Country Bliss - the allotment

August

2011-08-23T01:52:00.000-07:00

Pattypan

Peas

First tomato turning red.

We grow quite a few flowers to encourage beas & to for cutting : Sweet peas, Gladioli, Nasturtium, Sweet Williams, Heartsease & Lavender.

The long grass you can see in the photos is on the outside of our rabbit fence, we keep it long as apparently rabbits prefer short grass, they don't like to get wet tummies! Being a field we see a lot of rabbits but they do keep away from our veg plot so it's obviously working.

Gladioli

Sweetcorn

Tomatilloes in the polytunnel.

Aubergines at long last in the polytunnel. We've been trying to grow these for 3 years & have had flowers, which eventually just fell off.

Habanero chilli

Jalapeno chilli

Cayenne.

Last year the Cayennes were so successful that we thought we try some other chillies this year & opted for Jalapeno & Habanero.

Sweet Pepper

Main crop

June & July

2011-07-22T22:47:00.000-07:00

Everything is a bit slow growing here this year but things are slowly starting to pick up.

In the polytunnel we've been picking cucumbers, Basil, coriander & salad leaves. There's now plenty of flowers on the Tomatoes, Aubergines, Chillies & Jalapeno's.

Lots of green tomatoes but no sign of red ones yet.

We've dug up the first earlies & were pleased with the results 30lb 9oz, I think I paid £2.39 for the seed potatoes.

We're eating a lot of Turnips, Kale, Chard and Broad beans and the red Pak choi is just about ready.

But the peas & runner beans are slow I've only picked a handful of peas & have only just got flowers on the runner beans.

The Courgettes, Pumpkins & Marrows have flowers but no sign of any fruit yet but the Pattypans are now showing.

April and May 2011

2011-06-15T01:47:00.000-07:00

Whoops first blog of the year! In March/April I sowed the seeds at home.

We bought a small polytunnel.

Early May saw lots of flowers on the strawberries and we planted the sweetcorn

doubly protected from the pheasants with upended plant pots and netting.

I had sweet peppers, & 3 types of chilli (Cayenne, Jalapeno & Habanero) growing everywhere

!st and 2nd Earlies doing well and the ground was so dry.

In the polytunnel there was an invasion of cucumber plants.

At the end of the month we started picking strawberries and the first cucumber was formed.

This year we are growing:

*French beans (purple queen & golden butter) *Broad beans *Runner beans

*Peas *Kohlrabi *Pak Choi (white & red) *Kale (curly & Cavolo de Nero) *Carrot *Parsnip *Turnip *Swede *Potatoes (1st earlies, 2nd earlies, maincrop) *Swiss Chard *Shallots (Golden Gourmet & Red Sun) *Red onions *Garlic *Purple sprouting brocolli * Brussel Sprouts *Cabbage *Cauliflower *Sweetcorn *Baby corn *Cucumber *Courgette *Pumpkin *Marrow *Pattypan *Butternut squash *Tomato *Cherry tomato *Tomatillo *Beetroot *Leeks *Sweet Pepper *Chillies (Cayenne, Habanero, Jalapeno) *Cape Goosebery *Aubergine *Salad leaves, lettuce, rocket, mustard. *Basil *Coriander

*Strawberry *Raspberry *Redcurrant *Blackcurrant *Red gooseberry *Blueberry *Rhubarb

We also have Lavender, Sweet Williams, Gladioli Sweet Peas, Nasturtiums, Sunflowers and Marigolds to encourage bees and to cut of course.

Autumn harvest

2010-11-22T23:07:00.000-08:00

All the pumpkins, marrows & butternut squash have now been picked also lots of chillies although my chilli plants are still producing. We had an early heavy frost this year on the 19th of October, which killed off my potatoes but luckily that was all.

The first parsnips that I've ever managed to grow, hopefully we'll be picking these up to Christmas.

I've picked some of the red cabbages & pickled them.

Marrow & date chutney, chilli jam.

