Allotment/Veg Patch Thread 14 ! growing into summer

[bookbook]

Well, here we are - its the end of May and after a cold spell , we are heading for summer .
Everyone welcome to join us in the joy of growing your own , sharing the ups and downs , tips and advice
previous thread HERE

Beanpole you don't need to have a permanent position for compost. We pile all the compostable material on a bed. Early the following year we cover it in weedproof matting then a few months later we plant through the matting for courgettes and squash etc. When they are over the matting comes off and the soil dug over. It will have been hugely improved by having all that compost rotting directly into it.

All our beds are roughly the same size so it makes it easier to re-use the weed proof matting from year to year.

All the plants are in their drinks bottle collars to protect them from wind damage.

I think I need wind collars, my runner beans look sorry for themselves after planting out on Fri and then it being windy all weekend. We use squash at work, might have to ask people to save the bottles for me.

The bottle collars are really useful. DH makes ours by topping and tailing 2l bottles then cutting them open to join 2 together to make a wider collar. A long reach stapler is useful.

Do collars help keep slugs off too? Last year I lost some bean and pea seedlings. Have some bottles which I was planning to use for a watering system but could adapt. Any recommendations on adapters for drip watering too?

didi - is it a friendly place , has anyone got a strimmer or mower they could lend you to get the grass cut - It may be someone will help if you ask ?
All the advice upthread is very useful , Keeping it up does take a lot of dedication . If you are very short of time , could you 'share' your plot with someone ? On our site plots can have joint tenants , to share the load .

I sometimes use collars with a ring of copper tape around them to keep the slugs off - you want them fairly small for that as they can obviously come up through the soil. Overall an application of nematodes a week or so before planting out seems to be more effective.

All growing nicely so far!

Ooh, just found the new thread. My battle with the bindweed and couch grass continues and I think I'm losing, but there are actually some future eatables starting to appear. Newbie me is very excited and spending a lot of time admiring (and watering) the apple tree, which is positively sagging under the weight of tiny apples and receiving lots of bumble bee attention.

I'm less than impressed with the way bindweed is punching through the cardboard and mulch layer to appear all over the veg bed. Without sacrificing the seedlings, all I can do is just keep pulling the shoots and hope that I can at least slow it down a bit until I can get a bit more aggressive with it in the winter. The wool and jute barrier I laid around the blackcurrants is containing the bindweed much better but is too expensive to do the whole plot with.

I just risked moving a cucumber and three tomatoes out of the cold frame into the plot. I'm a bit nervous about that one. They were safe at home in the cold frame. Next step, supports for the beans and peas.

I'm probably only about half cleared after four months work, but the supervisor's okay with the progress so I'm fairly safe for the moment.

I covered half my plot with a plastic sheet a couple of years ago. So the remaining plot is a large raspberry patch (which this year is waist high in grass - that's never happened before) and four raised beds we made last year but couldn't clear enough in one weekend to plant up. The end one is full of grass and poppies....

I did ask the allotment group (unfortunately I go to the allotment at the weekend while all the other allotmenters are retired and there during the week) but they told me I could hire a lawnmower from the next city over. I think I might just cover the weeds in cardboard again and get more horse manure and soil improver from the council (I can get the tip before 11am on a Saturday to get it). The grass was just such a surprised this year - and because all the neighbouring plots are cultivated they have none... My compost bin is buried under stickleweed....

I've taken the black polythene off the last bed today, dug it over, added compost and planted cucumbers and patty pans. Tomorrow I am going to take out the PSB and plant beetroot, Kole Rabbi and spinach. We were promised heavy showers today but nothing has materialised so more watering tomorrow.

Evening !
Rained all day today - so hurrah for getting everything watered.
Sounds - just one word of warning re bindweed - it disappears underground in winter , not to be seen or found You need to keep at it while you can still see the leaves .
didi - that is just pants ..
What I have done is sown the replacement french beans , which arrived this morning , also ( no hanging around in plot land ) have also sown savoy winter cabbage , autumn cauliflowers and some more spinach .
On a good news note , due to the hand weeding of my asparagus bed plus photo evidence of lack of much asparagus , I have been given a full refund on the crowns I bought - so I will feed them and see what happens .

Evening, living up to my reputation of being rubbish keeping up with thread!
We too have the battle of the bindweed but I'm finding it far easier to ease out of compost no dig beds when it is germinating seed stage as the little plants slide out. With the bigger roots I just keep trowling out when they appear.
Spinach and lettuce doing fab and tastes so good. Fruit bushes looking good - even the previous 14 ft thornless blackberry that I cut right back has sent up young shoots and is hip high. New trees seem ok and most the rhubarb crowns I split and moved doing well. Have rows across both plots now.
Brassicas planted and protected and most beans and peas in. Corn and courgettes still at home waiting to plant out. Struggle with time a bit but still happy with progress so far
Keep enjoying your plots 😊

