Revised Plan for Planting in 2019

My first stab at the layout for Plots 1 & 1A in 2019 

I've put the shed where it actually got erected and not where it was planned to go, and I've added the rear and side extension to it. The narrow flower beds at the transition and difference in level between plot 1 and Plot 1A and the effect they have to the layout on the left and the main path is shown. Plus I've adjusted the layout of the Dalek Army on Plot 1 removing it off the edge of the plot and the path between my plots and plots 1 & 2A. 

Here is a closer view of the main anticipated growing area, that you can actually read what is intended to be grown in each bed. Everything to the right of the flower beds is already in and the planting layout is based on the assumption that I'm going to get bed 1, 13 - 15 and 27-28 at least in and ready for the start of the growing season in 2019. 

October Update Video

By hook or by crook I was going to get to the allotment this Sunday one way or another, as I have not been down to do any work for the last three weeks. According to the weather forecast there was supposed to be light rain showers over night but they were supposed to be gone between 6 - 7am. it didn't quite work out that way!

With the clocks going back it was idea for an early start, but the rain had other ideas. Good job I could tidy things up in the shed and make a cup of coffee. Then as soon as the rain stopped it was all systems go!

Whilst extracting the carrots, I looked down on what I thought was going to be a massive specimen, I had visions of a huge giant Bugs Bunny type carrot coming out of the ground. what I got looked more like a stubby hand.

  
I have to say I was gutted, but also amused at nature, as it looked so massive from the top when it was in the ground.  

Life Gets In The Way Sometimes

So my first visit to the allotment in 19 days on the way home from inspecting two properties, and that was only because I had to pass the site. I dropped off three food buckets of shredded paper and to see what's going on plant wise and weed wise. 

My Brother-in-Law has been in hospital for three weeks, with low blood pressure & heart problems and was released home and within a day was re admitted only to collapse in the hospital AMU ward with his heart stopping and having to be revived by a nurse using CPR.  He was then transferred up to the Intensive Care Unit which he has been in for the last week.  

So daily visits to see him and keep his spirits up, interwound with work and decorating the second largest bedroom so that my second daughter can take over the first daughters bedroom now she has left home and is getting married has taken priority, over any form of gardening or the allotment.

The weeds have taken advantage of the fact I have not been around and have populated the two beetroot beds. I harvested by far the longest and fattest cucumber I have ever grown it was more like a marrow. I have courgettes that are beyond marrow size, and finally butternut squash that are actually large enough to be worth harvesting.

The temperature is dropping daily, there is dew on the car and grass now each morning, and one way or another I have shoe horn some time in to harvest as much as I can this weekend before I loose it to the weather when the frost hits, and every bone in my body is telling me that's not going to be long. 

The good news is that although only between 5 - 9 degrees C this Sunday, its going to be dry, plus the clocks go back. So I have far too much to achieve on Sunday Morning but I will do what I can.    

I still have the three Power Planter augers to play with, the good news is that the universal smartphone tripod adaptor that I have been waiting for so that I can actually video myself testing and using the power planters has finally arrived. 

Freecycle Magic

Looks like the Freecycle bad luck gremlin has been well and truly beaten and the magic has returned. Within the last  couple of days a 40 Litre sack of unopened Jacks Magic All Purpose Compost and 10 fold up storage crates, one extra large and the other standard size.

I will use them to store the cut to bed size weed and planting membrane in the shed neatly.