July was great...but its august already

I can't believe that its August already, how did that happen?! There's been plenty going on at allotment 28a since I wrote last. I've had loads of courgettes (courgette soup anyone?), potatoes, peas, beetroot, beans, redcurrants, raspberries, blackcurrants, sweetpeas, lettuce, radishes and chard.

Our plot has kind of caught up and is now producing lots of veg. The chinese broccoli hasn't been a success but pretty much everything else has been good. The runner beans are nearly ready and I sowed another 4 rows of peas to take us through autumn. And we've got a pumpkin! There was some debate whether our pumpkin plant would produce any fruit as I saved seed from last year, but as you can see, we've got a fat pumpkin growing. The slugs have had a lot of the plant but so far the pumpkin is looking pretty good. The chard we've grown this year is really delicious, I've been eating lots of it.

What other news...the sweetcorn has quite a few cobs, our neighbour Shelley planted lots of flowers this year - dahlias, echinacea and verbena so the bees are happy. And...someone has taken over nettle mountain and has started the hideous task of clearing it. They've done a very good job so far, I'm really pleased, it might help stop the nettles and bindweed spreading to our plot.

I love sweetpeas

I adore sweetpeas, they're my favourite flower and they remind me of my dad as he always grew them when I was young. I bought some seed at last year's Chelsea Flower show, the important things were the colour and the scent. They had to smell like proper old-school sweetpeas. And they certainly delivered on both fronts! I started them off in the late autumn last year. The plants on my roof terrace are now about 7 foot tall and producing so many beautiful blooms. We have some at the allotment too. Stunning.

On another note I bought some seed in a half price sale, mostly winter veg - kale, sprouting broccoli and some savoy cabbage. The seedlings are just poking through now. I'll plant them out at the allotment once they're bigger we've got some space!

What's been chewing on our broad beans?

Something has been having a go at our broad beans! Whatever it is, its got sharp teeth...squirrels maybe?

Its been dry weather so Seamus and I have been mostly watering the lottie in the last few weeks. I've sown a couple more rows of peas, they're doing really well this year and you can't have too many gorgeous fresh peas.

The redcurrants are glowing a deep red, we've got some flowers on our french beans, the early potatoes look like they're nearly ready for the pot and we've got some teeny courgettes on one of our plants.

It all seems good. But a lot of our plants and veg seem to be lagging behind a little. We can't decide if its the lack of sun our plot gets or the compost we dug into the beds in spring...

Anyway, onwards and upwards, if we get the very hot summer we're being promised then the shade that creeps over our plot at about 2pm may save our veg from being scorched. Fingers crossed.

Daz & I went up to the lottie today for the fist time in a week (slack I know) but we've been busy in my garden planting lovely Roses as a tribute to Loulou and making a lawn for Daz to roll around on as he loves grass. Things have grown loads we have Onions big onions which we thought were Shallots, ah well you live and learn. Tanya's sweet peas are flowering and I ate a Strawberry it was gorgeous. I watered everything really well, Tanya had planted Beetroot last week and they are looking good.

I ♥ Loulou

Seamus' dog Loulou passed away yesterday, here she is looking very regal at the lottie with Daz in the background. Will miss you Loulou.

Ta daaaaah!

Check out our new fruit cage! I asked James to build one for us a couple of months ago. It took about 5 hours to put up, the weather was glorious, we both got proper farmer tans! Each panel comes off so we can get inside and its really sturdy. I wasn't expecting anything nearly this fancy but its great, it'll last for years. Am really looking forward to having loads of fruit, we've got 10 raspberry canes, two redcurrant bushes, one white currant bush and one black currant bush in the cage.

I made nettle quiche the other day, it was delicious but if I made it again, I'd definitely put more nettles in.

A very different plot...

Allotment 28a is a very different plot these days. Since my last post 5 months ago we've been hard at work transforming the lottie. We've got loads of raised beds now, they're all in, and working is a lot easier. There's a part of me that's sad that it won't be the same overgrown patch as last year, but its great having level ground and space to move around between the beds. Last year when we watered, the water ran straight off into the grass, but now it seeps into the ground where its needed.

So. What have we planted/moved. We picked 10 of the best raspberry canes and gave the rest to other plot holders and planted them in a long bed where they were before along with 2 red currant bushes, one white and one black currant bushes. We ditched our onions as we got bored of watching them doing very little, but we kept the shallots. We split the rhubarb and planted it at the ends of 2 raised beds. We moved the lavender bush to a different bed and made it a herb bed. 

We got all our potatoes in at the end of March. We've got Dunluce and Rocket which are both earlies and good old King Edwards for roasting. That's 3 beds of spuds. Yum.

Our winter/spring veg has been really funny. The birds kept on stripping it so by the time we managed to cover it properly it had basically had enough and did nothing for months. Now there's a bit of warmth and sunshine its growing although not enough to harvest anything. A bit of a waste of time but at least we'll know for next time. We might get enough for one meal of purple sprouting before we have to get the plants out to make way for something else. Oh well.

We've got some horseradish in a container. That's something that I'm really looking forward to, I ADORE horseradish. Horseradish on everything please.

I started some broad beans, Seamus started some peas and they've gone in, and looking rather fantastic. We've got leeks and french beans in the propagator and some other bits and pieces. 

I'm making nettle quiche right now for dinner, didn't manage to last year, hope its good...

Here's some more pics: