The 2015 Allotment / Veg Patch Thread Part 3 already!

[agoodbook]

Just seen the other is full , so here goes - we are heading for summer now! Welcome to everyone old and new :)

here is a link to the previous thread

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/gardening/2350947-The-2015-Allotment-Veg-Patch-Thread-Part-2?msgid=54546739

Sorry, goodbook, I wasn't very clear. We've got lots more garden/lawn space that I will do things with and that's where I'll plant some fruit trees. Maybe along the street-side fence, though I'd quite like a climbing rose there.

Also thinking about extending the current actual garden patch all the way along the fence. That would add another 8 metres or so. I could then plant a proper vegetable garden and use the bit along the house for plants that do enjoy shade. My mother said hostas are good.

I think the wee patch is on the east side of the house but I am rubbish at cardinal directions. I'm fine in NZ but here I just can't do it. Will ask DH.

ethel sorry about your pear tree.

Photos for zebra as requested! first is the veggie patch, second is the greenhouse (have planted more toms since then) and final pic is of POTATOES! So exciting - this was the rogue plant so DS and I decided to see if there was anything there. He was enthralled by the whole process - much "tatoes mummy! MORE tatoes! Look mummy! Nother one! Ooh, slug. Yuck. TATOES!"

He's scrubbed them and they're now boiling for tea. Yum.

Oops. Sorry for sideways picture. I'm so rubbish at this!

So lovely to do that with your son, Cupcakes.

DH tells me the little garden plot is on the north side of the house. I wonder if I'll ever work it out for myself. I've been here nearly 10 years.

cupcakes your weed free beds are putting me to shame. I was weeding loads yesterday and will need to do more on Friday (my next day off.) I have also begun uncovering the really tatty side of my plot which was covered in weeds and plastic. Like the rest of my plot the black plastic is covering EVERYTHING! Which would be fine if a jungle hadn't grown on top. It's been an absolute nightmare clearing each section. But, the very small section I have uncovered looks like the loveliest darkest soil ever, so it might all prove worthwhile. At present, it appears to be home for the slugs and wood lice. I can't wait to get the rest cleared so I can start cleaning up the plot and making it pretty. At the mo it is functional but it want bunting and pots of herbs and lovely flowers. On the plus side my recently chopped lettuce and radishes were eaten today. I can report they were delicious. I was ridiculously pleased with my little salad lunch!

I was going to complement cupcakes on her amazing weed free plot, agree with her about the fabulousness of eating your own veg, and then have a long rant about the weather and bloody midges

But my phone ate it , maybe tomorrow. I'm off to put my few remaining chickens to bed.

Zebra show us yer armpits!

cupcakes - your plot is lovely, and your son looks absolutely delightful. I loved reading about his enjoyment of rooting up the potatoes. There is something magical about putting in one potato and getting out loads, isn't there?

Sorry to hear yours haven't done much, ethel - I wonder what could be the cause? Maybe your soil is too fertile? (Sounds like a good problem to have in a way! ). I'm itching to dig mine up and check that the same thing hasn't happened - because I added quite a bit of manure so it's a risk.

Hooray for harvesting your own lunch, linski!

Ethel that's strange about your potato - and what a disappointment after all these weeks of waiting. Was there no sign of anything eating potential potatoes around the plant? I harvested a beetroot and that was disappointingly small (H and my daughter both went 'another radish!'- no its supposed to be a beetroot!). I think I should have left it in there a bit longer. But there are plenty more (or plenty of leaves anyway!).

I've never thought about using the armpits from tomatoes to get more plants. I've just pinched them out in the past. I'm not bothering with tomatoes this year as I am fed up with the blight - but maybe next year I'll give them another go and I might try that as well.

We've picked our first three pea pods! And harvested some of the lettuce leaves that my daughter grew. The others have been attacked by something that has had a good munch of some of the leaves - I guess a slug. I think another squash has bitten the dust but the rest look OK.

The french bean seeds that my neighbour gave me have germinated which just confirms what I have suspected that the seeds I bought aren't very good because none of them germinated. (Although I might try chitting them next time to see what happens). I bought some french bean plants from the garden centre and the pot got knocked over and some of them were damaged. But amazingly they have mostly survived. I've planted them in pots in the garden with some lettuces because it will be more sheltered than the allotment.

Before you get all jealous of my weed-free beds there are some things I have to remind you all of!

1. My veggie patch is only 15 feet x 17 feet, not big at all.
2. I'm working in my own garden, not at an allotment, so I can grab 15 minutes easily here and there.
3. Remember that massive pile of clay soil DH dumped on the veggie patch a couple of weeks back? Well it was apparently SO heavy it's killed the remaining weeds...
4. If I had turned around and taken a picture the other way you'd see a bit more of my garden which has waist height weeds! In fact I might show you later.

DS ate some his potatoes for tea. He was chuffed to bits and even took his bucket out to show the bin men this morning (who feigned interest ever so well!)

Shove even better for us - I'm fairly certain we didin't even plant the potato, and it's one that DDog nicked and buried. He has form for this kind of thing!

cedar do be careful - Armpit Cuttings are addictive. I'm now up to 15 cuttings, on top of the 11 original plants. I can't stop myself!

What are armpit cuttings?

Kiwi when you grow cordon tomtatoes you have to pick out the side shoots. Most of us just binned them but alternative told us we could pot them up and they'd grow and now some of us are addicted. And now alternative is nowhere to be found and we are left to deal with our addiction.

I think that I spied Alternative on a name change. Possibly she is running away from the Armpit Addiction that she has caused us! Only joking, Alternative, I am so delighted with the armpit info, and I literally cannot stop - growing them, checking on them, talking about them Join us, Kiwi, you know you want to....

