Not much happening on the allotment this week though as a plus point we once again didn’t need to do any hoeing due to the frost earlier on. We did cut down the lily stems and add them to the compost bin, however. And we also brought some mulch from home and put this on the dahlias to see them through the winter:
And in exciting news, we have our first mini-harvest of sprouts! Just a handful to add to the beans at lunch but it’s a start. Sprouts of course are my favourite vegetable so my season has just begun!
I’m finally back on the allotment after three weekends away due to ill health, so I spent a lot of time beating down the weeds today, LOL! Still, after yesterday, at least we didn’t need to water. The lilies are looking amazing:
And the sweet peas are hanging on in there:
But just look at our perennial bed! It’s a riot of roses (second bloom of those this year), dahlias and gerberas:
However, the outright winner in terms of how much crop there is has to be awarded to the French climbing beans! There’s a veritable glut which we are freezing – see later pics!
Mind you, there are a lot of courgettes too – so we’ll make and freeze soup with them:
And we FINALLY have some growth from our peas – though we’re unsure whether we’ll actually get a crop from those now as it’s very late in the season:
And the lettuces are going crazy:
This week, there is just SO MUCH harvest that I have had to take two pictures of it! We have one lettuce, 5 huge courgettes, lilies galore, dahlias, roses, gerberas and sweet peas, plus a few mangetouts, those French climbing beans and some soft fruit (hidden by the beans!) Here they are:
I’m afraid I’ve been unwell for a couple of weeks so have been unable to get to the allotment – am hoping that next weekend I’ll be well enough to get there and I’m certainly a lot better than I have been, which is good news. Anyway, my husband has been working hard in my absence and here are a couple of pictures for you.
This is last week’s harvest:
And here is this week’s harvest for you. As you can see, the French climbing beans and courgettes have been amazing, and the flowers are also wonderful. And the lettuce is great too. Plus plenty of soft fruit for a crumble.
Here are this week’s flowers at home:
Have a good weekend, everyone, and try to stay well!
Good news on the allotment as the first lilies are in bloom!
I’m also pleased to say that we have one freesia now in bloom as well – tiny but perfectly formed and brilliantly scented:
In other flower news, the first dahlias are also out:
The alstroemerias are also doing well:
As are the sweet peas:
And just look at those gerberas – amazing!
The courgette also looks a lot happier though no fruits as yet:
And just look at the size of those lettuces!
Whilst there today, we gave everything a good water and weed as usual, and also collected some soft fruit. So here is our harvest of mangetouts, the first of the French climbing beans (hurrah!), one lettuce, assorted soft fruit, lilies, roses, one freesia, gerberas, alstroemerias and sweet peas:
And here are the vases at home. The scent is just lovely.
At last! We’ve finally planted the Brussels sprouts on the allotment – they’re not quite big enough really, but we hope they’ll be encouraged now they are actually in their two beds. We’ve had real problems getting them to grow properly in their pots (which is true for a lot of plants this year, I’m afraid) – and I think it’s probably due to the fact that we can’t get proper compost any more and have to make do with the pesky peat-free variety. Yes, I know that puts me in a minority of people who prefer peat and think if it’s properly managed, then it’s not an issue. I’m also not convinced about the environmentally friendly nature of the peat-free process, but as it’s all we can get these days, we don’t have a choice. Hey ho. Anyway, here are our two beds of sprouts:
As we had such a good rainfall at the beginning of the week, everything seems to have come on quite well since then. The courgette is looking good but no more fruits as yet:
The French climbing beans are looking healthy and even have flowers now!
The mangetouts are also growing very happily and needed yet more tying in with string. And they have a very small but perfectly formed crop too.
We are also pleased with how the lettuces are doing:
In terms of flower crops, the lilies are SO nearly there!
The gerberas are in full spate:
And the sweet peas are also blooming very well:
We also have a HECK of a lot of fruit in the fruit cage which we spent some time picking. There are haskap berries (similar to blueberries), blackcurrants and red currants, plus a few tayberries too. So here is the harvest of soft fruit, a handful of mangetouts, roses, gerberas, sweet peas, one carnation and one stem from the alstroemerias:
And here are the vases at home:
Have a lovely weekend, everyone, and welcome to July!
A week of utter sunshine and no rain at the allotment this week, so I popped up on Thursday afternoon to do the watering and here’s what I found:
The sweet peas were finally in flower!
There was a midweek harvest of roses and sweet peas, plus a couple of gerbera:
And a midweek vase moment!
Today, we have planted a couple more alstroemerias which my husband kindly picked up yesterday when I was visiting my mother.
The lilies are looking fabulous and finally coming into bud.
And there are yet more amazing roses.
Today, the asparagus bed has become a forest, but we will leave it like that until the plants actually go yellow so they can store up energy for next year’s crop – which we hope will be better than this year’s!
We also have the world’s smallest courgette – which, yes, is supposed to be yellow and round as that’s the type it is!
The French beans have now reached the top of their growing poles so we’ll probably have to trim them soon.
And the peas still seem fairly happy.
Much to our astonishment, the lettuces have actually got a big bigger.
We spent more time watering everything today, and we also dug up a half-bed of tulips which I have brought home to plant here in November. So just one bed of tulips to dig up now. We have also planted out the rest of the freesia bulbs in the gladioli/freesia bed and hope for some good things there at some point.
Here is today’s harvest of some redcurrants and a handful of haskap berries, plus sweet peas, carnations, alstroemerias, roses and one gerbera.
And here, once again, are the vases at home. This time, I have put most of the white roses (which appear to be more delicate than the other colours) straight into some floral foam to see if they last a bit longer.
In non-allotment news, I have now reached 90,000 words in my latest novel project so am surely somewhere on those final few laps now! Have a lovely Sunday, everyone.
The asparagus is looking good this week – definitely enough there for a couple of meals for us both.
The shallots are doing well:
And so we have planted some more. We did put netting over the bed after I took the photo to prevent the birds from pecking at them.
The French climbing beans are slowly getting there so we’ve tied up a couple of the taller ones with string.
And one of the peas has definitely grown taller so that’s good news – I tied that one up too just in case.
The beetroots are really struggling at the moment though, but at least they’re still just about there.
Meanwhile, the lilies are looking good though still no flower buds yet.
The roses are quite happy in the perennial bed.
And the dahlias have so far managed to avoid the slugs.
Whilst there, we did a thorough water of everything as there’s been no rain at all this week and the sun is quite hot – there’s no shade anywhere at the plot. And here is this week’s harvest – just asparagus this time.
We’ve added in the rest of the French beans to the bed now we’ve remembered to bring the sticks for them, so that’s another job done on this lovely sunny day:
I’ve also decided to plant freesias rather than more gladioli this year, so we’ve put in half a bed of those and will add the other half (there are 200 bulbs in total) in a couple of weeks’ time so we can get successional flowers.
This week, we also had three alstroemerias delivered so I have added these to the perennial bed. They don’t look much now, but the roots seem good so am hoping for great things later on:
Also in the perennial bed, the roses are getting bigger:
Elsewhere on the allotment, the lilies are very happy:
And even the sweet peas next to the shed are looking slightly healthier:
Astonishingly, our dahlias are starting to sprout too, so I have put slug doom down for them as otherwise they won’t be there next week!
I’m a little worried about the courgette we planted last week, but we’ve given it a good water (along with the rest of the plot) and I’ve put more slug doom down so we’re hoping for the best:
This week’s harvest is some asparagus to add to lunch tomorrow, and a few sticks of rhubarb for a crumble:
Not many pictures of the allotment today as my phone died, LOL! Never mind, we did get a lot done, including planting a couple of rows of gladioli and also putting the roof on the fruit cage.
Sadly it looks as if most of the gladioli saved from last year are not viable for this year, so once I’d planted the two rows, I have put the rest in the garden waste at home. I might think about getting a different sort of summer bulb instead of more gladioli for summer though – maybe freesias? I will have to see.
We also had a bit of darning to do on the fruit cage roof – using string and lots of ingenuity, I think we have managed it. We’ve also started putting down black weed suppressant fabric in the fruit cage to save all that weeding everywhere but that will take a few weeks, I think – as the space is quite large.
Anyway, here are pics of the lilies doing well and the one viable tulip we have this week:
The sweet peas we planted last week are still surviving which is good news!
But look at how amazing the rhubarb looks:
So, here is the harvest of one narcissus, one tulip and lots of lovely rhubarb which I plan to put into a crumble for tonight. Don’t forget, everyone – rhubarb leaves are incredibly poisonous so do NOT eat them!
Have a lovely bank holiday weekend – not long till the Coronation now!
There are yet more glorious tulips on the allotment today – which are simply stunning. They last about a week in the vase, have lovely tall, strong stems and open out beautifully so we are really thrilled with them this year. We’ve checked the label and they are a variety called Darwin Mixed, so we will definitely be getting those again!
We also have some striped tulips coming up now but I don’t know which ones they are. Though as I’m a BIG FAN of striped flowers, then I’m sure we’ll have more of these in the future.
The lilies are bigger than they were last week and there are more of them popping up which is great news.
Meanwhile, the roses are slowly getting there:
Our rhubarb is getting larger too, though not large enough for harvesting quite yet. I think our rhubarb is the slowest-growing on the whole allotment as other people are definitely harvesting theirs already – so we must either do a lot more composting next year or build a raised bed around them over the winter – or possibly both!
Here is today’s harvest of tulips and some scattered late narcissi (some of which are scented so that’s good news):
The Allotment Wife 