30th August 2022 - Avocados On The Loose And A Race Against Time Now!
The last blog of the summer (August) and an unexpected guest on the potato patch. You see that plant in the middle of the picture, well this is an Avocado plant… What on earth is that doing there? (this is 1 of 3 by the way). Well, there is a story attached to this…
We take all our raw food waste from our respective kitchens down to the allotment compost bins. So Chris never puts his avocado skins or seeds into the rubbish taken to the compost as the skins do not decompose so easily and the seeds, well they don’t either. Anyhow, Desi does put those items into the compost. Now… we haven’t emptied or distributed the compost at the “Haven” as yet, so how come we have avocados on the potato plot? Well during the spring there were rats on the plot messing about in the compost bins and they were digging tunnels. They had taken fancy of the empty bin where we have wood drying out. Around here there were piles of earth forming, where the soil was being turfed from the tunnels, and then building up both inside and outside the bins. At one point this soil (quite nice soil) was transported away from the bins and placed on top of the growing potatoes to cover them… and this soil must have contained these avocado seeds… mystery solved!
The potato foliage is now dying off and if you look to the left of the avocado plant, to our eyes that looks like the blight… does this mean the end of the tomatoes too? Potatoes and Tomatoes both suffer the same, so from now on we will be keeping a close eye out and disposing of this foliage too…
At the moment the tomatoes on the new plot look to be doing ok, but from past experience we know that this blight travels quickly and once the plants get it, they quickly die off…
Meanwhile, at the bottom of the plot, the butternuts are beginning to get that matt orange hue to them signifying that the vegetable is getting closer to harvesting time.
Melons in the tyre are coming along too… These need good sun to finish off and ripen but we might be running out of time. The days are getting shorter and the weather more variable. We are hoping like in recent years that we get a good Indian summer through September into October, but no guarantees.
Having given the Gooseberries a severe haircut, it is nice to see them sprouting again, at least they haven’t been killed off. This growth will not account for much this side of next year, but hopefully will give them some encouragement to get going at the first sign of spring.
Wahey! Check out this sweetcorn on the cob! What a lovely example of home grown sweetcorn, they are not all like this, and they all tasty in their own way, boiled on the cob along with nice salted butter, absolutely amazing! These beans can be fried in a little oil with garlic and some soy or oyster sauce - a simple yet tasty side dish to accompany any meal.
