My apple trees at home are shedding their leaves and for the last couple of days I have been clearing the paths to my sheds and stores at the end of the garden. I also had a Rheumatology appointment and a visit to give more of my valuable blood for review at St Georges Hospital. It will be great once the trial is over and I can just give blood at the local health centre again and not have to go all the way to St Georges.
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A visit to the allotment this morning as its looking like it's going to be one of the better days in the next couple of weeks. It did start raining but in between the showers I managed to harvest a load more tomatoes and with the temperatures falling and warnings of snow on the way I wanted to get as many green tomatoes into the potting shed to ripen off on the bench.
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It was raining today so no plot visit, so I did a search on line on Tools Station and Screwfix and I found 3mm & 4mm Erbauer Brad Point Wood Bits at £1.29 & £1.89 for twin packs respectively. I order a few packs to replace those smaller bits in the drill bit tins on the allotment, and allow for future breakages.
Precision-ground drill tip for smooth drilling in hard and softwood. Designed for both portable drills and drill presses. Extremely sharp drill bit, with centring tip, allows for exact hole positioning. 2 flutes design for fast chip removal..jpg)
Plus John said we have all that mulch worthy woodchip in the car park, it will save you a job, and that made me decide to burn it all. It was not what I had planned to do but when a plot neighbour offers a one day only offer of help you grab and embrace it with both hands.
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I collected and loaded up my two wheel barrows a couple of times and John loaded up his wheel barrow a few times. He did run the timber up to the vacant plot for the open fire we are allowed to have 5 days either side of 5th November.
I do wish I had the level of fitness and stamina I had pre cancer and treatment, but what I have today against what I was like even a year ago is a massive improvement, I'm just hoping I do not loose too much pain release and mobility once I'm weened off the steroids and just on a autoimmune medication.
A cup of coffee and rest & a chat, then I found another two barrow loads and by that time it was nearly 2pm, I was totally knackered and it was time to go home for a late lunch.
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A short visit this morning as heading over to see my grandson who is 1 this weekend, Harvesting Tomatoes & Beetroots for Emma as Digby has tried and likes Beetroots. Quite a lot of the tomatoes are now splitting because of the rain and too much water.
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A great video by Liz Zorab Gardening, I have bought all her books and watch all her videos and the information below is from the video above.
What to sow in November | Seeds and plants for November | Self-sufficient vegetable garden. What seeds can I sow in November? Suggested seeds to sow in November for continued harvesting throughout the year. Seed details below. Gardening tips for November. If you are wondering which seeds to sow in the garden or what to sow in autumn on the allotment, or what vegetables can I plant in November, here are a few ideas. We live in the equivalent of hardiness Zone 8b, so I think it's safe to say we are growing in zone 8.
Order my first book, Grounded at https://bytherfarm.com/books or on Amazon https://amzn.to/3dSE9Gn (affiliate links)
Seeds in UK (As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.)
Dill - Mammoth https://amzn.to/2Tu1Hb7
Parsley - Triple Moss Curled https://amzn.to/3ot42BD
Basil - Genovese https://amzn.to/3nuCSKR
Chives - Cipollina https://amzn.to/2THznlX
Broad Bean - Aquadulce Claudia https://amzn.to/3gtRynW
Cauliflower - All The Year Round https://amzn.to/3kF6X7n
Corn Salad (lamb's lettuce) https://amzn.to/319UpAF
Spring Onions - Performer https://amzn.to/2Epn7Sz
Peas - Meteor (first early) https://amzn.to/3GtqNhu , Kelvedon Wonder https://amzn.to/34uu0N0
Salad Leaves - Oriental Ruby Streaks https://amzn.to/32Y2uHi or Mustard Green in Snow https://amzn.to/3mfYs6i or Organic Mizuna https://amzn.to/2D4K8K9
Onion sets - Senshyu Overwintering onions https://amzn.to/3j5xB8U
Garlic - https://www.thegarlicfarm.co.uk/buy/g...
Seeds in USA (As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases)
Cauliflower - Snowball https://amzn.to/2G2kWoB
Corn Salad (lamb's lettuce) https://amzn.to/35WQcAs
Spring Onions - White Lisbon https://amzn.to/2Byj9G4 or Organic White Nebraska https://amzn.to/32XnhdY
Overwintering Onions - Senshyu Yellow https://amzn.to/2WZbKav or Ruby https://amzn.to/330rKfV
Salad Leaves - Mustard Tendergreen https://amzn.to/2WWFlRK or Red Giant https://amzn.to/3g4RVGb
About Us.
Byther Farm is a small organic homestead, designed and managed using permaculture practices. We aim for self-sufficiency in fruit and vegetables for increased self reliance and better resilience to the modern world. I recognise that we are unlikely to be truly self sufficient, but do the best we can. I share our home with my loving husband, Mr J and our cat, Monty.