This year I decided that it was a waste to just carve a pumpkin for Halloween especially when it was home grown. All this from one small pumpkin - spiced tea bread, pumpkin bread & pumpkin soup all delicious and made many times since. You can find the recipes here.

August randomness.

2010-09-23T06:08:00.000-07:00

We've been so busy planting, harvesting, watering, weeding & preserving that my blog has been neglected so here's a quick catch up in pictures.

caterpillar control, I never realised that shield bugs like to munch caterpillars.

My 2 hens are in moult but they are such good girls that I'm still averaging 9/10 eggs a week.

The allotment has also kept me in flowers through the summer.

Piccallilli

Runner bean, mango,coconut & Indian spice

Sweet & sour cucumber pickle, Rhubarb & curry chutney, Rhubarb & ginger jam.

Greengage jam, not grown by me but a bargain find.

Blackberry jam.

Bread & butter sandwich pickle

July/August catch up

2010-08-16T08:16:00.000-07:00

All the flowers are growing adding splashes of colour & enticing lots of bees.

Lots of grasshoppers & slo worms too.

We have 5 Aubergine plants that are flowering but have yet to see any Aubergines.

At the garden centre they had free bags of onion sets that were past their best, so I picked up a few threw out the bad ones & so far have some healthy looking plants. They are red, white and snowball.

Lots of Butternut squashes forming & getting bigger by the day.

Pumpkins, Italian tomatoes and red cabbage with brocolli behind.

We've started picking the runner beans but need sunshine to bring them on a bit.

Lots & lots of chillies, hoping they'll go red soon.

We've had 17 cucumbers so far & plenty still growing. I've just made some cucumber sandwich pickle with a couple of them, have to wait 3/4 weeks to see how it turns out.

My first red tomato picked last week.

We've harvested all of the potatoes & shallots now.

I'm getting lots of carrots too, I didn't thin them out until they were big enough to eat so none have been wasted.

I'm astounded this year by the amount of courgettes we've had 61 now. Because I've tried lots of different recipes with them we haven't got bored with them in fact I'll miss them in the winter. I'm doing a blog post on my other blog of courgette recipes.

And then we had rain!

2010-07-21T07:14:00.000-07:00

After weeks and weeks of sunshine we've finally had some decent rain one of the sunflowers open yesterday, I'm amazed that none of them went over in the gales unlike the sweetcorn.

Which luckily we were able to upright & fingers crossed no harm done, in fact a couple of days later we saw the corn had started to grow.

The sunburst pattypans are doing well haven't picked any yet but it won't be long now.

The marrows are also lapping up all the rainwater.

The outdoor Italian bush tomatoes are starting to fruit too.

Flowers are starting to come on the Aubergines, this year I have them in a little plastic greenhouse as I didn't get to pick any aubergines last year when they were outside.

Pumpkins are also prolific.

We've harvested some of the potatoes. L normally won't eat potatoes but as she helped with these she actually ate them & asked for more.

We've now picked 21 courgettes so as well as having them in meals I've made courgette & oregano scones, chocolate courgette cake, courgette clafoutis & chutney. I also swapped a couple for some blackcurrants.

Only a few gooseberries but enough to make a pie and some Loganberries

A bumper day on Sunday - turnips, baby carrots (needed thinning), some shallots, French beans, courgettes, Pak choi,rhubarb & Lavender. The only thing I bought for our roast was the meat & the breadcrumbs for the stuffing.

And finally I made some preserves Blackcurrant jam, Rhubarb & ginger jam, Courgette chutney.

I'm hoping that the sunburst pattypans will be ready this weekend I found a nice looking recipe so can't wait to try it out. Have to make another chocolate courgette cake too, requested by elder daughter who doesn't eat courgettes but managed to eat most of the other cake!

First week of July

2010-07-09T04:48:00.000-07:00

We've actually had some rain in the past week, one day it was quite heavy showers & another day of drizzle the ground is still very dry under the plants though. We've been picking broad beans, peas, lettuce & Pak choi virtually every day.

