Allotment Diary 9

We didn’t write an Allotment Diary during summer last year. It gets a bit much with watering, harvesting, living a life, oh, and classes! This year we’ve made sure we’ve taken plenty of photos to jog our memory of what’s been going on and when – this should follow on nicely from the last allotment diary.

It’s also been good (?) to hear that these diaries have been a useful for sending quite a few of you to sleep in the evenings!!!

Garlic

We’d planted this in two places in October last year and harvested it around the middle of June. The batch we’d planted on our second plot did better than last years, and we were pleased with it but where we planted it on our third plot had had a big pile of manure on it for a good couple of years (which is why we planted it there) and it really did show. It was easily double the size of the garlic on the other plot!

Cabbages

A few of these seemed to want to be ready early and we were left with no choice but to pick some sooner than we thought. We didn’t realise we hadn’t grown this variety before – they’re smaller than the cabbages we grew last year and the size caught us out a little bit as we were waiting for them to get a bit bigger. We ate the first couple with our Sunday dinners and Vicky made sauerkraut with a few others. We still have a variety of pointed cabbage growing that are definitely not coming out until later in the year but are doing well.

We have savoy cabbages in a different bed that are doing extremely well. We picked a couple last week and you can see how big they are in the photo below.

Apples & Fruit Bushes

We’d inherited a few fruit bushes on our first plot and have tried various methods of pruning but they’ve never really taken off or produced what we’d expected. Last year we took time to cover them really well in makeshift cages to keep the birds off but this year we’d said we would barely prune or cover them as it’s so much work for little reward.

They’ve ended up flourishing, even the redcurrant bush that has always been very slow and offered up very little has produced lots of fruit. Our gooseberry bushes did much better than last year too so we’ll only prune these a little bit later this year again.

We’ve also left our apple and pear trees alone this year to see what happens – the truth is, when it comes to pruning we don’t really know what we’re doing, plus the four trees are all too close to each other really which is a shame - we’re contemplating removing two of them but don’t want to. At the moment they’re doing well but there’s a few more months to go until they’re ready. We’ll see how they go…

Sweetcorn

This started really well, almost too well, and a couple of people on the plot said it flowered too soon and was too small – there was a chance we might have over watered it early on but it ended up being fine in the end. Whilst it wasn’t as tasty as last year it was generally very nice. We had more of a problem beating the rats and foxes to eating it. We’d have left them in a little bit longer had they not eaten their way through about six plants.

We have two beds of corn, the first one has all been picked and now has manure on it (this is the plot with the poor dry soil). The second bed is doing well and will be ready to start eating very soon. This will get a cover crop in ready for winter too.

Cucumbers

These have done really well. We’ve been eating them for a good number of weeks now and it’s always hard to pick them the right size as everything looks smaller outside. They can be bitter of you leave them too long but we’re picking them spot on now.

Tomatoes

Last year was a disaster for our tomatoes for a few different reasons and we were saved by just a few plants in the end but we always had a good feeling about them this time. This year they’ve all been doing so well (beefsteak, salad and cherry tomatoes). They are slowly taking over the flat and many will go in sauces ready to use over the winter.

French Beans

These have been really good too. They were planted in a really nice bed of soil and covered with our hoops and netting as last year they kept being eaten. We’ve had about four pickings from them and expect to get a couple more before the end of the season.

Courgettes & Squashes

If you’ve been reading previous diaries you’ll know we got off to a really bad start with our squashes and courgettes, mainly because we put them out too early and they got hit by a late drop in temperature which basically killed all of them. We’ve since replanted numerous times and slowly they’ve established to the point that we’ve actually had some good sized courgettes.

The squashes are taking hold but I think it might be a stretch to think we’ll get anything along the lines of last years harvest but we’ll see, if we do they will only be small… The grass we grew in this bed before planting has done a really good job of building up the soil but it may have also been a reason they plants took a while to get going along with the cold - it’s hard to know for sure.

Cover Crops

It’s crazy but the planning for next year has already started and once our sugar snap peas, garlic and onions had been harvested it was time to sow a quick cover crop for the summer. We put in buckwheat where the onions and garlic were and more phacelia where the sugar snap peas were (there’s also alfalfa on another bed). The buckwheat has really done well as you can see from the photos below. This will be chopped down into the soil late August in time for hopefully sowing field beans again before the cabbages go in next year. We might just put some manure down though if there’s some in.

Summer In General

Summer is hard work when you have so many plots to take care of and watering can become a real chore but we’ve managed to get a better routine by watering a lot less than we have done in the previous years. We water one plot a day, which means each plot goes two days without water but there’s plenty of moisture in the soil by the time we get round to them again.

Late Winter and Spring are my favourite times of year on the allotment, everything begins to comes to life and all your planning comes to fruition (hopefully), the beds look nicely laid out as the plants are smaller. In the summer the plants are (hopefully) going crazy doing their thing and it’s more a case of just keeping on top of it all – there’s not as much change to see. If things are going well, just making time to harvest food before it gets too big can become a real effort, the hours can melt away down there.

Another (Cut Short) Video Tour

I took some more video on all three plots for you to have a look at again but my phone ran out of battery near the end. It’s still seven minutes long and gives you a nice idea of what’s been going on again for those of you that are interested.

We hope you’ve enjoyed having a look at how the plots are doing through the summer. It really is a busy time and keeping up with it all really can take over but it’s worth it in terms of being able to eat lots of food you’ve been able to keep your actual eyes on.

Don’t forget August sees us start a new theme for the month. You can read all about our theme for August here.

Oh, and for those of you that have found these diaries good for insomnia - night night!

Allotment Diary Archives

Suggested Reading

• Crop Rotation and Cover Cropping: Soil Resiliency and Health on the Organic Farm
• Natural Hygiene: Man’s Pristine Way of Life
• What Really Makes You Ill? Why Everything You Thought You Knew About Disease Is Wrong