Gardening Sunday

I spent the morning clearing up around the garden, I had a bucket from my neighbour who was keeping chickens and saved the sawdust and poo for me. I've collected all the fallen apples and had nearly a bucket worth of them. A bucket of spent compost, and a bucket of shredded paper plus the last few tiles left over from the wet room conversion.

In the afternoon I picked up a sack load of warm cooking grass from my sister and took the lot to Mill Green to feed Dalek 6 which was once again down to half way full and ended up two thirds full by the time I had finished applying in layers and wetting down.

The SoilFixer Potatoes in Buckets looked a little thirsty so I tried as best as possible to ensure they all received the same amount of water. With the Redrow building site next door the biggest problem is access and parking so the usual mid week visits just have not been happening since they started work. These are 7 weeks into a 13 week growing period so harvesting should take place around the 21st or end of August blight permitting.

I watered everything and replaced a sweetcorn that something had pulled out of the ground, the French Beans planted last week are just showing.

I have two craters that I can fill using spent compost where the Cherry Trees were, as I donated them to my bother-in-law Keith as they are cookers and his wife Pauline likes to make jams and preserves where as my wife isn't into that kind of thing. Keith & Pauline were also in the plot and I went to look at the trees in there new home, on Keith's second plot which is dedicated to fruit. Somehow they looked a lot larger on his plot that they did on mine.  

I then made my way to Spencer Road Allotment to water and drop off the wall tiles and watered the beds there.

The beetroots in Bed 6 which was the over wintered Japanese onions are starting to bulk up a bit which is good, so between Mill Green and Spencer Road I should be ok for Beetroots this year. We pickle and distribute so many jars around the family each year. 

I harvested some red spring onions, but I only have one air onion with bulbs which is disappointing, I'm glad the Catawissa Walking Onions at the back of the plot aare doing so well and hopefully I will have enough bulbs to create two beds worth next year. 

A butternut squash or marrow has decided to self seed in the potatoes in Bed 4, for the moment I'm not going to remove it I will try and work around it.

  

Bed 1 needs clearing, it was supposed to be for Parsnips, but I have not got around to clearing or sowing. I must see if I can squeeze in some parsnips they may not be large but it would be nice to have some. 

Bed 2 the potato foliage has wilted, so I've pruned the plants down to ground level, about an 1 inch above the soil surface. Don’t cut them any lower than this, as you may expose the tips of shallow potatoes. I will now wait at least two weeks two weeks before digging out the tubers out to allow the potato skin to thicken.

So much infrastructure works is required on this plot, I really need to get onto it once the harvests are in and the existing beds are put to sleep for the winter.