The 2015 Allotment / Veg Patch Thread - it's here!

[TheSpottedZebra]

Yes, it's the thread you've all been waiting for, a place to chit chat about your allotment or fruit and veg patch - however big it may be. Even if it currently only imaginary or no bigger than a pot of growing basil from the supermarket.

Come discuss your plans, your seeds, your learnings from previous years and your goals for this year. All levels of knowledge welcome, from absolute beginner, to enthusiastic 2nd year-er (me!), to anyone else.

Great, can I join?

Made my first trip to the allotment to actually do some gardening and managed to get half my new soft fruit planted. I managed to get in a rhubarb crown (need to get two more), gooseberry, red currant, black currant and loganberry.

I am waiting on 9 raspberry canes I got bought for my birthday to turn up, so need to clear that part of the bed before they do!

Strawberries can go in later in the spring.

I also planted a concorde pear tree I got in Wilkos yesterday. It was £7 so I thought what the hell. But it was bought about 5ft tall and looking at it it looks all wrong. It looks like the badly pruned tree in this pic: www.clemson.edu/extension/hgic/plants/vegetables/tree_fruits_nuts/hgic1351.html It is on a quince rootstock, and I think a semi-dwarfing one as the lable says max height is 4m.

Do I need to chop off A and C and hope the teeny weeny 'branches' further down grow a bit more or just leave it and hope for the best?

Btw whoever was asking about tomatoes, roma and marmande are great and what I am growing this year. They are the tastiest tomatoes I have ever grown. I will probably throw in a few stupice so I have something to eat mid-summer when the other varieties are just blooming away, roma and marmande in particular are quite late!

Sowed. I sowed my seeds. I didn't sew my seeds

Still no sign unsurprisingly.

Ditch the spuds, Stainless! Not worth the risk?

Amantes seed planting already ! Apart from my celeriac, which I will sow next weekend,I do mine in March - obviously a lot later by about a month 6 weeks up here, due to late frosts. The first year of allotmenting I planted my potatoes ( time as suggested) - an old timer came over , tutted, and brought me a load of agricultural potato fleece to cover them -he told me to chuck out all the timings on packets etc as we get late frosts 2 years out of 3 . he saved my potatoes that year, just a few blackened shoots at the edges :)
ethelb - thanks for that , its always patience with stuff - I will do sungold to eat off the bush earlier :) - I can't offer advice on pruning - my DH is pruner in chief here, as i tend to not do it hard enough

Welcome, ethel And catrush

Well, pending paperwork, I now have a allotment and I am jolly excited. I went to look around, and there was a choice of a few. One was very very overgrown with couch grass, and Stainless you're a better person than I, as it scared me off! It was very sunny and right near the water, but maybe too big. And a right old state. Then there were a couple of other, but 'my one' must have been cultivated until very recently as there are hardly any weeds at all. And it's in between 2 nice (but not too pristine) plots. And it has a shed, and a compost heap thing, and an apple tree. There are apples rotting on the ground, so it was clearly productive last year. I love trees, especially if they give me fruit. The tree will probably cast a fair bit of shade on a third to a quarter of the plot, and I might need to give it a bit of a prune, but I like my new plot a lot. It really doesn't seem to need too much resurrecting at all!

Then i went to Wilko and bought some more soft fruit. In fact everything on ethel ' s list bar the rhubarb. Er, potatoes too... I forgot to take pics as I was too excited. And I don't really know the measurements, they said it's about 94 square metres, but that seems a lot. I need to make some lists now of what to grow at home, and what to grow on allotment.

Ooh, apple tree sounds nice, I've been coveting some of those small cordon ones on someone else's plot.

Talk to me about potatoes please, which varieties do you like and why? I did Rocket and Desiree last year, I always like Desiree but the Rocket were a bit meh, tasteless. I'd like some really tasty early ones for potato salad etc.

