Allotment?Veg Patch Thread 10 - Plotmenters busy into summer ! and loving James Wong

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Last thread has filled up so quickly! Thought I had better get one up and running before I get off to the plot.
Busy, busy people, just waiting for the harvests to start, fighting the bugs, slugs and weather :)
Last thread here
THREAD 9

Gnome I will have a look what tomatoes we're growing - they're outdoor varieties from next door who grow a combination of indoor and outdoor, and ours are doing so well. Getting a container full every evening - it's s good job they're so tasty!

Off the top of my head, I can remember Super Sweet, Sungold, Mountain Magic and Torenzo in the baskets. Will check the others.

Pity there's nobody with bees on your allotment Gnome, sounds like honey would have been a bit easier though I'm very impressed by your dedication! Because it's their first year we're leaving our bees almost all of the honey that they've produced, but I'm hoping we'll be able to take a tiny bit of honey to taste - we'll see next weekend if it's warm and dry enough to open up the hive.

In other news, I have a few days leave coming up and I'm thinking about relocating some of the shrubs from what's going to be my ornamental edibles bed. I'd thought of waiting until the winter but it's wet enough that I think it would be safe to move them now. More and more plants are accumulating to go in it - trying to resist the temptation to stick them in straight away as I'd quite like to do the whole "lay out all your plants in the right places before planting" thing rather than my usual "bung things in as they arrive and hope" approach!

as I'd quite like to do the whole "lay out all your plants in the right places before planting" thing rather than my usual "bung things in as they arrive and hope" approach!

THIS!

we grow toms outside (don't have a greenhouse).
this year we had 'standard red' from a diy store, gardener's delight, black krim.
all tasty but black krim is very intense&sweet.

Afternoon!
Una - thats a bit radical - organising where stuff goes!
well, a bit grey here, but dry and breezy, so went and managed to dig up yet more strawberries - they are going for world domination I think. Nearly there though. Harvested green, purple and runner beans, picked loads of raspberries , sweetcorn , and another cauliflower.. ( cauliflower and potato bhaji is next on the recipe list - we are having cauliflower cheese tonight from the previous one )
The St Pierre tomatoes are carrying on in the greenhouse. they are my favourite for flavour, just to slice for a salad . I think the best tasting tomato I have grown.

Evening everyone,
Apologies to all...
I have completely fallen off the thread over the summer. I've been trying to clear my new half plot whilst maintaining my quarter plot, so it's been quite a juggling act, and because it's also been school holidays I've got out of the habit of posting on here about the plots.
Anyway the new plot is progressing slowly although it is mostly weeding/hauling many bags of rubbish away from the plot. The previous owner left some useful things but also a lot of waste. The shed is a bit of a worry as there was a huge amount of comfrey growing very close up against one side of it, this has held a lot of damp & caused the side panel to badly rot away, as well as part of the chipboard floor. When I chopped away at the comfrey I found that there were enormous lumps of comfrey root underneath the paving slabs which form the shed base. I could only hack away at them but couldn't dig them out. They are already sprouting new shoots. So I think I'll be fighting a losing battle with the comfrey unless I can move the shed, lift the paving slabs, dig out the roots, re-level the base and put the shed back (replacing the rotten panels as well). It's a big job, DH would usually be well up for helping but he's awaiting surgery and can't manage heavy lifting etc at the moment. So I'm crossing my fingers & hoping that the shed will make it through the winter, we'll have to look at repairing or replacing in the spring.

On the positive side I have loads of autumn raspberries on the new plot and have been eating them as I go along. I did have a pretty good growing crop of sweetcorn on the quarter plot but the squirrels have been stripping the cobs! It's very annoying. My half-plot neighbours advised netting the sweetcorn, I think I'll have to do that next year but this year's crop is lost.

Just to add a couple of photos taken from the same spot on my half plot, one is the day I was offered the plot and the other was last week after a LOT of weeding. It does make me feel a bit more positive about the progress when I remember how weedy it was when I took over!

That is amazing progress timtam23 you must be very pleased with that achievement. I do like to see waste ground being changed to productive ground.

Something to be very proud of.

Morning!
timtam - that is looking so good! Shame about the comfrey/shed. Tricky to do anything other than dismantle/put back up again. Though if its the invasive comfrey, best to get rid anyway.
Please don't anyone worry about posting - I will just burble along!
Squirrels - yet another pest ( does anyone remember that programme training squirrels across an obstacle course? :) )
I have noticed we are getting near the end of the thread - anyone got any title ideas?

comfrey is a great green fertiliser. I would try to get as much out as possible, roota and all and drown it in water. then either tip this water on the compost heap or strain and fill into bottles to use as fertiliser (1cup per watering can)
caution: it stinks!