There are Pattypan, Courgette, Marrow & Pumpkin flowers everywhere but none on the Butternut squashes yet.

Marrow.

Pattypan

Pumpkin.

The sweetcorn plants are doing really well.

The red cabbage & Chard are coming along nicely too.

The Peppers have a lot of greenery & I can see buds of flowers on them.

The tomato plants have gone haywire & have plenty of fruits forming.

We dug a few of the potatoes - Desiree.

One days harvest showing Turnips,Rhubarb, peas, lettuce, purple radish, Broad Beans,Pak choi and the first cucumber, only a small one but

there are plenty more nearly ready!

This week.

2010-06-26T00:08:00.000-07:00

Everything is growing quickly now, it's getting very hot in the greenhouse/shed so we're now leaving the door open. The plants are still wilting by the end of the day though!

Very excited to see the first cucumber flowers even more excited when I saw the cucumber above.

The indoor tomatoes are flowering.

Lots of grasshoppers around, this one was amongst the broccoli.

Cabbage, Sprout & Cauliflower plants waiting to be planted.

Peppers & Chillies.

Potatoes flowering.

Beetroots & Shallots

Parsnips.

Carrots & salad

Pak Choi.

Gooseberries these are at home & the leaves have been completely stripped by caterpillars.

Rainbow chard.

Marrow.

Purple top Milan turnips.

Courgettes

We're picking lettuce & strawberries everyday.

Pak choi.

Rhubarb & peas.

End of May

2010-06-04T13:48:00.001-07:00

The allotment is loving this sunshine although it is taking a lot of watering at the moment.

Peas and Broad beans 2 weeks ago

Now have flowers and skinny pea pods.

Sweetcorn was planted, this year I've planted in 2 rows rather than blocks the netting is just in place for the time being because of the pheasant.

2 weeks later & it's growing well next to the Butternut squash & the runner beans.

I continued to earth up the spuds until the 3rd week of May then realised that I would have 3 mountains in the field if I carried on!

The Courgettes, Marrows, Pumpkins, Butternut and Pattypan squashes were planted.

Courgettes now have plenty of buds on them.

Ruby Chard and red cabbage.

And again a week later.

Salad, carrots and parsnips in the raised bed.

Has certainly sprung into life.

And in the shed/greenhouse Basil,

One of many Chilli plants, I have peppers as well but can't find the photo.

Cucumbers, it's the first time that I've grown cucumbers from seed so I'm chuffed with these so far. I have 6 in large pots.

I have 9 Tomato and 5 cherry tomato plants inside and the surplus are all outside.

L has also picked and eaten quite a few radishes from her little patch!

Early May

2010-05-25T00:00:00.000-07:00

Thought it was about time I updated for May these are all from the beginning of the month as I've yet to upload the photos for the past week. This year we made a small raised bed for L to plant up. I gave her some seeds that I knew would come up quickly - cress, radish, carrot, marigolds & dwarf sunflowers. As you can see the radishes popped up within 5 days, L was rather pleased with this!

We found a slo worm in the compost heap, surprisingly hard to photograph this was the best of 10 shots.

Just about empty plot at the beginning of May.

Inside the shed cucumbers, courgettes, pattypans, butternut squash, pumpkin and a messy floor.

Runner beans coming along very quickly.

Bedtime reading, I'm loving Paul Merrett's book added bonus is that half the book is recipes for using your produce.

Now onto the 15 May strawberries, rhubarb, peas & broad beans growing. Sweet pea wigwams in place.

In the greenhouse shed everything is shooting up sweetcorn,

cucumbers, courgettes & pumpkins.

Pattypans & butternut squashes.

chillies have now been potted on to slightly larger pots.

Pak choi didn't have any luck with this last year, I think I was a bit late planting.

Garlic has now come up.

Potatoes peeping though earthed these up quickly because of the frosts.

And this is a tray of compost that my wormery worms made for me, I'm hoping my chillies & peppers will do well in this.

