Pulling up the onions

The onions have had a lot to put up with this year.  Soon after planting the sets, the moles moved in, that must have been a bit traumatic for them being pushed up out of the soil before they were ready, but they seemed to recover and carried on growing.

Then as time went on the weeds arrived and took over. Now I know that onions don't like competing with weeds, they like their own space, but we were busy moving house and so the poor onions got neglected, but they continued to grow.

At this time of year it's now time to harvest the onions. All around me on the neighbouring allotments I can see racks of onions drying out in the sunshine. So I decided it was time to pull my onions up. I have to say that although I did try to do a little bit of weeding in the onion patch over the last few weeks, the weeds won. So when it came to pulling them up, I had great difficulty in finding them amongst the weeds. But I managed and I was amazed to find big onions.

I laid them out to dry in the sunshine on the greenhouse staging which we dragged out from its summer storage behind the shed and also in the cold frame.

And so, despite all the trauma of bad growing conditions, the onions have done well and seem as good as in previous years. I'm pleased with my harvest.

#mygardenrightnow

This post is linked to Michelle at Veg Plotting who has created the challenge for us gardeners to post a photo of ourselves in our gardens or allotments this weekend which shows how our garden or allotment is looking right now.

So here is my contribution. Here I was in my garden on Saturday morning on my hands and knees clearing the leaves and dead plant material from the beds. I am doing this bit by bit as the weather and time allows. It's hard work on my back, but I always feel good when it's done and I can see some progress.

In the afternoon we went down to the allotment and did more back breaking work. My husband was cutting the hedge back which involved climbing up the ladder so his knees were suffering by the end of the day. I was hoeing the vegetable beds which over the winter have looked good topped up with manure and quite weed free. But in the last week the weeds have been popping up in the form of those wretched spinning jenny seedlings which fall from the sycamore trees. There is one tree across the lane in front of our allotment and another at the top of the plot. The good thing is that the seedlings  are quite easy to get out of the soil with the hoe, but there are so many of them, they are everywhere. So here I am again down at the allotment.

Harvesting the onions

 

It's now that time of year when all the allotment holders are harvesting onions. As we walk along the lane to the allotment we can see onions strung up in greenhouses, laid out along benches or left lying on top of the beds. They are everywhere.

I spent an afternoon last week harvesting my onions. The tops had started to bend over so I knew they were ready to be pulled up. Not only that, I could see that they had grown amazingly in the last couple of weeks. Then came the annual problem of where to put them to dry out. The first lot went on top of the brassica net frame, another lot went on an old growhouse frame which Richard dragged out of storage.

A couple of days later when the roots had dried out I moved them all to the cold frame which is not being used for seedlings at the moment.  There is no room in the greenhouses to store them and not much space in the shed either.  They will be fine in the cold frame until they have dried out completely and I can clean them up and put into onion bags.

With the onion bed cleared and weeded I made use of the space to plant some lettuce seedlings and sow some more radish and beetroot.

Richard has been doing some work on the fence down one side of the plot recently. Our neighbour on the other side does not look after his plot and the weeds get out of hand. There are some really bad weeds growing there--nettles, Himalayan Balsam, bindweed, hogweed to name just a few. So Richard has put some black weed suppressant membrane along one section of the fence and a length of bamboo fencing along another. These are just materials which we had to hand. They will not stop weeds from growing under  the fence into our plot, but they will help to stop them growing through and will hide the ugly view we have of a very neglected plot.

Easter Monday on the plot

With lots of family things going on over the last week, we haven't had time to get down to the allotment to do any work, apart from occasional visits to feed Ziggy the cat and to check the seedlings in the greenhouses. So it was good to be reunited with my plot on Easter Monday. I had a long list of jobs to do.

Ziggy was there as usual wanting to be fed. I think she would eat until she burst if we kept feeding her. She certainly doesn't look underfed. And she now lets us stroke her. When we first adopted her she wouldn't come anywhere near us and didn't have a voice, just a snarl. Now she follows me around as I work and meows all the time which can be a bit annoying, but I am learning to ignore it.

 I am really loving my two new greenhouses. The seedlings are coming along great and I never fail to get excited when I see new seeds coming through. There is something so amazing about new growth. I was especially pleased to see that the peas I sowed in a length of guttering a few weeks ago are now starting to come through.