Someone asked about elephant garlic upthread. We've grown it the last couple of years and it has done well for us. However, it is expensive so I think of it as a bit of an indulgence because you only get one bulb per clove and the cloves are expensive to buy. It has been as easy to grow as normal garlic and I think it has cloved (is that a word?!) up better.

Timtam your plot is looking really good! You've managed to clear lots of weeds.

I have a blackberry which has done really well this year. We just hack it back in the autumn to stop it taking over. No idea of variety because it was already there when we took over the plot. I am also having to dig out brambles in the new part of our plot. I cut back a red currant and managed to dig out about 5 brambles from around it. Next I've got to tackle a holly bush which has come up in the middle of another currant and then take out the raspberries which are swamping the gooseberry bush (I don't even like gooseberries but DH and DD do so it will be for them!).

Thread title - something to do with autumn/winter I guess?

book I found this quote which seems quite autumnal for a thread title! Will keep looking, I like hunting for quotes

"When the bold branches
Bid farewell to rainbow leaves -
Welcome wool sweaters."

• B. Cybrill

Thanks for all the blackberry help. Have been looking at different varieties and have boggled my brain which doesn't take much to be fair . I think I am going to just get 3 blackberries and 3 rasperries to start with and see how we get on. Have found a huge row at the stables which no one ever takes and I am sure we accidently took a lot of rasperries out when we bush cutted the plot so we might get a few surprises next year anyway.

Had a lovely couple of hours on the plot this afternoon. Ds who is 4 in December is a bit of a livewire at the best of times but is so well behaved on the plot. He followed me around for an hour with his wheelbarrow taking weeds to the burning pile or cuttings to the compost heap. Helped me pick tomatoes and beans and courgettes and cucumber and didn't want to leave despite the rain coming. He loves being outdoors anyway but loves it even more up there.

I think beans are just about done now. Took a french bean wigwam out to get more light to the late crop of beans I put in. And weeded the raised beds. Sweetcorn still not ready despite brown tassles which I am getting a bit worried about. I also stuck some over ripe bananas around the least ripe tomatoes to try and speed them up a bit.

No idea for a thread title, am rubbish with stuff like that. Something like 'summer is over, it's bean emotional but will are still plotting along'.

Frouby I think there is something very calming about allotment fields. It isn't just being out in the open, there is always something to do but none of it has to be done perfectly. It doesn't matter if you miss a bit or spill a bit.

Lots of children come onto our field and they always behave impeccably and have a great time.

Thread title suggestion a combination of the two above:

'Bid farewell to rainbow leaves and keep plotting along'

It is very calming isn't it Gnome. Even DP who is as stressy as they come is calmer and more relaxed up there. And normally if I am doing something I want to do it perfectly or not at all. On the plot it doesn't matter if it's not always immaculate or perfect.

Normally me and dp are terrible to do DIY ttpe stuff together. I want it done just so. He wants it done quickly. Apart from the Great Fence Debate in the first couple of weeks we leave each other alone to get on with whatever we are doing.

Ds has gotten so much out of it all. Still can't get past his veg dodging but he has eaten a fuckton of fruit. I passed a bag of tomatoes onto my ndn yesterday. She is a bit of a funny onion, either really chatty or completely blanks you so I tend to pretty much ignore her rather than have a hello blanked for whatever reason. But she sent me a couple of photos of her dcs with the toms lined up and choosing which ones they were having. And her ds with the biggest eating it like an apple. Wish ds would be like that but he won't entertain veg other than courgette in bolognaise and mushy peas bizarrely.

Morning all, a totally miserable day here, drizzle and cold with it.

Not much happening here, my mystery sqaush has set a couple of fruits so will be interesting to see what they turn out to be. My courgettes also seem to have come back to life and have flowered again after I almost pulled them up last week.

Late planted beans not quite there yet but plenty of flowers so just hoping it doesn't get too cold too quickly.

With regards the comfrey mentioned up thread, it's difficult to get rid of. We had a huge amount when we moved in, we pulled up roots as big as an arm. Our raised beds went on top with a liner, then a foot of top soil and we still have to battle with the stuff every year. I'm trying to relocate some to an abandoned corner, as the bees really like it and I make lots of 'tea' from it.

Afternoon!
An allotment is such a joy ,it's very de - stressing - well for me anyway , and lots of others .
well, a bit of a day - rain this morning, very wet overnight. This afternoon brightened up , so DH and I went for an hour. He cut the grass, and chopped down old fruiting summer raspberry canes.
I cut flowers, picked raspberries, beans and caulis ....
We went and decided to look at the crown prince squashes and picked 5 of them - another one to pick, possibly two if it has enough time. Not bad from 2 plants :) - they range from smallest at 2.88 kg, to biggest at 4.18 kg . So, they have been washed in a dilute bleach wash , rinsed and I have popped them on my bench to dry before storing .
Thanks for all the thread title suggestions , will sort one out shortly :)

New thread folks
THREAD 11