In the past couple of weeks everything has gone haywire because it has been so hot I'll update soon.

Things are gradually coming to life

2010-04-23T05:32:00.000-07:00

In less than a week everything seems to be springing into life probably because the weather has been amazing here for the past couple of weeks. It won't be long and we'll be tucking into a rhubarb crumble. It's the second year for the 2 rhubarb plants so we'll be able to eat some this year. Just in case the slugs also start munching we've been making copper wire circles to put around some of the plants.

This is our homemade shed, which also passes as a greenhouse it has certainly helped with the seed growing. I sowed some of the seeds here and the rest at home. At home I've been taking them outside in the daytime and bringing them in at night as we are still getting quite heavy frosts most mornings.

Yesterday I potted on 30 tomato plants, 24 Pak Choi, 29 sweetcorn and 25 courgettes. It's hard to tell the sizes of the plants in the photos as they look smaller than what they are.

Here's some before(5 days ago) and after( yesterday) pictures.

Courgettes

Sweetcorn

Tomatoes

Broccoli and French beans

Runner beans

and my cucumbers that are in the shed 7 days from when I planted the seed.

In the meantime my OH has been coming home from work and spending his evenings making a chicken house, which hopefully will be finished this weekend. He has to make a door and a ramp put some waterproof black roofing stuff on and stain it a cornflower blue. I have asked that he cuts a heart window/vent in the side but we shall see, he didn't say no :) The chickens will be living at home as I now have the space where my vegetable patch used to be.

Here we go again!

2010-04-14T01:30:00.001-07:00

We've started getting the allotment ready for this year by digging in lots & lots of bags of horse manure and some of sand. We're also widening the beds by about 2ft as we realised we didn't need so much path. Some hens have been moved alongside our patch, which is very relaxing listening to them as you work.

We've put in a raised bed, which L painted, not bad for a 3 yr old! In here I planted carrots & parsnips with 5 types of lettuce & rocket in between the rows.

The potatoes will go in here, hopefully at the weekend.

The peas and broad beans are now in situ. I have to grow them at home because of mice but find that they don't touch them once they are seedlings, I do put plenty of bramble branches all around for added measure. We also have to scatter windmills and anything else that flaps in the wind about as there is a resident pheasant who will pull all of the young plants out.

Other than that I've planted beetroot, shallots and another 16 strawberry plants, the red onions are coming along nicely and both of the rhubarb plants are growing as this is the second year for them we'll be able to eat it, yum! At home I've been busy planting all the seeds about 30 varieties so there are seed trays everywhere. When we made the shed last year we used very thick clear corrugated plastic for the top half and roof so this year I'm going to put some cucumber, tomato and chilli plants in there and see what happens.

Still here!

2009-10-07T06:31:00.000-07:00

We're still here beavering away, so much to do I haven't updated for 6 weeks or so. Her's a quick update of the past few weeks.

I was delighted to find baby cauliflowers this week, they are tiny probably not much bigger than a golf ball.

Amazingly these peppers are just growing now, I think it's because of the lovely sunshine that we have had for the past few weeks.

We also have a couple of squash, I'm hoping that they'll continue to grow.

and more marrows, luckily my family are loving stuffed marrow:)

Lily had another sunflower, a bit bigger this time.

I've also done a lot of weeding

and found some creepy crawlies, this one was on an aubergine plant, it's a flower crab spider, which changes colour to blend in with the background. I assume this one had just come off the gherkin flowers.

Butterflies that left some

not so welcome visitors

We've harvested quite a few things lots of sweet peas.

yummy sweetcorn

There's still plenty growing turnips, swedes, carrots, parsnips, beetroot, leeks, cabbage, cauliflowers, sprouts, broccolli, chard, pak choi, kale, courgettes and squash. I've planted potatoes that should be ready for Christmas and I have red onions and garlic to go in this week.

