Budding Promise

Things are a-stir on the plot, things are a-stir everywhere! On the plot today I ignored the fact that there seem to be loads more slugs than last year already, and just concentrated on the shoots and buds that are appearing, and some lovely flowers out in the afternoon sun- nothing fancy just pretty spring blossoms!

Can you tell what this is yet?

It's the first gooseberry!

 

I wonder what colour this tulip will be? I love the green bud

 

This is a shoot of one of 5 clematis I've added to the plot- like my Dad before me I love them! Mind you so do the aphids by the look of it!

I think this is the cherry, but it could be the pear. The apple blossom is pink

A Spanish bluebell. Would be nice to have the native ones. Something for the future

The wiggly hazel is such a bonus on the plot. I've planted a blue-ish clematis to go through it during summer

Grape Hyacinths are nothing special, but they look lovely close to

Just showing that there are veggies on the allotment too -honest!

My favourite tulip- I think it's called Strawberries and Cream. If it isn't it should be
 

Weather great for gardening- lots to do!

At last most of the UK seems to have had reasonable weather for the time of year. Down in the South East we haven't had a decent frost which may mean diseases haven't been killed off, but we'll just have to see.  The sun and warmth really makes me want to get out and grow! 

Still being a newcomer to the allotment (this is our second season) we have a lot to learn, and I already feel a bit behind in sowing seeds. So far I have:

Set potatoes to chit   (oops, left most of them in the box they came in for too long: hence long weedy sprouts!  Knocked some off and hope more come!)

Far too long and pale!



Will do better with these!

 

Sowed broad beans   (patchy germination, maybe the rough compost I sowed them in hasn't helped)



Sowed sweet peas  (I need to sow a second lot, they were great last year, and I am greedy for more!)
 Planted out some banana shallots, some garlic I'd started in the greenhouse, and some random spare leek seedlings from last year

 

 

 

Nice strong garlic

More garlic, and leeks

And we have:

Prepared the potato and broad bean beds
Cut back the raspberries and top dressed them
Pruned the apple, pear and cherries
Pruned the gooseberries   (the giant one we have inherited, and I also made cordons of some spares- Monty Don reckons it cuts out pest and disease problems)
Sorted out the greenhouses
Painted fencing
Reset the brick edges of paths and beds


Fiddled and diddled about with other stuff!

Oh and we have enjoyed:

Purple Sprouting Brocolli: how delicious it is compared to the shops!

Cavolo Nero: now this has gone to flower we are just cutting off the whole of the top and eating it flowers and all- yum yum

I love this time of year!

Weather terrible- gardening continues

What awful weather we've had  lately in the UK. Well saying that doesn't do it justice. I have nothing but sympathy for everyone affected- and contrary to those who may think that down South it's only "posh" houses by the Thames affected I can assure you it isn't.

 Last week I saw hundreds of extremely ordinary terraced houses in the London Borough of Croydon with filthy water lapping against them (it must have been in the houses as well), sunken cars, water gushing from manholes, a couple of forlorn fire engines piping water around, desolate minor roads, and elsewhere traffic hold-ups where major road underpasses were deliberately flooded as temporary reservoirs. And it has been going on for weeks. All credit to the emergency services and others which has stopped what looks like a disaster zone from actually being one.   Elsewhere of course there has been all sorts of damage, including the many hundreds of acres of crops destroyed by the constant flooding, and the massive problems for farmers.

The River Misbourne in Bucks is normally a small stream. In Amersham it has flooded cellars and back gardens. The picture was taken yeasterday after the water had receded quite a bit.

Any concerns we might have about the sogginess of allotments seem irrelevant.  However it has made me think about issues of food security. I think it is pretty much accepted now that the current situation is likely to be repeated- the relatively rapid global climate change is at last generally considered to be caused by humans- and we will see more dramatic weather events.  I hope we are intelligent enough to be able to globally co-operate in addressing issues and planning for the future, and it starts by getting our own house in order, and supporting one another.   But on the micro-scale of our allotments I have two thoughts- one (self-centerdly!) I'm glad we have an allotment if in the short term veg and fruit prices are likely to rise; and two- are we going to have to adapt our styles of gardening?