We are a fifty-something couple who live on a smallholding in Monmouthshire, Wales. We are going green and creating a gentler, cleaner and more healthy life for our family.
There is a large organic kitchen garden with no dig gardening raised beds and young food forest in which to grown our fruit and vegetables. We keep chickens and Aylesbury ducks.
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Reviewing the diary over the last Thirteen years for November
2012 - My second month of ownership of an allotment. I found out where Benhill Crescent Horticultural Society was located and actually a plot on their site would have been ideal as I could walk to it and the entrance was more or less opposite my sisters house, but at the time I got my plot the waiting list was 24 people.
Cutting, clearing and stacking material to be burnt on pallets and covering with a tarp to dry them off took place during November. My wife at the time was in good health and came with me and helped me.
By mid month all the clearing had been done and we had many stacks of drying weeds, to burn We enjoyed getting the allotment clear and going down late in the evening as it was getting dark and having the fires in the two incinerators.
The plan layout I did on the 13th November later got modified, and I started looking at standard beds and bed layouts for various types of vegetables.
Saturday 17th November the shed arrived and on Sunday 18th my wife and I erected the shed and felted the roof. I love that photo of her in her pink boots standing proud next to the shed. She is short and makes the 6x4 foot shed look massive!
2013 - A year on and I have infrastructure in place, a central concrete path made of the paving slabs that I had been using as a drive for my car, six beds between the path and the wall, a patio area at the top around the shed, and two beds installed on the other side of the path and I was working my way down the plot digging clearing weeds and installing beds and paths.
A racking and storage area was in place, I was harvesting spring onions and attempting my first overwintering of spring onions in a pop bottle Borg cube I had made, was still harvesting tomatoes and peppers in the blow away greenhouse next to the shed.
First Frost was the 13th of November this year. First time I had planted Green Manure and rescued a box of leaves and added to my leaf bins for the first time.
2014 - In this year the infrastructure of beds and paths were all in and I had a lot more varieties of vegetables growing on the plot. I harvested Peppers of all colours from the greenhouse which I had erected on Bed 6 earlier in the year.
Most of the work this month consisted of clearing and covering beds for winter, I still had Brussel Sprouts in a large hoop enclosure. Open trench compost for the runner beans bed. By now my Dalek army was 6 strong and I was getting into the art of making compost. Limited success with Parsnips this year we had the magnificent five and the rest, well they were parsnips Jim but not as we know it!
In all I had six beds covered in hoops and debris netting as I had been growing a lot of brassicas this year. I left the netting in place as defence against the foxes. This year we also had problems with mice and rats and traps were deployed. So many slugs and pop bottle traps were made and deployed against them as well. Six bags of manure used on the beds.
2015 - Damp foggy and site tour video made Sunday 1st November, Harvesting Beetroots, Carrots, Onions, the last of the French beans, Sowing Japanese Onions grown from seed. Overwintering Cabbage, still weeding beds and covering up for Winter, Harvesting Carrots, Onions and Parsnips. Digging in Green Manure Mustard. Finished clearing Comfrey and placing in Daleks as an accelerator.
Woodchip paths that are now 3 years old have broken down and are turning into soil and needed replacing and the old went into the Daleks as browns. I also had plot 23B on Spencer Road this year and was building up the Dalek army on that plot.
I found that splitting your time on two different plot on two different sites was not really viable and maintainable. I put my name down so that if my neighbour gave up his plot I was next in line for it on Mill Green. Snow at the end of the month but didn't settle for very long. Parsnips thinned out a little to allow the remainder to bulk up ready for Christmas. Rain stops weekend play at the end of the month.
2016 - Sixth of November was our first frost. Ten bags of leaves and the two leaf bins on Mill Green were full to the brim, I started to sort out my seed boxes and cataloging what I have and what I needed for next year. Over half of the infrastructure was in on Spencer Road and I had acquired many concrete paving slabs and was in the process of building the patio next to the shed during this month. More vandalism on Spencer Road they melted my blow away and tried to se fire to my Daleks and set light to one chaps polytunnel and basically broke into sheds and nicked what they could or just threw it out onto the plots.
Modifications to the shed and another lock installed to the top of the door as well as the side of the door. break-ins continued and meeting took place between the Committee and the police on Spencer Road Allotment, To be honest the problem with the vandalism and the break-ins is what ultimately made me decide to give up Spencer Road Allotment, after I managed to arrange for a drop off and pick up area to be formed at Mill Green.
2017 - Having just taken over Plot 1 on Mill Green in October this year most of my time in November was spent clearing the weeds on it, As it was so dark at night and I could not get down to the allotment it was weekend working only when dry.