Week 12

2009-08-14T05:42:00.001-07:00

Well week 12 is here, we should be harvesting loads by now but the weather is really not helping, first it was really dry then it was rain, rain and more rain, subsequently I have had to pull up 24 rotted tomato plants this week, not happy! Plenty of weeds around though.

Bees and insects too.

Lots of flowers on courgettes, marrow, squash, gherkins, runner beans, peas and strawberries.

The sweetcorn are coming along too.

Look out there's a pea thief about!

We picked this little lot on Tuesday. I said to Lily that I was going to pull up some turnips, so she stood behind me put her arms round my waist and said pull, pull, very funny. She loves 'The Enormous Turnip story.

My first picking of peas,

runner beans

and the 'enormous' turnips.

And a marrow that I stuffed and cooked last night, surprisingly they ate it and declared that it tasted lovely.

Oh and I mustn't forget Lily's first strawberry.

Week 11

2009-08-03T07:33:00.000-07:00

Week ten on the allotment

2009-07-23T12:22:00.000-07:00

I found this little fella yesterday and he kindly posed for about 20 photos.

The sweetcorn is doing well.

The nasturtiums are providing a welcome splash of colour.

We now have 1 inch runners beans along with quite a few flowers.

Peas.

Rainbow chard, I picked some yesterday, haven't tried it yet though.

Purple flowers on one of the aubergines, very hard to photograph as it's quite low to the ground.

My first courgette and tomato and some more radishes.

Another courgette, rainbow chard and yet more radishes.

A bit of colour and the wormery.

2009-07-16T07:09:00.000-07:00

We've had quite a lot of rain this week and it's very warm too so everything is having a growth spurt. Lots of flowers on the plants too so hopefully after a bit of sunshine and if Mr bee comes across there may be something to eat! We've put out some slug pubs and tested lager then bitter to no avail so now have real ale in there.

Lots of insects around, don't know if these are good guys or bad.

I have managed to pick some sweet peas.

Pretty runner bean flowers.

A crystal lemon cucumber apparently a favourite of Victorian times.

A sweet pepper.

My first lot of Desiree potatoes, there's hopefully a lot more but I only dug what I needed.

I've bought a wormery with 1000 composting worms, which will hopefully give us not only lovely compost but some rich fertiliser too.

Things are starting to improve this week.

2009-07-02T06:17:00.000-07:00

We used a strimmer and cut all the paths at last.

I've planted lots of swede, turnips, brocolli, cabbage, cauli, sprouts, carrots and parsnips, hence the white fleece everywhere, it's very fine so the water can still seep through and the plants seem to be growing well underneath.

Lily was delighted to find a flower on her strawberry plant at last.

Although the 16 tomato plants look rather sparse as far as greenery is concerned there are now quite a few little tomatoes growing.

Broad beans are still flowering although the first planting have been attacked by greenfly & blackfly. I found an organic spray, which is safe for use near children and you can eat the veg on the same day as spraying, but have now noticed some ladybirds so hopefully nature will sort things out!

Sweetcorn is doing well so I'll be able to remove the net soon, I've found out it's Jackdaws that pulled up my seedlings, so now I net everything.

Runner beans are starting to romp away at last, couple of flowers starting too and we've had rain today so that should do them alot of good.

Peas are looking well, I was concerned about a couple of mice holes in the ground but no damage yet.

These are some of the neighbours chicks, we are hoping to get some soon probably not from this bunch but similar.

Can you spot the lacewing?

Love the colour of these thistles.

I don't know what these are, they are growing all along the hedge and smell gorgeous.

Yesterday I finally managed to pick something, yay!

These are the books I've been using, as I don't tend to watch gardening programmes I don't really know who gives the best advice. I bought Carol's book last year and it's very easy to follow, I've bought the 'Cook your own veg' one now and it has some nice recipes in there.

Had to get these two as well of course, getting plenty of tips.

A bit of rain please.

