Allotment/Veg Patch Thread 16 Weather weirdness prevails !

[bookbook]

Hello to everyone !
pull up a garden chair and join in with the trials and tribulations of growing your own , against the odds of weather , pests and diseases.
Previous thread is HERE

Hi, can I join in? I have been grown courgettes this year and some of the plants are looking very bedraggled. I also read that if you let a courgette become a marrow then the last will not fruit again.

Has anyone else removed any courgette plants yet? Is it the end of the season for me?
Thanks z

My courgettes haven’t been great this year but they seem to still be flowering so I’m hoping I will get a couple more before they die off. They usually go crazy and I’m usually over run with courgettes until October time.

Thanks for the explanation elephant and lovemusic. Makes sense now

@VanillaSucre I missed a courgette on one plant so allowed it to grow into a marrow (am fond of the occasional marrow for cooking anyway). So after that pulled that plant. Have another courgette but flower production is definitely slowing, getting one or 2 courgettes a week now, much more manageable. I tend to remove lower leaves that are yellowing etc, or any that are very heavily mildewed.

I didn't know that about pulling the plant once a marrow had appeared

my courgettes are v sneaky and keep growing when I don't expect them to - I only have 3 plants but they've been a lot more productive than normal

like others though, my corn is a bit disastrous this year!

That's a shame @BlueberryDream. Our corn has been a great success, mainly due to the incredible stretches of very warm weather I think (we're in the southeast, whereabouts are you?)

Re the courgette/marrow predicament, I just find they don't produce after a marrow has grown. Other smaller fruits shrivelled etc, am assuming it just exhausts the plant/no longer needs to produce flowers as it has "successfully" fruited.

Picked some more fruit today. Got some huge cherry tomatoes on one plant. They look like they've been pumped up. Some average ones on another and tiny baby ones on a third.

I also read that if you let a courgette become a marrow then the last will not fruit again. The plant's aim is to produce seeds, so if your keep picking the immature fruits, it encourages more flowers to form (in the same way as picking sweet peas encourages more flowers, or deadheading roses). Conversely, allowing a courgette to mature will reduce the number of future flowers.

Thanks for the replies. I’ve tried to keep on top of the harvesting but every now and then I find a sneaky marrow that has hidden itself amongst the undergrowth.

If you're still getting other flowers and fruit I wouldn't worry. This was how big I let ours grow in the end (medium sized courgette in the photo for comparison). Have a few marrow recipes I love though so it was deliberate (and delicious!). Although we get our veg from a local farm, never seem to get marrows!

That is one huge marrow!! I have a delicious marrow and date chutney recipe so I shall be making that over the weekend.

Ok,thanks,I’ll tidy up a few sorry specimens and keep the ones with flowers. The runner beans look completely over but a couple of years ago I had a walk around a posh hotel kitchen garden and the beans were still there in October half term. They were completely dead so I presume this is a nitrogen thing (as you can tell, I am no gardener).

Afternoon!
I only take up courgettes when I haven't seen a set courgette or flower for a week . So today - I have pulled up 2 , but one ( Defender) still has fruit and flowers . The cold weather from last week didn't help them one bit . My french beans have just about given up the ghost too - another slightly tender one .
A couple of trips today to the plot - this morning to dig up the courgettes , and weed where they have been . Rake and get ready to plnat out spring greens . Picked raspberries . Then went back this afternoon with DH to put in the support hoops for the environmesh ready for the cauliflowers . I have blue heavy duty plumbing pipe as very large and wide hoops ( Much taller /bigger than the metal hoops ) as I don't want the mesh to come into contact with the cauliflower curds when they arrive . as it turns them nasty in the damp .
The Borlotti beans are going strong though , so I picked some of the more ripe pods - I open freeze the beans , and I don't want them too dried out . It will be a good harvest .
Feeling like autumn now for sure

@bookbook you still have raspberries going!! I'm very jealous

The DC start school properly soon, I'm hoping to tidy the garden up and make proper plans for that (and possibly the allotment) for next year once I finally have the time!

Morning all, raspberry picking for me too this week, mine are autumn fruiting and only started picking properly this week. I can see that some of my plot neighbours summer ones are still going strong, maybe the cool weather has delayed them, mine have been a bit later getting started than usual. Harvested all my sweetcorn and froze it this week, cleared the plants and neighbouring sunflowers which had been trashed by the torrential rain last week. So many weeds underneath!

Also picked and pickled what were probably the last cucumbers and took lots of photos, it's a great time of year with both summer and autumn colours

Yup raspberry picking for me too and a few unexpected strawberries as well as courgettes, runner beans and a cucumber.

EasilyDeleted do you freeze the sweetcorn cobs whole or strip the kernels off first? I grew quite a lot of sweetcorn this year but most of it ended on the compost heap because I picked it and then didn't use it in time or it had gone to tough and stringy because we went away on holiday just as it was ready

Afternoon!
yes autumn raspberries Ruby - easy to look after , as you just cut them all down to the ground in early spring :)
Well, a trip to the allotment this morning - I now have all the beds ready for the spring veg ready to plant up . Took down the wigwam of french beans , and the last small sowing of peas. Just a few bits to pick from all these . The pea pods look sad and mildew-y, but the peas inside are fine . Dug up a cauliflower - should have picked it last week , but sort of by passed it , but it will still do for cauliflower cheese , even though the curd is opening up a bit . Cut some flowers too . Did a final weed of the asparagus bed , just need to put a winter mulch on and a bit more feed too .
At home I have picked all the peppers and aubergines , the leaves had just gone after the cold snap , so needed to tidy them up and into the compost bin. Still have a lot of tomatoes to ripen yet , hope we get some warmth . I have two cucumbers waiting to fill out a bit , and then those plants can go too .
I sat and sorted next years seed order out - going to try a couple of different varieties of things - its easy to fall into always growing the same ones , however successful , you may just find something better :)

Well we are home-a month away from the plot and everything in tact but some a little out of control... quick harvest. Will catch up the thread this evening. Hope you’re all well...

Just a few bits picked today, keeping fingers crossed for some warmer weather so I'll still have a few things to pick through September. I'm picking some tomatoes and chillis slightly early in the hope that energy is used to ripen other fruits.

Definitely going to try trombocino next year, they look ace. Looking for a new bean variety too, giving up on yellow ones, they've been useless this year and last. The purple beans I grow alongside do fine so not going to waste any more growing space.

@DesdamonasHandkerchief I peeled them, chopped them in half and blanched them for 5 mins before cooling and freezing (you can stand lots of them upright in the pan for blanching this way).

Hi, sorry I fell off the thread. Loved looking at all your pictures.
Two weeks holiday and my plot is full of weeds, so a busy day spent there today!

Tomatoes are ripe in the greenhouse and 7 cucumbers have grown in two weeks!

Raspberries - like the strawberries are a disaster in hardly any there. Despite getting new ones, Autumn Bliss, three years ago in the hope of a better crop.

@tizwozliz What are the white things?

Picked 16lbs apples off the Herrings Pippin today. The largest are getting on for the size of a small cabbage, and they already come "ready spiced". Definitely can't manage one of the big ones all by myself.

Pale sweetcorn, I had one plant that was a different variety to the others. Waiting to see if the other plants which are a few weeks behind amount to anything.

Ah thank you @bookbook, we had a great load of raspberries in the summer but they all died off a while back! Possibly DS2 giving them a wash with soapy water didn't help

Found an old bucket today that we'd tried to grow carrots in, DP didn't put any drainage in so they'd drowned long ago it was full of things that looked like tiny tadpoles though?! No idea what they are as I thought it was well past tadpole season - plus we're nowhere near a pond/ river/ lake so I don't know where any frogs would have come from. DS2 was very excited and was all for keeping them as pets, but I've made it very clear they will be staying where they are for now!

Probably mosquito larvae or similar @RubySlippers77 I'd 'accidentally' knock that bucket over fairly sharpish!