Daffodil Season

The daffodils are definitely out on the allotment today – such a delight to see:

Another delight was the red kite flying over the allotment this morning – such amazing birds! Anyway, K replanted some of our soft fruit into our new cleared area and we are still thinking about putting in a fruit cage (which has been agreed by the Allotment Committee – thank you!) to make everything easier. It’s looking really good right now:

We are gradually clearing away the old raspberry canes which you can see to the left of the picture. And, as you can also see, we have obeyed the instructions of the great Monty Don in terms of watering the replanted stock in well. Though I do ALWAYS water in, no matter how wet the soil is as I like to give a plant as good a chance as possible.

Here is the harvest:

And here are those gorgeous daffodils at home:

Have a lovely Sunday everyone!

Anne Brooke Books

First Daffodil of Spring!

A lovely morning at the allotment today – the weather was just right for being outside. K took out the rest of the old autumn raspberries from the soft fruit area so we now have space for the three blueberries that are on their way.

We also found the loganberry we planted a couple of years back (or was it last year? – can’t remember now!) and I tied it up so there is more space in the middle for the air to move round. We might well get another loganberry so it can have a friend as well.

I also did some more composting though there is plenty more to be done. And I did a bit of weeding round the plot though there wasn’t too much to do, hurrah.

Here is THAT daffodil, yay!

I am just so excited about it that I even screamed when it saw it, which gave poor K a bit of a shock!…

Here is the harvest:

And here is the vase at home:

Have a lovely weekend, everyone.

Anne Brooke

The Big Replant

The picture below shows the last of the leeks from the allotment, plus I am moving all the rudbeckia from the allotment to the garden at home – as they have been in flower here ALL WINTER so I want to add to them.

Have also taken up the chrysanthemums and will plant at home, and we are moving the raspberry canes back home gradually as well to add to the garden waste. And at the bottom of that bucket in the middle are a whole lot of daffodils which I was going to throw away as being a bit dodgy but they are growing(!!) so will replant them too.

More allotment planning also under way!

Anne Brooke

Fruit section overhaul

Today at the allotment we mended another raised bed – so there’s just one more with real problems which we hope to tackle later on. We have also made the decision to remove the autumn raspberries as they’ve not given a good crop in the last couple of years, so we’ve done half of that today and will carry on with it next week:

We would have brought the discarded canes home for the garden waste bin but Waverley have stopped collecting garden waste temporarily due to staff shortages in this tricky year. Whilst we were removing them, we were surprised to see how deep some of the canes in the middle had actually rooted as autumn raspberries normally have quite shallow roots so they must have been there for years! Definitely time for something new, but if anyone out there has any ideas, please let us know – thank you!

In flower news, the daffodils are doing well and a couple of them now have actual buds on, yay!

Not much to harvest this week, though I did find a couple of spare sprouts which must have escaped me last week, LOL! So just those and some leeks today:

Have a good Sunday everyone.

Anne Brooke

The Winter Allotment

I’ve not been here for a while as there’s not been much doing in winter – though we have managed to mend one of the raised beds which desperately needed it last week – only another 6 or so to go, LOL!

Plus we’ve been harvesting the sprouts which have done amazingly well this year – I’m SO happy about this as I just LOVE sprouts!

The only trouble is they are a bit of a fiddle to prepare for cooking, what with all that taking off of the outer leaves and then making a cross in the top to ensure they’re cooked all the way through – still, SO worth it!

So here are a couple of pictures of the winter allotment – not much seems to be happening, I know, but the daffodil shoots are already coming up and the rudbeckia are still flowering every now and again. I think I’ll take those up later and replant them at home as they’re not great in vases, though very pretty in the garden.

The picture above shows the autumn raspberry area – which we’re planning to dig up and plant with a better cropping fruit this spring.

Happy Sunday to all!

Anne Brooke Body Shop at Home Independent Consultant

The windy wet allotment

Really soggy at the allotment today so definitely a Wellies visit. We were the only ones there too, so maybe people are confused with the extra hour? Anyway, the wind we’ve had during the week certainly played havoc with this poor gladiolus:

Though at least the sunflowers are just about hanging in there!

The asparagus is definitely on its way out now and it’s nearly time to cut it down, but we didn’t do it this week because we were too busy cutting back other plants, such as the mangetouts (which the wind tore down), and the perennial flowers.

Here is the harvest this week – which includes an unexpected sprinkling of autumn raspberries, well gosh, and we thought they were just not doing anything this season! We also harvested beetroots, French climbing beans, the sunflowers, a couple of rudbeckias, two gladioli and some chrysanthemums.

Here are the flowers at home:

Have a good Sunday, everyone.

Anne Brooke Body Shop at Home Independent Consultant

Sunflowers and Soft Fruit

The sunflowers are still looking amazing on the allotment and EVEN taller than they were last week!

We have harvested as many runner and French beans as we could, although sadly a lot are now infested with black fly so I left those ones well alone. I sprayed the whole lot in the hope that I might beat them back!

So a harvest today of sunflowers, gladioli, the first of the asters (yay!), one sweet pea and a few rudbeckia. Plus potatoes, the beans and the smallest autumn raspberry harvest EVER, LOL!

Here are the flowers at home:

Anne Brooke Body Shop at Home Consultant

Stately Sunflowers and Yakons Galore

The sunflowers on the allotment are getting ridiculously tall – soon I’ll have to get a ladder to see them at this rate!

We also have the first dahlias out now (which is curious as I thought I’d taken them all out and planted them at home!) and an actual rudbeckia, yay!

We’re also very happy with the Brussels sprouts:

And the French beans are really going for it too:

However, it’s the yakons that are forging ahead – they have honestly never been this huge! Must be the sort of weather they like for some reason, but we’re certainly not complaining.

Anyway, here is the harvest, which consists of French beans, gladioli, sunflowers, the rudbeckia and one lone sweet pea. We also have some of the autumn raspberries and a decent crop of foraged blackberries as well – which will go very well with the apple crumble I’m making.

Here is the vase at home:

Have a great week, everyone!

Anne Brooke Body Shop at Home Consultant

Back on the allotment!

I’m finally back on the allotment today after a couple of weekends when I was too busy to go and so my lovely husband kept an eye on it instead.

Even though it’s definitely autumnal, the French beans and mangetouts have decided they can get another crop in before the frosts, hurrah!

I’m also REALLY happy with the Brussels sprouts which look and smell amazing – so hoping we can actually get a crop this year, as we’ve not had any luck with them over the last two years. Surely this year, things will be okay – I hope so!

The yakons are also really happy:

As are the beetroot next to them – though they’re tiny in comparison with the yakons, LOL!

However, we are disappointed with the autumn raspberries which aren’t giving as good a crop as last year. Is it the weather we’ve had? Or just that they’re old plants? Hard to tell really, but we’ll have to have a think about what we do with them next year …

The sunflowers are still going strong though:

Here is today’s harvest, which consists of potatoes, beetroot, beans, mangetouts, gladioli, the autumn raspberries, the sunflowers, one(!) sweet pea and two carnations:

Here are the vases at home:

Have a great Bank Holiday Monday, everyone!

Anne Brooke Body Shop Consultant

Netting and Thinning Out

It was definitely time to thin out those sunflowers today before they start exploding! Here is the ‘before’ shot:

And here is the ‘after’ shot – I think I’ve done a pretty good job with them too:

K and I also put the netting up for the soft fruit – we’d ordered a new net and pins to hold it down, but the new net still wasn’t big enough! So we’ve had to add an old piece to one end of it and we’re hoping for the best. We’re also hoping the structure will stay upright as it’s been pretty windy today …

While I was doing a fairly serious weed, K also added the netting to the peas so they can get going:

The Brussels sprouts are also doing okay, which is good news, though I added more slug pellets to them just in case:

Plus we’ve given everything a bit of a water as – in spite of the rain yesterday and today – the soil is still terribly dry …

Here is the harvest of verbascums, carnations, asparagus and rhubarb:

And here are the vases at home:

Have a good weekend and stay safe, everyone.

Anne Brooke Books