 One of my allotment neighbours gave me some cabbage 'golden acre' seedlings which I potted on and put in the greenhouse. I also had some spring cabbage plants which I'd started off at the end of last summer. These were ready to plant out, the first plantings this year. I covered them with some netting frames to protect from the pigeons which are constantly flying around the plots.

Whilst I was doing this Richard did some weeding. Now the weather is warming up the weeds are starting to grow and there are lots of sycamore seedlings from the tree at the top of the garden. We are also seeing some Himalayan balsam seedlings starting to appear. This is an awful weed which can take over if not kept under control. Unfortunately the plot next to us is not well looked after and the seeds are blown over from there, which causes much annoyance to us and several of the neighbouring plots.

The grand children's woodland den is looking very spring like with tete a tete daffodils, blue pulmonaria and anemone. The daffodils which I rescued from Helen's old plot are just starting to flower too.

I managed to tick one or two jobs off my list before it started to rain, but I'm hoping to get down to the plot again this week to get more done.

Falling leaves

The leaves are falling fast now from the big sycamore tree at the top of the allotment and every time we go there are even more.  It's time to start sweeping them up to put in the leaf bin. It's an ongoing job at the moment as soon as we  have swept up one lot of leaves there is another layer of them covering the beds and paths. But they are too good not to save, they make such wonderful compost.

Richard spent a few days recently weeding the leaf composting  area which hasn't been emptied in the two years we have had the allotment. The weeds were mainly bindweed coming from the allotment next door, which is a sadly neglected plot and I get very cross about all the weeds which come through onto our plot.  He weeded the leaf mould,cleared as many weeds as he could which were poking through the fence from the next door plot and then  fixed an old door against the fence to try to suppress them. All these bits of wood which we save come in useful eventually!

We have recently been given two of the plastic type of compost bins. At the time I was a bit doubtful that they would be of any use and even wondered where to keep them as we have a good sized composting area already on the plot. But when you have an allotment you don't like to refuse anything which is free and could be of some use. I am pleased to say that we have now found a use for them as storage bins for the rotted down leaf mould. The leaf mould has turned into a  lovely, crumbly compost and is ready to put on the beds as a mulch over the winter.  Leaf mould is wonderful stuff and so easy to make. Now that the rotted down stuff is out of the bin we can now start collecting leaves again to make a new leaf pile.

Growing

With the coming of Spring and warmer weather everything is coming to life at the allotment.  The weeds are growing fast now, those little sycamore seed pods which fell on the plot in the autumn are now sprouting all over the place, the Himalayan balsam which grows all over the lane and explodes its seed pods everywhere is now germinating all over the plot.  They're all easy to pull out but they are a nuisance and it means I have to spend a lot of time on my hands and knees or worse still I'm constantly bending down to pull them out. No wonder I have back problems!   The sight of these weeds seeds tells me that the soil is warming up and I can now start planting some things outdoors.

We planted the first early potatoes last weekend--in bags and pots.  The onion sets which we started off in cell modules weeks ago have now been planted out. I sowed broad beans direct into the ground a couple of weeks ago and this week planted out some which I'd started off in the polytunnel in cardboard tubes.  We also sowed salad leaves, radish and spring onion last weekend.

I've been sowing seeds under cover for weeks now and I'm watching them carefully every time I go to the plot to see if any have germinated. Some take weeks to come through and when I've  almost given up hope there they are with their little green shoots emerging.

I never fail to get excited over seeing things grow, this is such a lovely time of year.

Sorting out the pond

We seem to be having a lot of projects at the allotment this year. Or perhaps that's how I view these things that we do. Some of them might be just projects but some of them are real challenges too.  So our latest project challenge is the allotment pond, and it really is a challenge.

When we first took on Plot 8 we were pleased that it had a pond, although we might not have noticed that it had a pond if the allotment officer hadn't told us. The whole of the pond area was taken over by irises and  weeds as well as all the rubbish which you get with a new allotment.

There's a pond here amongst the weeds

We were delighted when the frog spawn appeared, but sad when the pond dried up and we realised that there was a hole in the liner. So we knew that we would need to sort the pond out as soon as we had sorted the allotment out. It's a job which has been put off a few times because of more important allotment work and also because we knew it was going to be a big job and we needed to work out how to do it. But finally this year we got started.

