Allotment/Veg Patch -Thread 8 - Its spring - time to get busy!

[bookbook]

Thought I had better get a new thread ready to roll!
It has been a long, soggy winter , but the clocks go back soon, we may see the sun , so it will be all go, go ,go
Everyone welcome, join us the celebrate and commiserate on the joys of vegetables
previous thread HERE

Thanks for that recipe Lulooo it sounds fantastic. I'm veggie but may try it with Quorn pieces or i also find large chick peas can be a substitute in similar recipes

Cold overnight here but a beautifully sunny day today, unfortunately the DCs are still off school so am unlikely to escape to the plot (have earmarked tomorrow as The Day as they are back at school then)

Luloo that recipe sounds delicious - DP is a huge fan of Indian food so will love that.

Did you say palak was one of the Indian vegetables you grow here?

wow IckleWickle, that soil looks amazing!

My first plot was a half plot which for us is 5 pole/11m * 11m. After a couple of years I took on another separate 5 pole plot which became the orchard plot (I planted it up with fruit trees plus some nuts and blackcurrant bushes). DH joined the party starting with 7 poles, then 5 then this year another 10.

I pay £75/year for all of our plots.

For horse manure we have a lady from a stables who will deliver a (big) trailer load to the plot for £10.

I think starting off with a smaller plot is a good idea. It’s a chance to try things out, see what works and what doesn’t. I think lots of people start with the idea that they will be self-sufficient then gradually refine their ideas.

luloo thanks for recipe- I'm going to try it with paneer as I'm veggie and only one DD does spinach. Did some work this morning as my kids back at school but nipped out to water the raised bed as it's another lovely day. The peas look ok finally and radishes and spring onions are coming on. Still waiting for French beans to sort themselves out so I can plant them out. First strawberry flower is out clashing nicely with my PVC..

Afternoon!
had a lovely hour at the plot this afternoon. DH not in too fine fettle, but he came and pottered in the sun, and tidied up my frankly messy shed and mended the lock on the second shed. .:)
I prepped a bit more brassica bed, tidied up under the enviromesh the row of cauliflowers, and found I have 4 more small ones coming..... And then picked a shedload of purple sprouting. I am bagging most of it up to give away...!
I was about to take the fleece off my plum and gage, when one of the older, wiser ones went past, and told me it would be best left on. So I did - never ignore the knowledge!
Meal is all prepped for tonight, so am off to prick out summer cabbages, perpetual spinach and some of the annuals in the greenhouse .

Had an unplanned day off work today due to something to do with the fuel injection system and my oil in my car. Eek. All fixed now, though, so no exploding!

Used the time to tidy indoors this morning and do some more in the garden this afternoon. I turned over the soil in the bed I weeded last week, then planted bulbs and seeds and put a covering of new topsoil on. Let's see how that goes.

Went on another slug hunt: another hundred or so of the buggers in the recycling now. Anyone who hasn't started yet be warned - I found eggs and some teeny weeny ones, so they're starting to get jiggy eyeing up my plants!

Planted more seeds, and fixed my excuse for a greenhouse with some poles left over from the last one that also collapsed and duct tape. DH will be proud!

Then had a wave of inspiration on my walk back to the garage and took a detour past the village allotments. Score - there is a massive pile of horse poo free for the taking just up the road. Thanks to the poor chap who just wanted to prick out his tomatoes in peace for answering all my questions! The allotment plots are huge, though, bigger than my back garden!

A proper allotment plot is big Firefly ! good job on the horse poo- so all you need to do is work out how to get it back without stinking out your car
Remind me to sow cabbage even more thinly. I will have spare....24 summer round cabbages and 20 sweetheart pricked out .. Perpetual spinach done too. Ah well, someone will be able to use them . Pricked out some of the flowers for the plot too - scabious, cosmos , hollyhocks and a mixed bag of yellow 'bee friendly' from a packet left over from last year.
This was a pic of my plot from yesterday, heath robinson structures and all - it goes all the way back to where you can see an orangey shed roof ,( different plot) - there is another maybe 10 metres beyond the big green netted brassica cage ( I am stood with shed and compost/manure bins behind me - another 10 metres maybe?

book that looks huge! And your bounteous harvests suddenly make more sense. When I look at that I do feel I am just playing at growing things to eat really as on such a small scale. I've just ordered my next lot of nematodes as I've found some baby slugs in the raised bed and it's 6 weeks since the last treatment. Will also get ladybird larvae for the greenhouse in a month probably. I'm watering our old apple trees with a calcium supplement starting early this year as I'm hoping to avoid bitter pit issues as I end up not using the apples. I was going to spray the leaves but then I read research that the calcium doesnt move from leaf to fruit. They are just starting to flower and look lovely in a lichen covered desperate for a prune sort of way. Also the baby plum tree having blossomed for the first time ever seems to be growing a grand total of 2 tiny plums. Not sure if it's just because it's a young tree or if I should have hand pollinated as it did seem really early to be in flower. I'm fairly sure it's supposed to be self fertile but just in case I feel I really should buy another one...

My plot suddenly seems tiny at 10x7m! You are only allowed one as well. I'd love to be able to get manure delivered but can't get nearer thsn about 100m from my plot with a car so not really feasible.

Spent a good while up there yesterday, finished getting potatoes in, DD came and planted broad beans and DH did strimmering and digging. We desperately need rain, had drizzle last night but the ground is still very hard.

it is big - old fashioned plot size - that is the two halves together - theoretically DH has the font half, mine is the one further down.
I started with a quarter plot, then moved up to half. The second half was sort of unexpected - I got on well with the man who had it, but he just lost interest one year , we agreed to do it jointly, so I could keep on top of his weeds, and he just never came back. I do feel that if the waiting list got more than 6-12 months long, I would give it back , it would seem selfish otherwise. We have a proper road which all the plots face onto, so no problem getting there. Even my manure comes and tips straight into my bin from the trailer !
Cath - I grew in my garden for years and years , it still gives a lovely sense of achievement to pick your own grown things.
No rain yet WhoKnows ? - we have had a top up , there was more last night.

book how on earth do you keep on top of it all!

I've run out of things to do in the veg garden now... I'm eagerly awaiting some sign of growth from something (anything!)

We have decided we are going to plant a patch of rape next year. We normally grow it on the farm, and it is so delicious to eat as a vegetable, but we've had to stop growing it due to disease. We're really missing having it as a vegetable, so I think we'll plant some of our own. The neighbours will probably think we're crackers, but hey ho.

I can't remember when it last rained properly here (Surrey/Hants borders). Probably about three weeks ago. So much for April showers.

Same here wh0 - I'm enjoying the lack of slugs though!

Gin I do a little bit, often , in truth. And I keep on doing it during winter - that makes this time of year not quite so frantic ! I have been retired for 18 months now , so have the time. But it is nowhere near as tidy as the ones around me :)
I wonder if that is similar to Raab 60 ? Spotted grows that

On my field the problem is with lack of cultivation. People who neglect their plots then come back briefly after receiving a committee letter. The field steward is happy to help people who are in temporary difficulty but gets annoyed when he clears a plot and it gets neglected again.

So i did manage an outing to the plot today. Watered everything again, we had a lot of rain on Sunday but the beds still look very dry. Radishes are all coming through and i think i saw 1 beetroot seedling, possibly an onion shoot as well. Slugs have been chewing on my broad beans. On closer inspection there was a cluster of slugs nestling under my wool mulch - not so good as a slug repellent then! Hopefully the plants are big enough to survive a few chomped leaves. I cross-braced the beanpole supports as the Committee have been warning me about beanpole structures being uprooted in strong winds. Also took a forked stick with me & hung up my "Trespassers" sign. Did a bit of weeding & generally admired the plot, it was a lovely sunny afternoon to be there. But still cold overnight so i haven't removed any of the cloches yet.

Still waiting for my James Wong reserved book to come into the library, but I've read his "Gardening Revolution" and am now collecting 2l drinks bottles so that i can try his tip on deep irrigation over the summer.

I had an idea yesterday. My plot and the paths round it have a lot of dandelions, usually I pull the heads off and leave them in a bucket of water to drown, but it gets smelly and attracts flies and leaves me with a bucket out of use. So instead I filled a 4pint milk container with them, filled them with water and put the lid on, left in a sunny spot. Hopefully they will stew down tidily and quickly so I can compost them. I have a big stash of milk bottles up there as I fill them to use to weigh down carboard and weed membrane.

Bee question - I have a big fat bumble bee living in my compost bin, could it be a Queen starting a nest? Lots of slow worms in there too.

Who knows - I had a bumblebee nest in my compost heap once, I only discovered it when my then partner went to dig it over and a load of bumbles came out. So we left it alone after that and they were the friendliest bees ever, they overwintered there or there lava did) two years in a row but I haven't seen them this spring (I think the pile finally got too rotted down for them).

Morning!
Um, I don't know much about bees tbh , the little I know is that there are more types of solitary bees . Its about the right time though - seen a few around.
The dandelions are rife all down my paths - I spend a lot of time picking off heads ! I always try to dig out as many a possible, but life is too short!

We've got stone walls so lots of bumblebees of different varieties which are lovely - but this year I've seen several large wasps nosing about the garden. I don't remember seeing them before august in the past and I'm hoping they are not looking to set up home. Is this early for wasps or am I not normally outside so much in April?

Cath I've been finding huge wasps in my dressing room! And quite a few milling around outside a nest we destroyed last year. They all seem to be a bit dozey though. I wonder if the weird warm weather a few weeks ago brought them out early?

Hello all - a lurker here! I am in the second year of allotmenteering and thoroughly enjoying it - all your tips and tricks help tremendously.

I was wondering whether anyone knows where I might be able to get hold of jerusalem artichoke; two years running I've ordered it and two years running I've been let down

I found a wasp in my bedroom last week. My compost heap is new and not very composted yet (only started it last summer), so lots of airgaps for creatures to nest in.

We have a road near us with a south facing sparsely grassy bank alongside it, any time now it will be swarming with mason bees, there are hundreds of tiny holes, they are fascinating.

I get wasps coming out in my bedroom - I know we had a wasp nest in the cavity wall a few years ago, and suspect they still manage to cope and find a way out, and yes, I think that really warm spell got them going.
LaContessa - not tried to buy any personally - I have a friend who gives me some to eat - I will ask where she got hers from. I wonder if they are the thing that you need to preorder maybe?, not that that helps. They are a perennial, and spread too, so is it worth asking if you know anybody on your site has any they can spare?

Gnome- lots of digging this year and getting stones out. Wished I took photos when we got it 3 years ago. It was so overgrown everywhere.

We had a wasp nest in our compost box a couple of years ago. There is a few very bee friendly bushes in the garden, they hum in summer.
Saw a few bumble bees on my pear yesterday.
I love bees.

No allotment today. Away to Edinburgh tomorrow. No plot till Friday again. I planted some seeds just now.