2009-06-25T13:02:00.000-07:00

Rainbow chard

Oh, it's hard work! I'm sure next year will be alot easier because we will have an earlier start. As we were a few months behind with the planting everything is taking so long to grow and we have to constantly take water down there, it's very exposed and the soil is drying out quickly.

Peas

Luckily the rabbit fence has worked but I have noticed mouse holes, no damage as yet! The pheasant took a liking to my sweetcorn seedlings and pulled them up but I managed to save most of them and placed upturned/bottomless plant pots & netting over them. This did the trick as they are doing well now.

Sweetcorn

Runner beans

Broad beans

Courgettes (can you see them?)

I think what worries me is the difference between the plants in the allotment and the ones in my garden. In the garden it's all green and lush, which is where I normally grow runner beans so I hope I get as many this year!

Potatoes

Jerusalem Artichokes

I know I shouldn't say it but I hope we'll get some rain tomorrow and then some more sunshine for the weekend, of course.

Seeds growing everywhere!

2009-05-21T05:51:00.000-07:00

I've broken my camera but couldn't do a post without pics so these are from my garden last week. I'd already planted potatoes and shallots in the garden before we got the field htis was a week ago and now they are twice that size.

You can just see the shoots of one of the shallots here next to my Jerusalem Artichokes, these have spread from one left in the ground last year.

Down in the field we have put up a fence of 1'' chicken wire to, hopefully, keep the rabbits out. I've planted my rainbow chard, garlic and broad beans and sowed lettuce, radish, rocket and chive seeds. At the weekend I'll be planting the courgettes, squash, marrow and tomatoes as I've hardened them off at home the last few days. I'll also be putting up the bean row but I won't put the beans in until June, they're about 6 inches high now so should be just right by then. Today I've potted on my sweetcorn, brocolli, cabbage and sprouts, there was rather a lot of them! All the other seeds, apart from the peas, are coming along nicely and my house resembles a garden centre! I'm hoping to get a new camera at the weekend so I can take some more pics especially as there's a beautiful pheasant who comes fairly close by and watches us.

Another photo from my garden, gorgeous gooseberries, not ripe enough yet though.

In comes the JCB!

2009-05-13T10:19:00.000-07:00

A couple of problems with our little patch - number 1 it's a mainly unused field so it's rather overgrown, number 2 there is an abundance of greedy rabbits in the vicinity! Luckily number 1 was sorted last night. We happen to know a man with a JCB who very kindly cleared the area and dug two 9ft by 32ft strips out for us, he did it so well that we have no need to rotovate yay!!

The soil is beautiful and apparently very good for growing, so no excuses then, that's if the rabbits don't get the veg first.

Lily has inspected the soil and is looking forward to digging it, hopefully with a spade not her hands next time.

And problem number 2 - well we'll try and stop the rabbits with a chicken wire fence and I'm trying to research any other deterents but I think they are the bane of many an allotment holders life!

These are the 'neigh'bours so I don't think there will be much gossiping going on at this allotment. There are also 20 ish chickens kept at the other end of the field so plenty of company.

The beautiful bluebell hedge.

A friend popped in today with these plants - tomatoes, cucumber, basil, coriander, chilli and aubergine, all of which I hadn't sown already so that was very handy.

And all of my seedlings have had a growth spurt in the last few days and will really need to be planted soon.

The beginning

2009-05-08T03:17:00.000-07:00

Although we live in the North Cornwall countryside we have a very small garden so for the past few years we have been trying to buy a field to use as an allotment and to keep chickens in. But this was to no avail as the farmers either don't want to sell or they want astronomical prices for it! Luckily for me, last weekend a lady we know offered to lend us a field. So now it's all systems go, it needs to be dug over and plants need to be in very soon. This will be my diary so that I can look back and see what worked/didn't work.

Courgettes

Butternut Squash

Broad beans

Luckily I have many plants growing as I always manage to squeeze alot into my tiny garden now they will have plenty of room.

No I'm not planning on keeping sheep but I couldn't resist taking this pic on route to the field. At the weekend I will hopefully remember to take some pictures of the field.