I decided that I would create post and started doing my seed storage box audit and catalogue and producing lists called "In My Seed Box" here on the blog so that I could gain access to my catalogue using my smart phone when I may need the urge to buy seed.
I met with the inventor of Kikka Digga and it's an amazing tool for the allotment holder.
I took advantage of a Lucky Dip offer on trees and got 6 for £19.99, they went into buckets as I had not cleared Plot 1 yet and Hawthorn Bushes were where they were intended to finally be placed.
The plan layout for my new kingdom was more given more though and detail in AutoCAD
2018 - Not a lot on the allotment front actually happened in November this year, apart from me nearly setting fire to the shed with the mini stove I had. Keith my brother-in- law who was more like a Brother to me died and was brought back twice, he bounced around the hospital from one intensive care set up to another, finally got a diagnosis that he had Amyloidosis which is an abnormal protein called amyloid that builds up in the tissues and organs.
When it does, it affects their shape and how they work. There was a hope for a transfer to a hospital that specialises in it's treatment in North London, which involved steroids and chemotherapy, the problem was that due to low blood pressure, Keith had died twice and been resuscitated, and his body just would not survive the treatment, and finally they told him there was no more that they could do for him to actually stabilise his blood pressure, before starting Chemotherapy and that he would not survive the treatment.
He shaved and cleaned himself up and basically told us what he had been told and that he had asked not to be resuscitated the next time his heart gave out with low blood pressure. I have never met or known a man so strong, and apart from my father, there has never been another man that I have loved. We visited and stayed with him on a rota system as only so many people can be around a bed in an intensive care unit and ironically all the family that mattered managed to see him and say their goodbyes before he passed away on the 19th of November.
2019 - Woodchips for the paths dropped off, Daughters Wedding stopped allotment play followed by bad and wet weather meant that sorting out seeds and planning next year took place for a week and a half during the middle of the month.
Harvesting Potatoes three beds worth, Three oil drums of leaves dropped off from Andy, I cleared and woodchipped behind the shed and the greenhouse area.
This was the year that I injured my leg and had cellulitis which meant that I could not really do a lot for some months, but in November I was fit enough to work on the plot once more and Emma and Andy (Daughter & my New Son-In-Law) came and helped me catch up and to get some additional infrastructure in place on plot 1 in the form of the first two narrow beds on the boundary with Plot 1A.
2020 - Wasp nest clearance plot 1A, Shed Questions and Advice, Upgraded my seed storage system, Harvested Squash, Won the Waltons Garden Chest Competition resulting in moving coldframe and reduction in Home Tomato plots, Raspberry bed infrastructure started as D.T.Browns Raspberry Collection came early!
2021 - The first week of November was so mild and sunny Andy and I worked in tee shirts and planted the overwintering onions. I won a mixed pallet of Equigrow compost, soil improver, and mulch which was dropped off at home and shipped down to the plot in the back of the car. Wire worm in spuds in the ground, that's why I decided to grow all in buckets in 2022. Leaf Collection and Bin increasing. Picked up paving slabs from Freecycle. Harvested the last of the beetroots before wind stopped play. Artic Winds and Snow in Scotland and Wales, but only rain in SE England. Showed two new plot holders & their partners vacant plots. Weeding and putting beds to sleep for the Winter. Storm Arwen caused major disruption across the UK.
2022 - More Paving slabs collected and laid as paths thanks to Freecycle. Making winter blankets for the 2.4m x 1.2m beds on the allotment. A great beetroot harvest. Sutton Allotment Group meeting. Collecting free paving slabs off Freecycle and laying paths. Looking at what's in my seed box for 2023, Many seeds purchase from Seed To Suit, Warnings of another beast from the east and snow on the way at the end of the month, beginning of December.
2023 - I came to the end of my radiotherapy for cancer and had been quite knocked back by the process and had developed arthritis in all my joints, I was no longer able to drive myself and was basically house bound and managed five visit to the allotment thanks to family members taking me and assisting with harvesting a full bed of Parsnips and the last of the potatoes and tomatoes and cut back the raspberries and mulched the boundary beds.
2024 - Dalek army on plot 1 sorted out, Compost bought and taken to the plot, Pet Scan at the Royal Marsden, Collecting leaves and dropping them off to the allotment, Harvesting Java maincrop potatoes, Struching Beds, Trimming Raspberries, Mr Fothergill no longer identifies as male. Some muppet took out the internet control box and I was off line for 14 days at the end of the month
November is normally the month for last harvesting and overwintering plus bonfires to clear the blighted foliage and if the weather holds infrastructure works and closing down beds for the Winter months.