My tree is more than a cordon- I'd say it's 6ft ish tall tho could take a trim (i hope). I think it must be on some kind dwarf rootstock; hopefully I'll figure out more anon! I'd love some cordon ones for home...

Hmm, re potatoes, I have Swift and Pentland Javelin. But I've never grown any potatoes before. I got 2 lots of 1st earlies as I am very enthusiastic and I want to do stuff NOW! And those varieties as I know my neighbour grows JP, and thought I'd have a crack at Swift also. I don't cook chips ever or roasties much, so don't need a pot that's good for that. Ooh, maybe i need some later pots also? I can get a winter crop in after 1st earlies can't I?

Spotted - the allotment sounds wonderful! - per the tree- just remember, that the roots of the tree will be as wide/bigger if not more than what you see above ground. If it looks as if it fruited last year, I would leave alone to see what it is like this year, but give it a good feed :)
WhoKnows my absolute favourite potato is a second early- Marfona
2nd favourite - main crop -Picasso.
I haven't yet found an early that tastes anything like so far - last year it was Lady Christl that someone raved about - sadly no :(
I did try the Sarpo Mira the year after we got blight - a really good crop (main) but too floury for me I am thinking of the kidney one that makes Jerseys, and splashing out on good seaweed fertiliser , but only if I get the other half plot.
You can get 'step over' apples- I was thinking of these to edge my plot , but decided against.

spotted - you tend to plant potatoes all at the same time- they just spend longer in the ground depending on whether they are earlies, second earlies or main crop
My favourite is a second early, but I dig a few up early :) and then dig up as I need them. Sadly we have had problems over all the site with eel worms, which make tunnels through them - very disappointing last year :(

Ha, you put them in at about the same time? Well, fancy that!

What can grow under the same of an apple tree? That isn't rhubarb or salady greens?

God I love step overs. They are so so so pretty. My fantasy kitchen garden inside my head has them.

Rasps and gooseberries don't mind a bit of shade, do they? What about currants?

spotted :) I tend to take about a week to plant my potatoes- its back - breaking! But you can stagger the planting a bit - but as a rule of thumb time to maturity/ harvest is
earlies 12-14 weeks
2nd earlies 15-18 weeks
maincrop 18-22 weeks
Fruit is usually best in as much sun as you can get , to help it ripen.
If your tree is about 6' ish, raspberries grow to about 4-5' depending on variety, and need a good lot of support - tensioned between quite hefty stakes is how we do it, so not sure they would be good under a small tree.
By the way - my favourite 2 books, which are my bibles for my allotment are
Andy Clevely - The Allotment Book

The RHS Encyclopaedia of Gardening - The Definitive Guide to Practical Gardening - ( I picked this up at a car boot sale!) which has a great section on veg and fruit growing

agoodbook, I'm about as far south as possible! It's barely jacket weather here Though the soon-to-be seedlings are admittedly on the kitchen windowsill, for now but I have just bought my dessert grape vines!

Spotted I really, really wish my apple tree was on a dwarf rootstock - it's threatening to fall, it's so top heavy (and completely, infuriatingly, inaccessible at the mo!).

Congrats on the allotment zebra!

I got some early potatoes too. Arran pilot though I meant to get rocket I only realised when I got home. Hopefully they will be nice. They are now chitting in the greenhouse.

Fingers crossed the raspberries turn up soon!

Amantes - its a good job I am oop north! - I go away for a bit of sun at the beginning of Feb , its by far the easiest time for holidays when it comes to allotments.
So it will all kick off when I get back, just hoping I get finished with the digging/ manuring before then -( though if I get that other bit of plot, goodness knows!) February up here is usually the coldest month
We got up to +1 today :)

Eek, agoodbook! It's 12° in the shade here

I hope you have a lovely holiday! Extra plot? Sounds like fun! I'm still waiting for access to mine, so we're cracking on with garden and container growing in the meantime. We're planning quite a large edible living wall, for something a little different!

