Merry Christmas

Well the last of the leeks from our first batch were taken up at the weekend to go into a hamper for some friends along with some other bits and pieces from the allotment and some homemade treats. That means that once the flood is over and Noah has parked his Ark we can get back down to the serious work of covering the beds over ready for the winter slumber and replenishment of nutrients.

            We do still have leeks growing from the second batch we planted and a few of them are just about coming to the right size for eating. Hopefully between them, the remaining parsnips, the purple caulis, the oncoming sprouts, the kale and the few remaining carrots we will still be eating fresh veg for a while longer before we have to start raiding the stores in the freezer. We never set out to be, nor do we intend to be, self-sufficient but it is a wonderful feeling for six to nine months of the year to thumb your nose at the supermarket veg aisles each week.

            We have been offered a huge 10’ x 8’ greenhouse by a rather wonderful lady I went to school with and it was our intention to dismantle it, ship it in to Nigel, and hopefully start rebuilding it over the Christmas holidays. I think the weather has pretty much scuppered that idea; although we are still aiming to get it built before the spring. We’ve bought quite an assortment of tomatoes (heritage and heirloom varieties with black and purple flesh), tomatillos and peppers (both sweet and hot) for 2014 and having a greenhouse to grow them in would be the icing on the cake. It’s something that we’ve both really wanted for quite a long time.

            We’ve got our seeds already for 2014. As you would expect from us there are a few curios from golden beetroot to blue sweetcorn to multi coloured carrots. We’re also trying salsify, new for us but an old vegetable that has fallen out of vogue in modern times. I’ll let you know how we get on with it later next year.

            We had to reseat a cloche at the weekend which gave us a chance to check out the broad beans. I’m pleased to report that they’re coming on well. Hopefully because of the early planting we’ll beat the blackfly next year. The onions and garlic are coming on nicely as well, although the elephant garlic doesn’t appear to have germinated so I think we may have to buy a couple of extra cloves soon and try with them rather than planting from what we had grown.

            Well that’s all the news for now. I’m sure if the weather abates we’ll be spending a few hours on the allotment over the holidays so maybe more soon.

In the meantime Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

Winter's here!

OK, so the whole Bahrain thing was a complete disaster! The job wasn't exactly as advertised and neither Mary or I were prepared for just how much we would hate being apart. The final straw that broke the camels' back (pun intended) was that there was nowhere for me to grow any seeds! What kind of backward bloody country is that?

Anyway, I'm home now and back on the allotment! Mary had been down and done some tidying up in the couple of weeks I was away. I went down today to just do a little bit of the heavy lifting work that needed doing. We needed to cover over the old potato patch with manure for the Winter to replenish the soil ready for Spring planting. Six bags of horse manure later and the job was done.

We'll just leave that as it is now over the Winter and then give it a good digging over in the Spring ready to get such novelties as blue sweetcorn!

We'll need to order some more manure soon. Once the last few leeks of this year are up we'll be digging that extended bed over and giving that a Winter covering of poo as well ready to turn it in to next years potato bed.

So the only jobs that really remain for this winter now are some pruning of the fruit bushes just to give them a little bit of a tidy up (we were given some excellent advise on this - don't worry about pruning. Just tidy them up a bit and they'll be fine. My kind of gardening), staying on top of the weeding (how come they keep bloody growing over the Winter) and trying to sort out a greenhouse so that we have a bit more luck with tomatoes and chillies next year.