Allotment/Veg Patch Thread 9 - Spring is sprung, its getting really busy!

[bookbook]

Well, the last thread filled up quickly - maybe due to the horrid weather . Its time to battle slugs, snails and weeds !
Last Thread HERE

Cath it's an 85l steel one. It was from toolstation that also deliver. Cant remember what there delivery charges are but it was the cheapest I have seen even if you factor in £5/6 delivery charge.

We use them for tools as well and they do have pretty good customer service and I think they use dpd for delivery which I like as you get a 2 hour slot.

Evening!
just in and had something to eat, now need to go and get wtared in the greenhouse.
I'm a wimp too Grouchy - hate the heat.
Ickle - your plot is a thing of beauty - where have you hidden the weeds?
Newt - in truth with seeds, I think they have just evolved to germinate at the optimum time for best results for them to get the most out of the growing season.
mmm- plastic free plots. I think its a little unlikely, and in truth, most of the plastic I have ( mostly just pots I suspect ) are used and cleaned year in year out, so its hard to see how I would benefit by changing them and binning. I did use coir pots for seedlings one year, but it was a bit of a nightmare keeping them at the right level of watering.

We would struggle to be plastic free. We use (and re-use) heavy duty weedproof matting for our hot beds and also under the grape vines and blackberries. One year I started strawberry plants in coir pots but like bookbook found them a bit of a pain and they cost a fortune!

After much searching we found a solitary fruit on our golden Gage so we are going to take the chance to do some heavy pruning on it.

Three of our plum trees have a good set of fruit but the Victoria still looks very spindly despite being 4 years old. Not sure if we should give it a prune to encourage a bit more bushiness.

Love the courgette Gin!

I also LOVE the plotmenting saying

Wow Frouby what a bunch of air heads.

Grouchy we have tried to go every morning after the eldest goes to school. He goes on my back and straight to sleep. I'm going to miss this.

Newt I reuse pots too. I also use heavy duty weed control.

Book I've has been hoeing a lot this year, there is so many weed seedlings due to the plot being overgrown 3 years ago when we got it. The amount of seeds are unbelievable. I am determined this year though.

Not sure about the plum Gnome we grow ours against the garage wall.

It's been boiling today. Planting out my sweet corn tomorrow. Rain forecast for Saturday onwards though.

Yes all of my stuff is reused over and over again which I suspect is the same for all of us. I can see how it might all look prettier without so much plastic. Certainly my terracotta pots are prettier than the black plastic ones, but then they cost about ten times the price.

Ive killed all of my tomato plants. So cross with myself. I was giving them a bit of a boost with a drop of baby bio but being lazy and putting it straight into the soil rather than diluting in water. It came out rather more quickly than I thought and now all of my little plants have collapsed and died.

I like to think they died happy though from over feeding!

when Newt ? can you water, water, water to rush it through?

Cathpot I've done the aspirin spray on tomatoes & soft fruit, also a molasses drench on the strawberries. Unfortunately with no control plot I'm not sure how I'll tell if it's made any difference!

Newts i use and reuse lots of plastic, the idea of plastic-free is a nice one but I don't think i could manage it.

Bargain of the day yesterday, my local Home Bargains shop was selling loads of young vegetable plants for 49p each. There was a really interesting range of tomatoes in particular. So i bought a Sungold which is my absolute favourite tomato and i am also now trying a Black Russian - have never seen this variety let alone grown it. And i have a little patio cucumber "Tiny Tot" variety. The weather's so warm i put them outside to harden off straight away.

In other news my lemon crystal cucumber seedlings are small but growing, and I've planted up some tubs of native wildflower seed for my alley's communal garden. Work is frantic this week so i won't be able to get to the plot before the weekend. I gave it a really really good watering on Monday in the hope that it would all cope for a few days, but it was scorching today.

manic at work, and had visitors - so not a lot gardening.

I do aspirin on toms, don't know if it does make a difference at least they don't have a headache

lots of extra seedlings popping up after a few warm days.

will have to think on what to do with sunflower seedling when we are away. am thinking of putting them in a big trough with compost and giving them a good soak. they are too small yet to survive the snails, so can only plant out when bigger.

black russian might be black krim.
delicious. very sweet and aromatic.

I grew Black Russian last year. Not sure I was that keen - haven't done them again.

missed that Red
can they go somewhere shady ? they tend to wilt really easily. Can a neighbour babysit it?

I thought for 49p it would be worth a try, apparently the fruits are large & it needs plenty of support - will probably go back to growing only Sungold next year but a change won't hurt. I already have 3 Sungolds

they are large! It may well just have been me - we don't all like the same
but I love my sungold too :)

Ickle your plot is immaculate! If I showed you a picture of my onions you'd be able to see all the weed seedlings where I ran out of time weeding them the other week!

I've bought some asprin and a spray bottle but haven't actually got around to doing anything with them yet. Must give it a go.
Meant to go and water yesterday but distracted myself transplanting lettuces from a small pot into bigger ones instead so ran out of time. Will go this evening instead. Such beautiful weather it's a shame I have to be inside working!

Thanks for the tip timtam, we have a home bargains near us. Can you remember if they had squash or bean plants?

Morning all no work for me today so I thought I'd spend a good few hours at the plot.
But I am at wimp, and it's MUCH too hot, so I've just even and watered and now I'm back at home in in the in the shade.

Oh, it appears I am too hot to type accurately. Oops.

Morning!
red faced and hot here.
Just spent the morning prepping bed ready to plant out squashes and courgettes at the weekend. There are borage seedlings everywhere ( not surprising really - thats the bed they were in last year!

Too hot , and like Spotted going to lurk indoors now. But I do have to go back and do some watering, but much later....
I have my first teeny sungold tomato set :)

It's roasting out there, isn't it? I've just been doing it a bit of weeding today, but I have to come in every fifteen minutes or so to cool down!

The garden is so happy though. Everything looks so lovely and green

Clara they didn't have beans. Not sure about squash. They definitely had tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, chillis. They were a bit pale & squished (crammed into shelving units in full sun) but have recovered nicely given plenty of water and some space to stretch upwards

Including the chairs gin ! Good paint colour choice - would that be willow by any chance

I wondered if you'd spot those Newt

Thanks tim

I definitely need to get down there or the garden centre to replace my munched plants.

I caught one of the culprits red (or should I say green) handed this morning - a snail of truly gastronomic proportions - but I didn't eat it, just chucked it over the fence into the street not sorry at all

In fun news, we have a frog that has decided to set up home in a half empty tonne bag around the n/e side of our house (the shadiest spot where we keep the bike shed). It is pretty massive and has been there for at least a week (probably longer but we only spotted it a week ago). DH is raging because he specifically created 'wildlife habitats' elsewhere in the garden to attract frogs, hedgehogs and the like, (think woodpiles and hedges) and he can't believe it wants to live in a half empty bag of sharp sand! I'll need to take a photo at some point to post.

Hello all

Had a rough day today and had dpony pts. For various reasons but mainly old age.

Anyway. I have had 2 honey suckle in pots on the back garden. Garden is north facing so gets full intense sun for a big part of the day from may to august. Then nothing.

I was wondering if anyone knew of a climbing rose that would so well in pota in that position. Pony was called Ros so was looking for a tribute to her. Alternatively a fruit tree/shrub with ros or rosamund would be nice to have on the allotment. Xx