Sunny, warm weekend.

Sarah and Mark down for the weekend. Got them weeding and built the next, long thin box to go in centre where currently there are some potatoes, and cabbages. Box is built, just needs some protective treatment.
 
The late planted garlic is also looking ready to pick (not bad since February) but noticed a few bulbs had died down and this was reflected in a rotten root ball ... so got rid of them and uncorvered the remainder ... maybe they are too deep (I dont think so) and the soil is keeping them damp. Anyway did half like this, so lets see how it works.
 
Sweetcorn coming along nicely. Mulched up between the plants. The only issue might be that some are much more advanced than others -- heights range from 4" thru 8", which might reflect in when the start seeding.
 
Red Cabbage planted up to fill remaining spaces, and netted over, in the middle box. The leeks haven;t grown much -- still rather thin and weedy looking -- plus the courgettes are very yellow looking. Maybe with the weather being a little nicer they'll take off soon.
 
Main bed of garlic and onions looking very nice. Garlic bulbs are starting to split so maybe time to pick the lot...wondering about clearing it and using space for something else...maybe more cabbages?

Picked first garlic.

Heatwave is over for now, with a cold spell and some storms. A couple of inches of rain on Sat night/Sunday morning, which was needed.

Finished digging out the far right box, down to about 18". Started a third skip bag to hold soil, this one next to compost bin at far end of plot. Now got to find something to line it, as previous plastic bags are very decayed.



Picked some garlic as looking very good and some starting to flower. Six bulbs; 3 with a purple hint and 3 plain white - cant remember varieties.

Planted some remaining squashes in the skip bag to right of compost bin at end pof plot. This containined very fresh straw and even some fresh cut grass, so not sure if they will be ok but we'll see.

Cut the grass at last

Mini-heatwave and not much rain. The ground is getting very dry and starting to crack.

Finally bought a petrol lawn mover (Ryobi, £150 with B&Q discount) and cut down the grass on the paths. Richard down on Sunday with Jack, so he was helping out with that. What to do with the old one though?



Got a few leek seedlings from Mum and planted them in the central box next to courgettes.

Only one of the french bean seedlings came up, so planted that amougst the runner beans, but I suspect it will get swamped.

Got some tomatoes from Mum and a few more from Steve O'Toole. Two largest planted at home. At the allotment planted one in tub, one in the pot that had carrots (which all got slugged) and one in a new pot which I'll leave in a tray on a pallette.

A spell of bad weather

Mum planted out some sweetcorn on Thursday (8x3 in bed, centre left). However they look a little small and that was followed by some bad spring weather ... rather gusty with short sharp showers and they dont look too good. Plus Michael was helping out and fell over and sat on a couple.

Also planted out butternut squashes in the fresher compost box at the back and made up a make-shift coldframe from the shower screen to protect them (although worried the wind will knock the screen over and it'll flatten the plants).

Courgettes planted at one end of the centre bed and closhed to try protect them also. Again worried the wind will simply blow the closh away. Plus one courgette in a large pot.

Continuing to dig our the far right box and resorted to filling up a skip bag as nowhere to dump the soil on the other beds. Tom helped alot on Sunday.

Bought a £25 strimmer from B&Q -- absolutleyl rubbish -- from a 5 hour charge, it only lasts 10 minutes and doesn't seem to hack down the grass well either.

Warm and sunny and no rain

A dry and sunny spell of a few weeks...although rain forecast for later this week.

Continuing to dig out the far right box and earth up soil around all the potatoes which are growing nicely -- about 12" high. Just over half the box is dug out...not sure what to do with rest of soil to empty it. Also set up one of the skip bags and filled that up with straw/menu mix, some green compost and grass and a few layers of soil.



The grass is getting rather too long. Unfortunately the lawn mover seems to have a petrol leak so need to find an alternative.

Planting out carrots, beetroot, leeks.

Mum down with carrot, beet and leek seedlings. Planted in various places - mostly in near row central box, and long thin box in middle row.

Dotted left over seedlings all over the place. Plus loads of onions in any odd gap. Plus planted up a couple of large pots with Pink Fir Apple potatoes, and one with carrots that couldn't go anywhere else. Even tried some carrots, potatoes and cabages in the very poor soil of the non-boxes beds. Nothing to loose as this was left over stuff anyway.

Earthed up the larger potatoes that were coming through (Michael helping out there) by digging out soil from last year's carrot box (first row, furthest right box).

Raspberries all coming through nicely -- shoots a few inches high.

A bit of effort to fix the plumbing to sphypon fill the water tanks -- the valve had split over winter so new fittings required; managed to reuse some bits from my plumbing junk collection.

More preparing the ground

A bit of rain at last. Generally preparing the ground -- digging over, digging in more chicken manure pelets, leveling off and tidying up.

Started on planting

Very nice Sunday afternoon. Started on the planting to get stuff in before the holiday.



Potatoes in the 3 back and right boxes -- 4 different varieties and about 10 of each. International under plastic cloche in thin box on right ... quite spaced out aswell so lets see if that gives a good early yield.

Onions and 2 rows of leeks in the bottom-left box, next too the little patch of late garlic that was already there.

Some more leeks, and a few parsnips in the newest box, centre-left. The leeks are a little small, hopefully they'll survive.

Dug over the last two beds in the centre -- possibly for carrots and beetroot -- although the soil is very solid and un-friable.

Sunny and warm

Finally cleared everything from last year. The remaining 8 or so of the leeks picked and eaten Saturday night ...very nice. All the boxes are dug over and I'm adding some b&q composted chicken menu all over. Tom down on Sunday helping with the digging.

Also clearing around the back of the plot and trying to direct the blackberry shoots away from my bit and toward the stream to try and build up some sort of barrier along that side.

Nice spring day

Nice spring morning, so went down to site, for only second time this year. However a major storms seemed to come out of nowhere (apparantly it was forecast) and soak me.

Managed to plant out a few more garlic (very late ... but lets see what they do) and clear some of the boxes of the last few red caggages, which are a rather worm-eaten but still worth having.

Digging over the compost box at the back, made from pallets, and adding remainder of compost bin to that. That box will be for squashes this year.