Hello everyone. I was on the allotment threads last year but dropped off them, probably through spending too much time up at the allotment...Anyway I do still have my plot and have missed "talking" to others who really get the excitement of growing produce...so am returning!
In news from my plot. My old shed (inherited with the plot) was barely clinging on so I shelled out on a new one at the end of last summer. DH very kindly helped me to put it up - in fact he did almost all of the work while I stood around being very picky about where it was/how the roof was put on/where the guttering was fitted etc. But it's great to now have a functional and dry shed for storage, it makes a massive difference.
I also decided to completely re-plant the raspberry bed that came with the plot (last year's crop wasn't great, the plants were quite old and berries were small). That was my main task a couple of months ago and it almost broke me - I hadn't really taken into account how difficult it would be to handle the very long wooden stakes for the corners of each bed (8' long and I had to dig deep holes for them/mallet them into the ground whilst perching on a ladder). Anyway they are now in, wires in place too, plants are thriving and I'm hopeful for a good crop this year.
I have strawberries coming along nicely but no fruit ripe for a while yet - a couple of pink-tinged Alpine strawberries though! Broad beans doing well but my blackcurrants are really struggling with aphids this year. Am spraying them with soapy water...
I've planted sweet corn, "Black Beauty" courgettes - no sign yet but only a week since I planted. My squash has poked a few leaves through the soil and I also have kohlrabi, swede and Hamburg parsley (really interested to see how this does) sown and just starting to germinate.
Hoping to add sugar snap peas this weekend which I'll sow in situ, I don't have much room at home to start seeds off there.
Looking forward to following everyone's posts over the summer!

SoundofSilence do you know anyone who has food deliveries from e.g. Gousto, Abel & Cole, etc? They use wool insulation sheets in their boxes, which are perfect to lay on the allotment as weedproof membrane/mulch. I get quite a few from a local Facebook reuse/recycling group and they are really good at keeping the weeds down. Can be dug into the beds eventually too, as brown compost

The corn seedlings I got from the car boot fair I have nearly doubled in size in three days. It's amazing. do I need to protect them from the wind? they seem to be doing okay but I am on top of the hill and I do get quite a bit of wind in the garden.

Silver beats seeds are popping through as are the radish. We are off.

I have some of that wool packing. Couldn't bear to throw it out and now I know how I can use it! Thanks.

That sounds like a good idea, timtam. I don't know anybody who gets deliveries like that but I'll check out the local freecycle group and see if I get lucky. I really want to go no-dig eventually so a cheaper way to use wool would be good. I'm losing confidence in cardboard.

bookbook the pain in your is noted. I will go on the bindweed offensive straight after harvest while there are still leaves to be traced. Strangely enough, when I took this plot on in January, there wasn't a bindweed leaf to be seen ::hollow laugh::

ooh its raining enough in SE to properly wet the ground (first in a long time) - perhaps water butt will be topped up a bit .....

It hasn't stopped raining all day today here. I know the ground needs it but haven't been able to do what I had planned today on the plot. Never mind there's always tomorrow.

Evening!
we got the rain yesterday , but its been nice today
Sounds - ha , good luck on the bindweed
Hi again timtam - its all sounding great :) - I actually have a couple of the gusto things given me - I used them to protect my dahlias over winter , but a great idea . I will certainly look out for more .
TheClitterati - and now its rained , the corn will be as high as an elephants eye perhaps ? Amazing how it grows so quickly .
I spent all morning at the plot today. I have planted out the second lot of sweetcorn , and courgettes today . Rest of the time was weeding . I tackled the messy area that gets left all the time ( does anyone else have one of those - I am a bit embarrassed about it tbh ) - there is hedge of rosemary and lavender between my plot and another , right at the end - and the bed in front of that has strawberries , so next doors couch grass always makes a break for freedom into it through the hedge , so it was ruthlessly weeded today - very satisfying as it came out relatively easily due to the rain yesterday , along with a lot of self sown hollyhocks ( also from next doors ) . I did get to have a good look at all the fruit at that end - I have gooseberries , jostaberries and summer raspberries . All looking good , though a bit of mildew on the some of the gooseberries - it seems to get it every year whatever I do prune wise and keeping the middle open

Rained all afternoon here too . However the allotment badly needed it, hoping to get up there tomorrow. I'm another one cursed by bindweed, but I quite enjoy winkling out the roots.

Book I have a totally wild area at the top of my plot, I'm pretending it's a 'wildlife area'

I put in a mini container pond today. I'd like to get some hostas to put around it but they're quite expensive at my local nursery and I'm worried it would end up as slug food!
Also planted a foxglove I picked up in the b&q sale. And potted on some tomatoes and strawberries at home.
Most of my kohlrabi has been munched so I think I need to buy more netting. What's the cheapest option? I've seen scaffold debris netting mentioned.

Lots of rain here too which has been very welcome!

water butt is nearly full & as I still haven;t sorted out my overflow situation I just went out and gave hydrangeas etc a thorough soaking.

Haven't posted on here for ages but plot is coming along really well. The difference in 2 months is huge! (See first pic taken in March and the second today) Everything is coming along well although keeping on top of the weeds is a challenge. Also I think I didn't plant my potatoes deep enough (newbie here!) So it remains to be seen how they will turn out! Sweet corn, tomatoes and beans going in now. When should I plant raspberries? I need to get that bit of the plot ready so I'm hoping autumn is ok?

Argh phone won't post images. Will add later.

Was really windy here this morning and one lot of potatoes are looking sad. They are my early ones but they hadn’t flowered yet, the wind has flattened them, so you think they will perk up again and flower?