Autumn Watch

 

November is not far off and it is time to gather in produce that is susceptible to the cold nights ahead.

Surprisingly the runner bean stand is still green and still producing some edible beans (in addition to the few swollen pods left to mature and produce seed for next year)

Next door the blueberries have definitely got the message that autumn is here and are putting on a fiery display.  Still one or two berries have persisted or rather have been overlooked.  These have been left for the birds, particularly as we had a bumper crop over the summer.

Jack frost has not appeared yet this year, as proven by the beans. But it won.'t be long now.

Allotment Tour Summer 2021

It is a sure sign of summer progressing when your fennel is ready for harvest.  After a summer where my focus has been elsewhere I realise it is time to do my "warts and all" tour of the plot. 

The parsnips are progressing steadily regardless of the stop start weather.  Alongside I have some second sowing of  autumn crops where the elephant garlic was.

The fruit cage is looking very green where the gooseberries and redcurrants are, A really good redcurrant crop but only a few gooseberries. I might have been a bit vigorous with my winter pruning?  The blackberries and autumn raspberries behind are yet to come. The two summer varieties are finished

Spring planted Onion from sets are flopping over of their own accord.  The early leeks behind show no such tendancy. 

For the first time I have tried to grow onions from seed too.  They are behind the celery and celeriac in this bed.  (It is also the first time I have tried to grow celery)

Moving along to the brassica patch there are three distinct phases as indicated by the height of the plants. The early cabbages and cauliflower are all gone but the Brussels remain tall and now suitably distanced. 

Further along the beans are hitting their peak.  Both Runners.

and Dwarf French

The winter squashes are the sea of green next door to the beans - although there are some flowers.  Fruits?  So far three marrow sized courgettes.

The foreground bare patch here is where the peas were and are now sown with winter leaves (Land Cress , Claytonia and Lamb's Lettuce.

Bringing up the rear I have hedged my bets trying to establish an asparagus bed but growing strawberries in between - at least until the asparagus gets going. It was grown from seed. (The rhubarb blueberries and globe artichoke just get on with their business year after year.)    

The final area is not very pretty,  It is the potato patch with nearly all of the tops cut off.  It looked like this in the middle of June.

But now it looks like this.

Hope you enjoyed the tour around my patch.

Currant News

 

Busy weeding, being sick and a week away, I see I haven't posted for weeks.  Yesterday's harvest will have to suffice.

First pickings

 

First visit for over a week, owing to a debilitating tummy bug.  The flash flooding in Edinburgh over the last 24 hrs meant I HAD to survey the scene. 

Broad beans podding up.

Fortunately no plots had been inundated. Phew!

The plot is meanwhile entering the harvesting phase. 

First blueberry to ripen

The salads definitely needing some thinning out

Salads bulking up.

So I went home with some lettuce, leaf beet and fennel.

The early cabbages (Greyhound) have shown signs of splitting so it is harvest time for them.

Brassica Patch

Time for me to get my digestion back in order!

Here Comes The Summer

 

Broad beans flowering, runner beans planted, salads setting off.

Brassicas putting on a spurt, onions and carrots on the go.

It won't be long before the garlic is ready for harvesting.  The potatoes have been mounded.

One crop currently in full flower: blackberries. The bees are loving it.

The blueberries flowered earlier but are fruiting up nicely.  

After a cold miserable spring we seem to have flipped to a hot dry summer at the end of May. Whoopee!

Allotment Tour May

It is raining again today, but yesterday was a surprise sunny day.  I took the opportunity to take some snaps of the allotment.  First, appropriately, the potato patch.

The shaws are appearing above ground and very soon it will be time to mound them.

Beyond the potatoes is the fruit cage.  The first of the three bays was strawberries.  Notoriously these have to be moved around in order to avoid build up of disease.  So currently this bay is garlic,  Elephant to the left, ordinary to the right.  In between are two rows of parsnips which are indistinguishable from the germinating weeds currently.  But believe me they are there!

The remainder of the fruit cage is more conventionally raspberries and a mixture of currants and berries:

Reaching the turn at the end I am most pleasantly surprised by these autumn planted red onion sets.  I had given them up for lost but come the new year they have reappeared and are thriving.

Also at that end are spring planted onion sets (tent to the left ) Carrots (temple to the right) and leeks between them.  Next  is onions and shallots from seed (I went a bit mad on alliums this year) and the start of the brassica patch in front of that in the picture below.

Working back to the start I have covered the ground, temporarily with weed suppressant fabric.  This is going to be the the other half of the brassica patch and the legume/cucurbit patch which currently only has broad beans and a row of peas on the go along with some salads.  The runner bean poles are up in readiness but the runner beans are only now germinating back at home.

Broad beans (under netting)

For the sake of completeness here is the last section with strawberries and blueberries to the left, rhubarb to the right and asparagus bed featured in my last post in the middle.

 

So there you have it.  Together with the seedling nursery at home this is my vegetable home!  Hope you enjoyed the tour.

Note To Self

 The cucurbits have curled up,  the beans have been, the lettuce is letting up - it's that time of year again.  Time to take stock.  What worked - and what didn't?

Worked                                            

• Winter Squash
• Carrots under nets
• Potatoes
• Raspberries
• Blueberries
• Tosca onions from seed
• Late season lettuces and Italian Endive varieties

No Go

• Sweetcorn - Three strikes and you are out.  
• Spanish Flag (Ipomoea lobata) and Spanish Dancer (Linaria reticulata) - These belong in Spain and don't like the climate in Edinburgh
• French Climbing Beans  - no competition for runner beans.  Dwarf French beans don't seem to be as sensitive.  Curiously Italian Barlotti beans don't seem to be as temperamental.  Mind you they are  grown for drying not for pods.
• French Cornet Endive varieties.  Cornet de Bordeaux bolted every time.

Happy Potatoes

French beans left - Runners right

Tosca Onions

Berry Berry

Be they red, blue, black or green the berries are most welcome at this time of year.

Black?  The blackcurrants seem to be enjoying a bumper year.  What surprised me was that the fruit appeared from tip to toe of each branch.  Here is a picture taken at ground level:

The reason for my surprise was that I have always understood that you want to encourage new growth from ground level with blackcurrants and prune accordingly.  The newer plant (set out in November 2018) didn't yield half as much as the older plants like this one, which also had larger berries.  Have I misunderstood the advice I wonder?

Allotment Tour 27/5/20

 Here is the current state of play in my warts and all circuit of the plot:

Rhubarb is at one end (together with a globe artichoke).  The bare patch before the blueberry pen and strawberries is my aspiring asparagus patch.

...beyond which is the potato patch...

...then peas and beans (with their scrap heap supports) ...

...climbing beans and cucurbits (currently finding their feet under netting). The cages are protecting celeriac. ...

Beyond that is currently a sight for sore eyes - soon to house sweetcorn and my brassica patch.

That takes you from end to end on one side.  Heading back along the other side in the reverse direction you start with the fruit cage.  This is three bays (Berries/Raspberries/Strawberries)...

...but the last (former strawberry bay) now has been given over to new salad sowings...

We are big on carrots - but so is the carrot root fly so they have to be covered .

Bringing up the rear are the alliums.  Onions to the left, garlic and elephant garlic to the right.

That gets you back to the shed!

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