Here in East London we are lucky to be protected from our River Lea by a special flood relief channel- without it the allotment would undoubtedly be flooded, and the house not long after.  So we continue to work on the plot- with some good sunshine at the weekend and not at all sodden soil.

Oh, and in the back garden, the tender nasturtiums thrive... climate change?

 

We've moved the strawberries back to the edges of a front bed, to be used soon for potatoes.

We are getting to grips with the back section, which hasn't had too much attention in the first year of our plot
 

 

In the back garden the cyclamen look almost exotic

 

And the primroses in my £1 from the charity shop cage look cheerful in the sun!

But perhaps nicest of all are the snowdrops- here they are en-masse at the Chilterns Crematorium, Amersham- which has lovely wooded, natural grounds

 

Nearly Wordless Wednesday- Micro Flora and Micro Fauna

New animals spotted at the allotment

 

Dino wants a piece of the action

Dino gets carried away, as do the Cow Twins

And the miniature attractions of the winter allotment are revealed on a rare sunny day: Fennel

Moss/ fodder

Feverfew

Rose

Beautiful Sun for Once

It was a beautiful day on the allotment- at least 10 other plotholders were out and we completed our raspberry/ gooseberry swap.  The gooseberry bush which we were very kindly offered is enormous, and very vigorous. Our fellow plotholders worked hard but unfortunately broke a spade and a fork moving it!   Our tools, luckily enough, held up better, and now we have a bit of a biggun (and potentially very fruitful) in our midst!

We'd inherited one gooseberry on the plot, which bore nothing last year, so we laid into it and made 5 smaller plants to see what happens.  I turned 4 into cordons to grow up our scaffolding fence (also inherited!) and gave one away. We separated 2 bushes from the monster plant, and gave one to our next-door neighbour, then replanted the biggun. We couldn't face trying to break it up anymore, that'll be a job for another day. Apparently the biggun has been very prolific, so fingers crossed for the crop. When we have some wood ash we'll top dress, as apparently they love potash. The plotholders we gave raspberries to were pleased, so hopefully all will work out.



One of my cordoned gooseberries

We also did some digging over as the ground wasn't too sodden (our plot borders a stream, but the local flood relief channel protects us, and all the neighbouring area). And a bit of weeding and chatting with our neighbours, who gave us a big handful of a peppery salad leaf which has been taking over their greenhouse (could be mizuna?). This was lovely with pasta and walnut bits for a simple (and very late!) lunch.

A good day!

a lovely early iris

Catkins like a reaching hand
 

wiggly hazel looks like a little head

Whilst this basically looks like a bare space, a bucket and the back of someone else's polytunnel it actually represents a day's work! The gap is where L dug out a massive boring municipal type shrub (leaving the buddleia for the insects!)- and on the left in the background is the monster gooseberry. Things are shaping up in this area as we straighten up the raspberries and weed thoroughly.

more bright primroses: more bright days please! 

Back to Blog

Just before Christmas and just after Christmas I was catching up with things after finishing my studies, and getting overcome with ME, but since that little hurdle seems to have been hopped over it's time to blog again!   I have been reading other allotment/ garden blogs but not commenting, and we've still been active at the plot and this weekend caught up work in the back garden as well as the allotment.

At the plot today we cleared out the greenhouses and did a bit of raspberry pruning. In the mild conditions the autumn raspberries had plenty of leaf buds and even a few flower buds, but we cut most back to base, and some back to a third of the length. We did this last year and seemed to get a good long fruiting season. We agreed to swap some of our raspberry plants for another plot's gooseberries.



The beginnings of this years onion crop

We cropped some cavalo nero, and some lettuce leaves from the greenhouse. Can't wait for the purple sprouting broccoli to develop heads. Talking to other plot holders it is clear we aren't cropping anything like the quantities of things they are, but since this is our second year it'll still be a bit experimental, and it's quite nice getting a little bit of different things.