Richard and Helen digging out the weeds

 We decided (well my husband did ) to get rid of the old pond but put the new pond in a different place. We just wanted a wildlife pond and it didn't need to be big, so as we are into recycling and reusing things we recycled and reused an old galvanised tin bath which we had found on the allotment and which was quite sound--no holes. The area where we have placed it is a fairly wet boggy area so we can also plant up a bog garden. We are also needing some space to put a small greenhouse or polytunnel and the area where the old pond was would be ideal.

The new pond

The first job was to dig out some of those weeds and plants which had taken over. That is a big job and we still haven't cleared them all.  But the old pond is almost cleared away to just a hole in the ground and the new pond is in place.  As I said earlier this is a big  challenge so we are still working on it. There is much still to be done but it's good to see the progress we've made so far. I've been collecting plants together for the pond and bog and I can't wait to get them planted up.

July on the allotment

Well here we are in July, halfway through the year, how time flies. There’s no let up in the jobs on our two  allotments at the moment. It’s a race to make sure seeds are sown at the right time and plants are got in the ground.  But everything is looking good.  I love to see the rows of vegetables starting to get bigger and I always think that once the bean frames are up in place then it starts to look like a proper allotment.  After a long dry spell of weather, we finally had some proper rain which has given the ground a good soaking and filled the water butts up.

We've been picking lettuces and radishes for a few weeks and last weekend we picked the first of the peas and broad beans.The brassica beds have been planted up with white cabbages, red cabbage, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, kale and purple sprouting broccoli. In the roots beds the parsnips and beetroot are coming along nicely.  Also in those beds  are fennel and celeriac. These are both fairly new to us crops. I tried growing celeriac a few years a go without success so I am giving it another go now on our new plots.

In the fruit beds, the gooseberries are ready for picking, the blackcurrants need to ripen yet and the rhubarb is enormous. I've already got a few pounds  bagged up in the freezer.

The weeds are growing fast. We try to keep them under control in the beds, but around the rest of the plot they grow at an alarming rate and I keep hoping I will soon have time to tackle them but there are so many jobs to do. I have a list of allotment jobs to do which never gets any shorter. As I cross jobs off, more are added.

This weekend I emptied the containers of  the first early potatoes (Rocket), picked more gooseberries, thinned out some of the flower seedlings in the cut flower bed, planted a pumpkin, fixed up some supports for the cucumbers and tomatoes in the growhouse and made up some comfrey feed. I was really pleased to cross all those jobs off my list.

Next week I hope to plant out  leeks and  celeriac, pot on basil and parsley seedlings, sow fennel and cabbage for the winter and do lots of weeding. 

Woodland den

On the day of the teachers' strike this week we were looking after our two grandchildren.  When I suggested going to the allotment I got the usual response--"oh yes!" from our grandson who loves going and "oh nooo" from our granddaughter who doesn't.  At my next suggestion, to make a woodland den at  the top of the allotment, all eyes lit up--yes this was much more interesting.

At the top end of plot8 is a slope with a big sycamore tree and some bushes, an elder and a holly.  It's not possible to use the space for growing vegetables or fruit.  The grandchildren always enjoy playing up there, it's a good place to hide and run around, but there are lots of weeds and rubbish- nettles, brambles, glass and plastic.  It wasn't a very safe area for children.  So I've had a plan in mind to make it into a safe area where the children could play and have their own space.

Armed with strong gloves, rubbish bags and secateurs, the children and I set to work clearing the area and cutting back branches.  My 9 year old granddaughter normally has no interest in the allotment, preferring to stay at home and read a book.  So it was good to see her full of enthusiasm for the project and to have her say that it was the best day she had ever spent on the allotment.  I had to admit that I was quite enjoying myself too. 

We managed to clear the nettles, cut back the brambles, trim the holly and clear up most of the rubbish. Under my granddaughter's supervision I cut back overhanging branches to her height and made an archway of branches at the entrance to the woodland, a soft curtain of leaves in the middle to provide a hiding place and a pathway all the way through. As we worked away we thought about what we could do to make the woodland area into a good den.

We got rained off later and after adjourning to the shed for our lunch we went home to make plans.  I got them to think about what they would like to have in their woodland den.

