Allotment/Veg Patch Thread 5 - The Diggers Rest !

[bookbook]

Thanks to teacuphalfempty for supplying the title .
so, its the 1st of March, the meteorological spring is here, and it's all systems go for the coming growing season. Let's hope for a good one -no pests and diseases, enough rain overnight and plenty of sunshine. Well, we can dream....

Luloo mine are in the greenhouse, where they will stay. My neighbour has hers outside. Cushy southerners though.

The packet for mine says they can reach 2.4m in height, I think they'll have to go out!

So Monday was a busy day for me. Built a little trellis for my indoor tomatoes, repotted a few things, mulched all the shrubs and blackcurrants and actually weeded. And then Baby Grouchy was born at 4:30 the next morning.

Don't know when I'll get back into the garden as I'm very sore and the SPD is worse after giving birth, but I'll enjoying keeping up with what everyone else is doing!

A Kiwilet! Congratulations Kiwi! You must be delighted.

Morning!

well Grouchy - that is about it the best "my harvest" photo ever ! You forget how small they are.......Well done you and congratulations :)

Lulooo - my tomatoes are in the greenhouse - outside ones don't do well enough here. I did try last year with a 4 spare plants , they did relatively well growing wise, but I never got a single tomato - they were gobbled before I was ever able to harvest..

aw congrats kiwi
the nice thing about a garden is that plants grow on their own. so take your deserved break to heal and let the plants do their bit in the meantime.

Congratulations Kiwi! She's gorgeous. This is the first allotment thread baby isn't it?

Oh kiwi - she is absolutely breathtakingly cute.

Very, very many congratulations on your new arrival!

Gardening AND newborns. Best thread ever. Many many congratulations.

On unrelated baby news- I think I managed to avert any more slug damage last night. I did a really thorough slug/snail search, and decided to move all the beans to my garden bench - a la WhoKnows and my cosmos to wire shelving. I think that confused them - though I bet the satnav has been redone today ... Lots of rain forecast for this afternoon

Aww, Kiwi, congratulations, she is gorgeous.

Hello, I completely fell off this thread and MN in general because I started a new job. Things settling down and my garden veg is behind but I've spent a few evenings catching up with direct sowing.

Lovely baby news, love the 'Monday was a busy day' understatement

Congratulations Grouchy!

I didn't realise that snails are not reliably killed by nematodes - how annoying! Oh well, I'll let you know if they start having a party in the absence of slugs. DH tells me that due to the mild winter, slugs didn't hibernate and so they've come out swinging this spring. Apparently the main culprit species is Spanish slugs; I amuse myself by imagining them slithering about going 'Ola!' to each other in little squeaky voices

Tomatoes are outside here and just starting to flower! The green James Wong tomatoes are doing best, with the red ones lagging behind (bought plants from Waitrose because slugs ate all my tomato seedlings and I got despondent huffed.

Looking forward to checking on the broccoli plants at the allotment this weekend; not sure how they'll do in that soil but am hopeful.

Hi!

Can I ask a bit more about you guys' mulching habits? I'm new to allotmenteering and don't want to mess it up! But my husband is doing a monster mow right now and I've spent the whole week weeding my plot (broken back!)...

Would you mulch all of the following (with grass clippings) or not? =
Lettuce, potato (I'm guessing not on that one?), brassica (psb, kale), mustard leaf, garlic, radish, parsnip, beetroot, corn, chard, leek, tomato, carrots, spinach...

It's not going to rain here until Sunday at least. Should I water heavily before I mulch? if so, should I do it all tomorrow morning to avoid helping the slugs, or should I just go for it tonight?!

Thanks in advance for any insight and bits of knowledge you might have!

Oh, I forgot peas and beans (weeding now!)

definately mulch when the soil is soaking, otherwise the mulch soaks up the rain water rather than the soil. i only mulched my beans, tomatoes and corn on your list, when the site had no water. the other things are a bit small and so birds etc might push the mulch onto the seedlings and it does encourage slugs.

Ah thank you dreamingofsun. My brassicas are quite tall now (already harvested leaves for salads) so maybe I can do those as well as toms, peas and beans asap... My corn is small still, just like the rest of my stuff, you're right.

Just to be sure, you mean wait for the big Sunday rain, then mulch, correct?

Re my question about what New Things I can grow - good idea, booky and Cupcakes - maybe I should have a proper go at oriental veg, and at salads. Actually I did st of intend to get after sowing baby leaves, once the tomatoes etc were out of the grow houses. So that is good timing!

