Grand Allotment Tour

Recent reflection has reminded me why I started a blog. To keep a record!  I've discovered that I have got rather too precious about revealing the true state of play at the allotment.  So I'm going back to my roots. Welcome to the warts and all tour of my plot today:

The internal path divides the plot into a broad side and a narrow side.  The path has been lost under piles of weeds that have never dried out with all the rain we've had this summer, so I'm excavating it:

Internal Path

Starting at the shed end of the wide side (on the right in the picture above) the raspberries are just finishing and the strawberries have definitely finished but require their winter tidy up now.

Next along, the broad beans and onions have gone and I'm using the space for leeks, recently planted out. Spot the remains of a row of beetroot - (lack of planning!)

Leeks + Beetroot

Moving along the three wigwams are runner beans barlotti beans and purple French climbing beans. Sadly the last one ended up as a mixture of leftovers - not a good idea.  By the way I have two wigwams at home too (neither of which is a mixture).


3 sisters planting?


Next in line, the potato patch looks a bit shambolic now that the earlies have been dug up and the maincrop haulms are dying back, but I've resown the area dug up with all sorts of autumn and winter possibilities like lettuces, corn salad, radishes, sorrel, spinach beet.  It was going to be green manure but I figured on growing an edible green manure instead! Also the remaining potatoes under the ground should be good judging from the healthy tops they grew. This was in sharp conntrast to the earlies which hardly managed any tops to speak of this year!




Potato maincrop + new sowings



Just over the wire is a riot of dwarf French beans. As usual the pods have come on strong but are rather hidden away under the leaves.  Not to worry as most of these are Canadian Wonder which dries nicely to give a substantial mealy red kidney bean.



Dwarf French Beans

 Next up is the area I reached up to when digging in manure last winter when it had leeks growing in it. It is currently my fire/compost/utility area...


Ugggh

 Beyond that there are the remains of my bumper pea crop!

Peas plants

And at the end of the broad side there are the trusty rhubarb plants that have loved the weather,  and my Cambridge Favourite strawberries.

Rhubarb + New Strawberries

On the other (narrow) side of the path there are two areas: Carrots, under the  nets, and other roots (celeriac, beetroot, parsnip, turnip and artechoke)


Carrots and "other roots"

and last but not least: brassicas under their protective net (together with even more strawberries and some othe soft fruit bushes)




Brassicas



Hope you enjoyed the tour.

There is work to be done, but this year's food returns have been secured. It remains to be seen whether in the Committee's  view this to come up to the acceptable standard.

A bone to pick

Leeks are one crop I have grown every year (for 20 years).  That's an indication of how easy they are to grow not of any skill on my part. You just sow them in spring in a pot at home and then plonk them into their holes in the vegetable patch around this time of year.  In return for this, and a bit of weeding, you get winter veg that carries on throughout spring. Unlike other alliums they are not too fussy, not subject to major diseases or susceptible to pests. Some years they do better than others but this year I thought I would be a bit kinder to them and apply a dressing of "fish blood and bonemeal" fertiliser when planting them out. Sadly the resident fox family had other ideas and spent the night digging up the leeks I had planted during the day! Of course they don't like leeks, just the fertiliser. After repairs I'm sure I'll still get a reasonable crop.

I don't normally comment on the BBC Gardeners World programme, but I have to say that Monty Don infuriated me last night.  First he showed how to grow leeks, the same way as I do (althought mysteriously straight after cutting back transplanted irises  he failed to top and tail his leek seedlings in a similar manner (so they didn't sit well in their holes)) he then went on to plant out groups of leeks grown in root trainers without thinning them out at all.  This sure looks like a case of a new product being used for unsuitable purposes just because it is new. I wonder if he will show the viewer how the two methods compare next spring! My prediction, the clumps of leeks will be poor compared to the  individually planted plants.

Also have to mention that my new weed "Great Mullein" featured large in several of the London Gardens Carol Klein visited. What a coincidence!

http://malsallotment.blogspot.com/2009/06/leeks.html

Leeks

A progress report on the leeks:



From my entry of 15th March I reckon they are 20 days old.




And here's my secret weapon for the brassicas. More details to follow: