Rain Stops Play

For me it was a late start, I didn't get to Plot 1A until around 9 ish, Kitchen scraps and flowers topped up Dalek 3 and leafs from the front garden in Dalek 2.

I had a tidy in the greenhouse and potted up the Japanese Onions from the small 20mmx20mm nursery modules into larger 75mm pots. so I now have two shelves full of onions.

There were four milk bottles full of sand that had become brittle and cracked because they are biodegradable and go brittle in the sun. I managed to decant the sand from two into new milk bottles but the others were too damp so the sand is on metal tray to hopefully dry out in the greenhouse if we get a couple of sunny days, I will then fill up some new milk bottles, one thing I have found is that you can never have to many soft bricks knocking around an allotment, and now I have two allotments I'm also using washing liquid and powder plastic containers filled with stones and debris. 

There now being room in the greenhouse some of the timber battens were put in to keep dry so I can cut and paint ready to build a base to a couple of mobile hoop frames for plot 23B. I will also be cutting some up and painting to use at the corners of the raised beds to fix the decking boards together.

I had planned to harvest some more parsnips today, but the rain came and stopped play and I retired gracefully and came home. 

Runner Beans and Parsnips

Snow yesterday morning for about 20 minutes that didn't settle but overnight the temperatures dropped well below freezing and there was frost on the roofs, cars and ground. The overwintering onions and cabbages had a nice layer of frost on them when I arrived at the allotment.

 

The foliage in bed 9 Parsnips and Carrots was all laying on the deck with a frosting.

Continuing with the winter clean up I harvest runner beans for seed, which took most of the morning as I cut up all the bean foliage and stalks as small as possible and topped up daleks 2,3 & 4 which had all dropped about 100-150mm.

By midday the sun was out and nicely warming my lower back which has been playing me up a little the last week or so, and beautiful my robin and I were the only ones nutty enough to be playing on the allotment today.

I started thinning out the parsnips, and from the looks of it there are plenty more to be pulled up, I just hope that the others will continue to grow and I have not left it to late to thin them.

The more I think about it the less I want to give up plot 1A, I have it for another year and two contractors have dropped out of the deal to develop the site behind the allotment. Some one will do it but I will keep 1A for as long as I can whilst getting 23B ready between now and April.

Sprouts and Spring Flowers in the Comfrey Bed

The plan was a 50:50 split between plot 1A and 23B the reality was so much rain yesterday that I continued clearing the paths of weeds around bed 12 and 13 and cleaned up Bed 3 the Sprouts and stayed on Plot 1A all morning.




The excess of red wigglers in Dalek 3 have returned into the compost, it may have been too wet or hot for them, it could have been the liquid from the decaying pumpkins but this morning a half dozen in the lid and some on the surface doing there thing

The second video shows the other areas of work on the plot and a surprise I found in the comfrey bed when I used it all up to use as an activator for the new layers of sprout leafs in Daleks 2,3 & 4 

More Coffee Grounds

I picked up my sister again last night from work and managed to obtain yet another two sack loads of coffee grounds for my trouble, so today they were taken to the allotment with Plot 1A and stored in the greenhouse until I can dry and decant into containers which I need to try and obtain from my friendly local pizza shop.

If I can find enough containers I will start building up a supply for plot 23B as well.

Senshyu Over Wintering Onions

Plot 1A - Dry (that's important) Not to cold and the sun tried to come out then light rain around 12 ish. The video below is shows and Update on the cabbages, work carried out during todays visit, clearing and covering beds and plant out Senshyu Over Wintering Onions grown from seed and a Dalek full of Red Wigglers.



From 12:00 - 1:00 I was on Plot 23B - talked to my neighbour for a little while then covered up the dug areas that have started to re grow weeds. Made more weights using washing tablet and powder plastic boxes and plastic cylinders. I need to weld some more 2.4x1.2m sheets.

Next Sunday Visit to be a 50:50 Plot 1A & Plot 23B endeavour. 

Freecycle comes up trumps again..

Freecycle comes up trumps again, picked up an nice large square compost Dalek that comes apart for easy transporting and emptying.  I have now dropped it off and put it back together on plot 23B.

It appears that the area I had cleared at the end of the plot and had not covered has couch grass re growing and the path along the bed I have covered up has small weed seedling growing. Looks like I need to get some cardboard or membrane down there pdq!. 

Goffee Grounds, Pumpkins & Parsnips

My sister managed to acquire a box and a sack of coffee grounds which I collected when I picked her up last night from behind the coffee shop.




So this morning a visit to plot 1A to drop them off and also feed the Halloween pumpkins to Daleks 3 & 4,

The red wigglers were going mad and many were on the underside of the lid of the Daleks.

I decanted the dry coffee from the greenhouse into a 70 litre storage bucket

with lid and one of the sacks into another 70 litre storage bucket with lid.

Some has been laid out on trays to dry and the rest has made it on top of the pumpkins in the Daleks.

After 3 weeks of wanting to see how the parsnips are doing in bed 9 I finally pulled a couple from the edge and I was pleasantly surprised with what came out of the ground. I will try and thin what's in there and leave some to get larger and wait for them to get hit by the frost before I harvest them, hopefully for Christmas Dinner.


I have harvested half of the carrots from the end of the bed and I will get the other half after Emma and I have noshed our way through them.

Putting Plot 1A To Bed For Winter

The video also shows how I build my compost bins up in layers