And I tried, half - heartedly, Chinese cabbage and tatsoi last year but they failed (slugs?) and I didn't re-do . So I have the seed, for both. Although I can find it in me to procure some more, I'm sure.

I really really really think I need more room. That allotment plot that I have been coveting opposite me, the one that didn't get worked at all last year, and not so far this year, is supposedly still occupied. The weeds are mid-thigh height now.

Congratulations Grouchy what a beautiful baby! Well done for keeping on top of the gardening right until the last minute!

Zebra oriental salad leaves would be interesting. And you could try dandelions. Apparently if you put a pot over them to blanch the leaves they have a nicer flavour and a grown properly for this on the Continent.

Welcome to all the new people to this thread. Hiahia I am using wool pellets round my beans. They form a layer which is supposed to act as a mulch and discourage slugs. It seems to be working OK.

I've been keeping my tomatoes and other delicate crops inside at night as it has been cold but I'm going to start leaving them out over night now so that I can plant them out soon. My climbing French beans are desperately in need of better supports. Next year I think I'll try to hold off sowing them for a couple more weeks (which will give me space to start off a few more things)

yes, mulch after rain. you mulch so that the water doesn't evaporate from the soil.

Evening!
hello again Ipanema - life will get in the way...:)
and welcome Hiahia -what soil type are you on, and whereabouts approximately? Is there a lot to do, or is it a lovely and well tended plot you have taken over? I have a subtly different approach to mulching. I apply a thick layer of rotted manure in autumn/winter as I finish harvesting crops . Then I plant through the layer in spring - I don't do much direct sowing - peas/swede/beetroot/carrots thats about it , but also do sowing into plugs as back up of beetroot - I did the same with peas and broad beans this year( luckily!). But I am on a fairly free draining chalk , unlike just about everyone else on this thread :).
well, had a trip to the plot this morning - DH and I trying to finish bird and butterfly proofing the brassica cage. It rained, and rained... And its still raining. And I still have a little bit of work to finish the net - we came back wet, and muddy - not surprisingly!

Hello!

Thanks for the extra clarification dreamingofsun - it does make perfect sense!

Cedar03 that sounds interesting... We're trying to keep things free/cheap right now (it's so expensive to get your starting kit going!), but maybe something to explore! To be honest... We don't really suffer from slugs at our allotment! It floods every month due to Spring tides and the water is slightly salty, which seems to kill them off! But I have a lot of weeds which I would love to try and suppress...
Thank you for your welcome, I do love Mumsnet and its treasure troves of information!

bookbook thank you :) I believe our soil is clay-ish indeed. We're in the SW. It was complete couch grass when we took over, (though we received a few currant bushes and a very small fruit tree - not sure what fruit yet) and then my gardener friend rotovated it for me... before I learned never to rotovate couch!!! so then we had massive weeding sessions of the beds, but we still have plenty coming up of course. I'll definitely try and put a thick layer of manure this autumn and forego any winter crop bar 1 bed perhaps...

Our peas and beans are in my garden as, apparently, they don't like to be flooded - not many slugs there either, which I'm putting down to us having relandscaped it massively this spring and added a lot of fresh top soil on top of our existing soil? So maybe this is a year of slug reprieve for us!? I'm not sure the reasons why but feeling very lucky.

free-draining chalk must be very nice...

what are you using for the brassica cage? We've bought black netting that has holes about 1cm square... Hoping this is small enough to prevent the butterflies from coming in?

Hope you get to have a nice hot bath - more water to while away the rainy dampness!

Just about small enough I think Hiahia - we have 0.8mm x 0.8 mm - seems to have done the job for the last couple of years, but you will always get some cabbage whites squeezing themselves through somehow :) And it stops the pigeons, which are a menace around here!

Thought I'd share a photo of the hardening off bench with you all.

I like the hardening off bench (and the feline beauty).
I am waaaaaay behind now - another quick trip needed to my dad (no emergency, just support) and I have had the mother of all lurgies. I thought it was bad hay fever/ asthma as started when I strimmed half the garden last weekend, but then segued into full on snot and chesty cough. My willow cuttings, which I now realise are too short to make a wigwam with anyway, are still sitting in water and seedlings are begging to go in the ground. Aaaargh!
Several hours free today though. Do you think if I just plant the willow in a circle, and wait for it to grow ( which apparently it does very fast), I could then weave in the growth as I go? It's that, or a living fence.
Do any of you suffer from allergies? It's a real pain that mine are getting worse again after years of mildness, just as my late middle age enthusiasm for gardening is increasing.
Grouchy, your baby is beautiful. congratulations. So glad to hear you are both happy and healthy.