So we now have a list of ideas:

• Make seats out of some of the bricks and planks of wood lying around on the allotment
• Bird feeders in the trees
• Make a bug house
• Make a shelf to put interesting nature finds/treasures
• Make things like mobiles or sculptures out of twigs, stones, pebbles, leaves etc
• Have a rope ladder so they can climb the big tree (Hmm, well maybe granddad can fix something up)
• Have a camouflage awning (this could cost money)
• Make a hideout from long branches like a teepee (we could collect branches from the woods across the lane)

I have to say that I'm quite excited about this project myself, but I'm wondering if adults might not be allowed in there once it's finished. I'll keep you up to date with our progress.

A big pile of weeds

On Friday afternoon I left Richard in charge of the new kitchen fitters and went to the allotment. I needed to escape from all the dust and mess of the building work even though it was to see more mess at the allotment on plot 8.

Looking around the plot I did feel a bit despondent. The weeds are starting to grow in abundance now the weather is improving and we are going to have a hard job to keep on top of them. The raised beds which Helen and I had weeded and prepared  for planting a week or two ago had weeds growing in them, and there was a great big pile of rubbish from when Richard had dismantled the old compost bins. This rubbish was covering an area of land which I had wanted to start digging over. But we have only had this second plot for 11 weeks, and it did come with its fair share of problems.  I think I am in too much of a hurry to get it looking perfect--that could take years!

Well, standing looking at it all would not get the work done so I got stuck in and cut back some of the hedge at the front of the plot, a lot of it is just dead wood which snapped off as I worked at it. It has left some gaps which will take away some of our privacy, so I am going to plant some cotoneaster cuttings taken from our garden which will be good for the wildlife too. I managed to dig over one small patch of ground and cleared some of the weeds along by the fence.  The dominant weed on the plot is himalayan balsam which is quite shallow rooting and pulls up quite easily, there are nettles too. I managed to dig up a few trugs full of weeds and debris.

A robin appeared as I worked away and followed me around keeping me company, probably looking for worms amongst the soil I had dug over.  It was very peaceful and good to escape from all the chaos back home.

Rain

 

There are times when the allotment is best viewed from the inside of the shed. Sunday was one of those days.  We went to the allotment mainly to take some tomato and purple sprouting broccoli plants which I had potted on to grow in the polytunnel. But we thought the rain might ease off so we stayed for a while.  We weeded the soil in the polytunnel borders, sorted out the plants in there, thinned out the carrots in the tub and then decided to venture outside.

There were some giant mare’s tail weeds growing in the raised beds so we went round pulling them out. We cut the emerging flowers off the rhubarb plants, admired the blackcurrants, examined the raspberries for more growth, put some shredded paper and cardboard on the compost heap and generally got very wet.

But we came away having harvested some baby leeks, chard and the last of the kale. And Ziggy the allotment cat was happy because she got fed twice.

Plot 8 a new allotment

 When my daughter got her allotment last year,  we agreed we would share the plot but I decided to still keep my name on the allotment waiting list. We worked hard last year getting her allotment in shape ready to grow food this year.  As we were planning what to grow in the different raised beds I did wonder if we had enough space, after all we are growing to feed two families.


Last week however I got a letter from the allotment officer inviting the first seven people on the waiting list to view three  plots which were available. They would be allocated in waiting list order if there was any interest. Two of the plots were quite big and overgrown, the third was next door but two from my daughter's plot and just big enough to give us the extra space we needed.  Although it did need a lot of work doing, we felt it was a project we would like to take on.

I put my request in for plot 8 and a few days later I was delighted to hear that I had got it! My own allotment!  Once we had got the key we went to have a proper look at it, as we had only been able to look through the fence before.  The plot has a problem with drainage, there is water running down from the top and out the gate, so the first job will be to sort that out. My husband has already made a start digging out a drain. Halfway down the plot next to the fence is a small pond. We were told that it has frogs and frogspawn which should please the grandchildren and we will be pleased if the frogs eat the slugs.

There are two very rickety sheds which will have to come down. Inside the sheds we found tools and all sorts of other useful stuff as well as loads of rubbish.

There are a few small raised beds, which need weeding and topping up with manure or compost, then we might be able to grow something there this year. Eventually I think I will get rid of them, dig the whole plot over and build some better beds.

