was so clean, but that is the difference between continuous hot dry weather and rainy warm weather, germination happens in the later!
Saturday, August 19, 2006
Changes
Bit of a strange week or so.
Have not done much on the allotment or in the greenhouse since coming back from Cromer.
Major surprise last week when the Town Council rang, Albert has given up ten of his fifteen rods. His brother had come up to see him and seemingly having seen how badly he was doing keeping on top of his plots had managed to persuade him to cut back a bit. They tried to move his shed from the ten rod plot to the five rod plot, however it proved immovable.
I had a look at the shed, 3x3 clad in corrugated iron, held on with six inch nails, folded over on the inside. The wood was hard as iron and stuck in the ground, which was like half cooked brick. No wonder two elderly gents had failed to move it.
So our ten person waiting list starts to move now, Alberts ten rod is marked as three, three and four rod plots, we have Laine's vacated plot also. First on the list, Nigel, has been and taken the bottom three of Alberts ten.
Am going to see what timber and stuff I can put together to make Albert a shed on his remaining plot.
On a more personal level the sweetcorn is amazing this year, well set, juicy and incredibly sweet, had twelve cobs with five-spice pork chops for tea between the four of us this evening, yum. I must get the brassicas and leeks sorted after digging up the second earlies whose foliage has now died off.
Have not done much on the allotment or in the greenhouse since coming back from Cromer.
Major surprise last week when the Town Council rang, Albert has given up ten of his fifteen rods. His brother had come up to see him and seemingly having seen how badly he was doing keeping on top of his plots had managed to persuade him to cut back a bit. They tried to move his shed from the ten rod plot to the five rod plot, however it proved immovable.
I had a look at the shed, 3x3 clad in corrugated iron, held on with six inch nails, folded over on the inside. The wood was hard as iron and stuck in the ground, which was like half cooked brick. No wonder two elderly gents had failed to move it.
So our ten person waiting list starts to move now, Alberts ten rod is marked as three, three and four rod plots, we have Laine's vacated plot also. First on the list, Nigel, has been and taken the bottom three of Alberts ten.
Am going to see what timber and stuff I can put together to make Albert a shed on his remaining plot.
On a more personal level the sweetcorn is amazing this year, well set, juicy and incredibly sweet, had twelve cobs with five-spice pork chops for tea between the four of us this evening, yum. I must get the brassicas and leeks sorted after digging up the second earlies whose foliage has now died off.
Tuesday, August 08, 2006
Holiday
Went to Cromer for a week.
Carefully checked everything before going, came back to bundles of ripe sweetcorn and bagfulls of climbing French Beans
Carefully checked everything before going, came back to bundles of ripe sweetcorn and bagfulls of climbing French Beans
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