I'm like you agoodbook - it's not unusual to get frosts right into may here, so no seeds until March at the earliest. Which is good because I'm currently short of windowsills and a veg patch to plant them in! Might do more on the patio this year, what's particularly good in pots?

I forgot to bring in the chilli plant that I'd managed to over winter so far. The -7C killed it last night :(

I use my bulb planter for planting spuds. I have ridiculously heavy clay soil, and even with that it just takes a morning for mine and I fill 1/3 of my lottie with them. I have one of these and use it for putting plants and tubers in, plus getting dandilions out. It is awesome.

Amantes - I think I will get to find out on Sunday - its the other half plot joining on to mine - I'm not sure if its fingers crossed they say yes or no! :) At the moment my half plot growing area is 7.5 metres by 18 metres , which doesn't include shed, water butt and compost bins or a lot of spare that is still grassed that still needs to be sorted.The other half plot has no grass , its all cultivated so it will more than double the size.
Bolshy - I'm not really a container grower, I do have stuff at home , and one of the things that has done really well for me is spinach- I always have a pot growing next to my back door - I have grown overflow potatoes in a couple of pots,( couldn't just leave them poor things) but though I tried to keep them well watered, they didn't produce a particularly good crop - they are greedy, so maybe I didn't feed them enough. I grow cut and come again salad leaves, and tomatoes and cucumbers in pots in my green house. Its getting enough depth of compost or soil that could limit you, but everything is worth a try if you are prepared to fail - I have seen dwarf french beans in pots.
OhYouBad - its always the same isn't it - if you are not bothered about it, it will survive through thick and thin, if you do care about it - back turns, and its dead!

fabulous idea Delicious - I have been doing it the old fashioned way- digging trenches 9" deep, compost lining the bottom etc, etc.
I must admit last year I had about 12 tubers left over, and I just got a trowel and dug a hole for each one and threw them in - they didn't seem any worse than the ones I put in the traditional way :)
I have home made tools -( my DH is a DIYer/bodger :) ) so my 3 favourite things I use all the time are here, made from cast off stuff
Leek dibber/measure/home made straight line
sophisticated eh ?

Gid I am pathetic. There I was thinking that my new 94 Sq m sounds massive. Then I read agoodbook has 135 of growing area. And now I am jealous and wondering if I need ore, and should have gone for a bigger one!

Potatoes on to chit now, so DeliciousMonster thanks for the bulb planter tip. My soil is heavy clay too, so I'll def try that.

Bolshy I did most of my stuff in pots last year -my first growing year. Tomatoes, tomatillos, lots and lots of chillis. Salady leaves in tray things. In bigger containers, beans and cucamelons. Took a lot of watering and feeding, but seemed to go ok? I have no benchmark however...!

Ooh, agoodbook your handmade tools are lovely, very charming. I love handmade stuff.

Potatoes are now on their way to being compost. As are strawberry plants. And I'm hiding at home, it was just too cold today!

spotted - I'm not that virtuous, I didn't realise it was couch grass until I started digging! If I had, I might have chosen a different plot - am very envious of your tree! The plot next to me seems to be neglected, I'm being optimistic and hoping the brambles on it are heavy fruiting.

I love those homemade tools, they look great! Might try making myself some, we hoard enough junk to bodge up something that has function over beauty! I'm pretty skint, so I'm trying to do allotmenting on the scrounge cheap, and I've already been given a load of seeds from a friend, she's also promised me strawberry runners. Just need to buy a few packets of seeds and I'll ask for rhubarb/raspberries for birthday presents. if I manage to keep it going for a year I'll treat myself next spring with some fruit trees.

I'm really enjoying reading all these posts, they are giving me so many tips and ideas.

I have been doing it the old fashioned way- digging trenches 9" deep, compost lining the bottom etc, etc.

If you want to do that - use one of these. You can do it in about 1/4 of the time/effort.

Stainless if you're on a budget you may like to know that lidl seeds are out soon - the leaflet says from 29th. last page seemed yo to work ok for me last year!