There's a lot of rubbish lying around which needs clearing up and taking to the tip. The place is littered with old plant pots, weeds and brambles. The whole plot seems to be covered in sheets of membrane or carpet, so it's impossible yet to see what sort of soil is there. Perhaps it's hiding something bad or was an attempt to soak up all the water.

We are going to continue to share our allotments and produce. There is still work to be done on plot 10b, Helen's plot,  and I would like to get the important jobs finished this year, before we start to concentrate on sorting out plot 8.

Looks like we've got another busy year ahead of us!

Allotment planting and clearing

The allotment is coming along well. We have planted leeks, swede, kale, spring cabbage and fennel in the last week in the new raised beds.  It's good to see it's starting to look like an allotment in some ways.  In other ways it's still looking a mess. But I have to remind myself that it's only 3 months since we took on this plot and when I look back on photos from the beginning then I can really appreciate how well we have done so far.

Fennel

Last weekend as well as planting vegetables,  Helen and I tackled the top end of the plot where there are a mass of brambles, nettles and much more.  It was very satisfying to attack these weeds and make our way up the plot into this jungle like territory.  We found some good things like a buddleia bush and a variegated holly.  We decided to leave these in place because we want to have an area for flowers which will attract wildlife. We'll probably leave some of the brambles at the back of the fence too. We're still not sure what our plans are for this top end of the plot, but when it's all been cleared we'll have a better idea how much space we're dealing with.

The top end of the plot

Meanwhile  Richard has been constructing what will be a poly tunnel/growhouse using the wooden framework from the old cabin which was taken down from the front of the plot. The framework was finally in place this week and next we have to buy some polythene covering. 'Buy?' we cried. 'Oh dear we will have to spend money!' But having been able to do so much so far by using materials we have found on the plot it seems hard having to go out and buy something.

Our homemade growhouse

This weekend Richard and I started clearing the area where the old cabin was. Here we plan to have some raised beds. Although the area is fairly weed free having been undercover from the cabin, there is an amazing amount of rubbish. There were probably about a hundred bricks which had been used as supports. Those have been stored in another area. Bricks are always useful for building paths, walls etc. There was lots of wood, some useful, some too rotten to be of any use. Lots of stones too, boulders and smaller stones all which can be used around the plot.  It was hard work moving all this stuff out of the way and there was just so much of it we didn't seem to be getting anywhere. We haven't finished but we've made progress.

What a mess!

There is a drainage problem on the plot as it is on a slope so Richard is building another drain before he puts  the raised beds in place.

 I ended the day by walking down to our old plot and picking some cabbage, beetroot and climbing beans. I also picked blackberries from the lane along the way. 

Family weekend at the allotment

As we come to the end of another week's work at our new allotment, I'm happy that it's beginning to look something like an allotment.  My husband has finished building the drains, we've had a lot of rain to test them out and they seem to be working. We now have four raised beds. They have been dug over several times, and  as many stones as possible removed ( there were lots of them). We have been  incorporating some good soil from another area of the plot and some well rotted manure into these beds. We plan to use three of the them  for fruit growing as we will need to transplant the fruit bushes from our old plot in the autumn when the tenancy comes to an end.  We have been working on this section of the allotment for four weeks now and in that time it has gone from looking like this:

to this:

and this:

to this:

 

We have planted up some purple sprouting broccoli, red cabbage and brussels sprouts in one of the beds.

At the other end of the L-shaped plot, weeding is in progress, but it's a long job.

All the family got involved this weekend. We had to make it fun for the grandchildren, so I made some obstacle courses over the muddy areas.

And we tried to make a way through the jungle of weeds. We still haven't managed to get up to the top of the plot, there are so many weeds and brambles. My grandson said he thought there was a bear living in one of the bushes. Hmm I wonder!

The plot is still full of surprises, my husband found two scythes in the shed. My daughter used one of them to cut down some of these weeds. I am used to finding many stones, boulders and bricks as I dig but today I had real trouble digging, my husband helped me and we unearthed this huge piece of metal. I'm sure we'll find a use for it somewhere around the plot!

There's a tremendous amount of work to do, I know it will take a long time to get the plot looking good but after this weekend I am feeling much more hopeful.