The Only Way Is Up?

The Sicilian Honey Garlic has gone from a floppy mophead,,,

                          15th June

.....to a quiver of arrowheads.

26th June

Something else with ascending flowers is the foxglove.

It has been dry for several weeks but now, with three days of intermittent rain, lots of plants will be putting on a spurt of growth. 

 

Halfway to Paradise

 

Allotments are anomalous.  Neither country nor town but a bit of both.  Some of the most dramatic displays are accidental.

These flowers are probably scorzonera (Scorzonera hispanica) in its second year, although "World flora" thinks rough hawksbeard (Crepis bienis) is more likely.

They are also a halfwayhouse for plants that wouldn't fit into a small town garden but can be given room here. Lysmaachia punctata, Large loosestrife can be a bit of a bully in an ornamental border, but has found a place on the bank of the burn where it can outcompete the geraniums and nettles. Did it get here as a garden escapee or was it given a helping hand?

Now here was a nice surprise in the corner of a neighbour's plot.  I couldn't resist taking a snap to identify it as Jerusalem sage (Phlomis fruticose) when I got home.  You would need a lot of space to fit this into a garden planting plan.  Maybe it was a garden reject or maybe it just appeared and was tolerated. 

There's a lot more going on at allotment sites than the formal rows of vegetables, and the place is a lot richer for it. The pollinators are definitely in favour of a more laissez faire approach.

Bee Magnets

 The garden is just buzzing today. Some bees have latched onto the new Buddleja globosa as if they are trying to eat them like marshmallows

A surprise to me was the attraction of the Stachys byzantina for this bee.

But top attraction for weeks now has been Cotoneaster horizontalis.

Allium Purple Sensation has an undeniable appeal for the bees as well as the human eye.

Just as the foxglove which is a more conventional source of attraction.

Also in contention for novel source of nectar is another allium, Nectaroscordium. (The name is a giveaway)

Even more common or garden plants like sage put on an enticing display just now.

Also in the herb patch is humble allium chives 

And still to come into full flower Pyrocantha.  Those bees won't know which way to fly first!

Wild Wild Flowers

Here's the current state of play  in the wildflower meadow:

Yellow is still the order of the day, but these are mostly  buttercups now instead of dandelions.

There is some white too with the cow parsley

White clover

And white, so called 'sea campion'

The oxeye daisies, red campion and sorrel deserve a mention too.

And then there are the beneficiaries for whom the garden has been created.  Happily they are much in evidence.

 

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!

Here Come the Cucurbits

 

Another rainy day dissuades me from visiting the allotment.  Instead I am tending to the plants at home waiting for their invasion of the allotment.  OK these courgettes, squashes, pumpkins and cucumbers don't look quite so alien when they are in the greenhouse under natural light.

There are plenty seedlings awaiting improved weather.  You might spot the tomatoes which are having a temporary excursion out of the greenhouse, and there are runner beans and peas too.  I have plenty of spare alliums and a whole host of lobelia just needing to be found a final spot.

Also there are some later brassica seedlings.  More than enough to fill the garden, allotment and school garden!

It is a relief to get to the direct sowing.  Soon I will have to reconfigure the greenhouse for the tomatoes and cucumbers.

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.