Hunt the Purple Sprouting Broccoli Head

In an exciting new development for this part of Walthamstow a new café has just opened at the end of our road, selling lovely salads, fresh bread, toasted sourbread sarnies etc. Within hours it was packed to the tinted windows with "hipsters" who are flocking to the area, having been forced out of their traditionally trendy habitats of Stoke Newington and Shoreditch by spiralling house prices.  They must have been attracted by the smell of fresh ethically sourced coffee and the plentiful use of the word "organic". Like many others I am very pleased to the see the café and the clientele alike, and hope to save my pennies up so I can occasionally go in- it's very welcoming and rather lovely.  I am wondering if they would be into swapping some fresh herbs or sweet peas for the table for a free tea and cake now and again? 

 

 

The mildness of winter around here is bringing out  both the primroses and the hipsters
 

Plot anniversary

We've had the plot for exactly a year and a week now and it's been great! In my last post I wrote about some of the reasons I enjoyed having the allotment.  Here are some of the things I would have missed out on in the last year had we not had the plot:

1  Posting up "before and after" pictures!  Appropriately here are two views of the plot from the front, on the first day we got the plot last year, and then three taken the same day a year later.

 

 

 

2  Experiencing light and crisp days during last winter, which got me through a much dreaded time of year for me. I loved being on the plot when very few other people were, getting warm and enjoying the quiet.

3  Proudly cropping our first veg-  overwintered  and undersized onions, which we thought at the time were well worth the effort!  And then enjoying the other firsts- like the Charlotte potatoes, my first successful sweetpeas, and the attractive, but not very productive tomatillo
 

 


4  Meeting new allotmenteers- it's been lovely to chat, even if all the chat of late has been about the constant thefts.*

5 ..... And reading great allotment and gardening blogs- and exchanging comments with the authors- very friendly and helpful folk

6  Watching and trying to encourage the wildlife: we've seen  frogs and toads; loads of birds (and hear parakeets all the time); mice; lovely butterflies and moths; and the star for us- the grass snake caught in our fruit nets but released to slither off to one of the most polluted waterways in London, our delightful Dagenham Brook.
 A strange cocoon found last week amongst the fennel

7  Planning- I love to plan!  When we started we had a good framework on the plot, underneath the massive carpet of strangulating bindweed and bramble, and that's really helped. I'm happy with the permanent features (for now) that we have put in like the herb bed, which has thrived.

8  Having friends take an interest and visit- more please!  We had a couple of lovely barbeques, and we've also benefited from advice and seeds.  I hope people enjoy reading my posts- I know  I don't get a huge amount of traffic but I am pleased that some lovely old friends read posts even if they don't comment!

 Thanks for coming along Minnie

9  Having meals made almost entirely from allotment produce.  Not only is the fruit and veg satisfying, fresh tasting and perhaps with more vitamins and minerals than supermarket ones, I am surprised to reflect that the plot has been remarkably cost effective.  There hasn't been much outlay as we have all the tools needed, have used cheap and home-made compost, and employed the traditional allotmenteers' mantra of make-do and mend.

 Potatoes, French Beans, Sungold and Gardeners' Delight tomatoes, lettuce, rocket, fennel. Eggs and mayonnaise not from the plot.

Potatoes, Chard stems and fennel braised in white sauce with veggie sausage done chorizo style, chard and spinach, Bloody Butcher tomato

Autumn Bliss raspberries- we've had these almost every day from June until now

10  Spending hours bottling cherries, freezing masses of soft fruit, using runner and French beans in every meal, and now preserving pears a-plenty.  Some will hopefully find its way to people as presents- as have big bunches of flowers.




11  Enjoying the tiny things- like Borage seeds shaped like little grazing creatures
 and the details of flowers and insects



12 Being able to plant clematis and other things we wouldn't like to chance in our rented garden

 The delightful Polish Spirit

As I hope you've seen we've really enjoyed our first year and hope it may continue!

*  E and H: you may be shocked to hear that whilst we have only suffered from one theft it is the shocking loss of Motorbike Boy- we like to think he is riding in pastures new. Dino has not yet recovered.