Cupcakes your space looks amazing, you must be really proud! And your DS is lovely, and his enthusiasm is joyous! Is that your spuds flowering in the back? I'm horribly envious of your greenhouse, you know. Your lucky tomatoes, all safe in there and protected from blight.

I've tried to count tomatoes. I have 17 plants at the plot, plus 7 armpits that are still quite small, though 2 have flowered already. I've just 'armpitted' them direct, ie pinched them from the plant then popped them in the ground straight away. Only 2 armpits have died this way.

Then in the garden, not sure. I've got 16 plants, then different generations of armpits. I shall go and count...

I had quite a nice time at plot yesterday. My beans finally look a bit healthier, I'd even class the leaves are green now! And where I'd sown (direct) some extras so there are 2 per cane, well, those extras are just starting to show themselves.

And I thought that I was down to 1 round courgette plant, but I've found another. Planted, I'd just thought it was a different courgette. I have to say, my courgettes and squash still aren't looking too clever, they all look slightly illing and not the healthy plants that I've grown before. But I do have a flower -hurrah! - on a courgette. And the squash of BenSquash seems to have settled in well so that's good.

My toms at the plot seem to be looking less pretty and have slightly fewer fruit than those at home. The ones at the plot are in the soil, whereas those at home are in pots in MPC. But, the fruit on the pot plants seems to be furthest ahead in terms of ripeness. Hmmm. I wonder if there'll be any difference in flavour?

Oh, I was trying to tell myself it was normal. Is it not normal to pull up a flowered potato plant and find nothing under it?
The soil is fairly fertile. We took the plot on last year and just put black plastic over the that part and let the grass rot into it before planting them in March. Nothing has been grown on that soil for 2 years. We scatter chicken poo pellets on it in the recommended quantity every 6 weeks and generally our clay soil is fairy nutritious (we haven't had any sign of deficieny in other plants).

And now alternative is nowhere to be found and we are left to deal with our addiction

Ha ha - no still here! Just on another name change.

Armpits eh? What's not to like?

Remember with armpits - they are the same genetic age as the parent so will fruit much lower down the stem. I take them and then give them away for people who forgot to put their own toms in/for groups to sell at plant sales later on in the season.

I'm in and out at the moment - so busy and just sown another herd of seeds for an event on the 6 and the 15th - got to get about 50 courgettes up for the 6th to be potted on and taken away by folks, and beans and lettuces to be up and growing by the 15th for a school plant sale. It never ends!

We had our full lunch today from the garden - beetroot from the polytunnel, radish, mustard leaves, spinach from the hugelkultur bed [only sown 5 weeks ago], potatoes from the students' beds, goldensweet mangetout from the students' beds, and loads of fat hen! Plus some dehydrated tomatoes from last year's crop. Made it into a soup and it was scrummy.

I don't share my armpits. I just pot them on and... keep them. Here are some armpits that I had -batch 2 of armpits I think. I've just planted them out today in some spare room I had in a raised bed at home. Then I cut off a couple more side shoots from my Black Krim plants (Lethal look what you've started!), which I still can't fathom - bush or cordon? Everything I've read says cordon, but they're not very cordon-y.

ethel it's so disappointing when something that you've nurtured for ages, doesn't come up trumps, isn't it? I dug up some of my garlic today. Pathetic. Barely bigger than when I planted out the clove.

Lethal that lunch sounds delicious. And you sound like you've been very busy.

Where do you grow your tomatoes, armpit or otherwise? We're in Scotland so sun and warmth are in short supply.

I grow my tomatoes mostly in the garden, though I have some at the allotment too. I'm in Bucks. I grew some last year, which was pretty much the 1st things I've grown, and they were quite successful. But it was crazy-hot, so I think I got lucky. I don't have a greenhouse so they're all outside, buy I do start them off in a conservatory, and then harden them off in a blowaway greenhouse thing. My allotment ones are all in the ground, and my home ones are mostly in pots, apart from a couple (fine, 7) of V2.armpits that I've just planted out today.

I bloody love tomatoes. I'm already perving over seed listings, dreaming about what varieties I'll try next year.

ALTERNATIVE IS BACK! HOORAY! [GRIN]

Zebra - I realise this is a ridiculous thing to post, and that your plants are coming on now, but I am in Aldi and they have windbreaks for £10. They look quite robust and are huge!

Ooh, really? A tenner is def worth a try, isn't it? I've not been to Aldi for a bit, so I'm due a visit. Thanks!

God, the old-school lot at the plot would really think that I'd lost the plot, if I were to erect one! There is already much teeth sucking at BenSquash, and more at the armpits.

Welcome home Alternative

All those tomatoes are making me smiley, I tried them once but came home from work to find the builders had put scaffolding up on them and thrown quite a lot of roof on them and sort of gave up.
One day when I have a conservatory...

Back in the real world it has stopped being freezing and started being almost seasonal. Unfortunately the midges are out. Poor DS was swarmed yesterday, we were digging over a patch to pop some of the red cabbage army in, and had to retreat.
We spent the morning cutting holly back so DP Carn run some electric fencing down the boundary wall to stop our cattle fratenising with next doors. The holly was apparently a midge hotel so DS got eaten again.
Finished the cabbage bed today but only got three cabbages transplanted before we gave in. I've just hung some washing out and am bitten to bits again.
Cedar you've inspired me to have another go with the french beans - should they be chitted first?

Lethal, how big do armpit tomato plants get, do they stay mini?
They are very dinky. I love them.

Midges now, Violet? Poor DS.