Hurried Polytunnel Usage

 14th July 2021,

Another mountain of earth, what’s going on here then?

Well the idea behind this little excavation was to provide an elevated “off the ground” space to work on. Basic, I know, but at least not plodding about in the mud! And the end result? A pile of earth (not topsoil most of this) and a couple of buckets of stones…

Now, about stones… Many people would just throw these away, "a pain in the arse for a gardener!" However, they are very useful, stones. They can be used to fill up spots where you don’t want soil but need some flexibility (because of their different sizes) and want to stop weeds from growing; good for drainage too! I’m a big believer in (yes!) sifting out bigger stones but keeping them. You never know when they might come in handy.

How this corner by the compost heaps is going to turn out? And what we are going to do with it, to tell the truth, we don’t really know yet, but…

The next picture you can see the trellis is almost finished. Just the last bottom section to finish off and then the flower surround is done. Raised bed / terrace next. Chris put in some rustic old brick steps just to add a bit of character to the path area there. Now that the stinging nettles have been removed, I think we have "borrowed" a bit of next door's plot (poetic licence on the borders) but only a small amount.

In the next picture, a little bit further down the plot, everything is beginning to grow nicely. In our keenness to coax our tomatoes along, we’ve planted a lot of “spares” along with the butternuts. Now it is a race between tomatoes and butternuts who takes the ground first, the butternuts have got their skates on!

The courgettes are certainly growing well where we have put them/ They have already taken up the same amount of space they did in a grow bag when grown in a previous year so looking forward to plenty of courgette this year!

The beans have not reached the top of their stakes. We should really have got 2m canes but then again how would we harvest them? And in the polytunnel, tomatoes are growing nicely. It has been a bit of a hurry getting the polytunnel ready this year with all the winds in May and almost losing the entire thing, but it is operational now.

The last picture showing our aubergines which got all mixed up with peppers and we don’t know what the hell we planted in the end… there are a few peppers… but mostly looks like we’ve got aubergines. Check out the makeshift “suspension” shelves and see what I mean by "hurried polytunnel usage" - all around the edge of the polytunnel we have weeds growing, a pet hate btw!

Taking stock

 10th July 2021

Chasing the season, but progress is being made.

With the digging to get the ground ready for the season only just finished in May, late planting of any kind of seeds, construction work then beginning, plus maintenance work to keep nature in check (as best we can) and keep things tidy, well... we have not been idle down at “the Haven”.

This blog post is just giving us time to take stock and take a look at what is going on...

The ground is now beginning to fill out It’s amazing when you first put things in the ground how it all looks very small and insignificant and yet now you begin to wonder if you have given everything enough space!

In the foreground of the first picture is our Brassica area: pointy cabbage, round cabbage, cauliflower, Brussel sprouts, kale, broccoli, and some leeks to finish off the square.

One of the challenges that we’ve got with the growing areas is that they are on a slope. This means that water “runs-off” and we get uneven irrigation. This is something that we would like to do something about next year but for this year let us just get some crops!

In the second picture you can see the leeks. 

In the 3rd picture you can begin to see the allotment plot beginning to take shape and the garden is now filling up. We have the following veggies:

Potatoes, carrots, parsnips, beetroot, celeriac, chard, tomatoes, butternut, courgette, cabbage, cauliflower, sprouts, kale, broccoli, leeks, onions, French beans, runner beans and also aubergine and peppers in the polytunnel!

This is not a bad start when you consider we have been chasing ourselves all year!

2nd July 2021 - More Building

 Construction continues, growing continues, maintenance grows!

July arrives and we are now into the middle month of summer. Everything is nice and green, receiving plenty of sunshine during the early part of summer. Since we thoroughly weeded the soil during the second dig, nowadays the weeding consists of disturbing the soil and picking up regular weeds, with the consistent removal of “the enemies” (bindweed and couche grass) as they raise their heads!

In the picture above, take a look at these courgettes as they find their footing in their new location. Freshly fertilised soil and well spaced out, they are starting to take off with first flowers already making an appearance.

6 Butternut have made it into the “field” as well, along with the tomatoes, making up the rest of what we will grow in this area. Butternuts are incredibly prolific growers and we are thinking they will easily fill this area, although difficult to imagine what that might look like right now.

Looking down the other side of the plot, we have the beans doing well beginning their journey up the “bean poles”. These are filling a space we left when we erected the polytunnel - we wanted to create some usable area behind as well as the front of the polytunnel.

This next picture shows the Brassicas. It is difficult to say what is what, but we have cabbage, sprouts, kale, cauliflower and space for leeks too! They have been growing well, and now we are thinking if we put them too close? One of the biggest problems for gardeners is wanting to grow as much as possible and the tendency to cram plants in. These plants each need the space they need, so being mindful of this is an important lesson.

First stage of the terrace complete! This is the easy bit, although not without its challenges. If you cast your mind back to the very early scenes in October 2020, you will remember we dug a trench around the plot. This was a random trench really to identify what we were working with, to define the patch, so to speak.

Now when coming to put the Terrace boundary in, the trench turns out to be in the exact spot needed to put in these pillars! Put it down to coincidence maybe, but if you seek out these confirmations to support "being on the right track", then here was the first one! How did we know, when we didn’t even know where and if there would be a terrace? 

This is another snap of the trellis looking up the plot from the polytunnel and check out the temporary seating area - much fun riding those chairs in the soft earth…

The last picture is another Trellis picture. This time you can see the dry wall addition of the bricks to assist in creating the side of the raised border which will eventually house a lovely flower display for us to enjoy sitting around.

 

30th June 2021 - A Terrace to Be

Construction of the Terrace at the ‘Haven’ begins!

Although technically work had already started on construction with the compost heap, we are now getting into the terrace area. A passing couple walking their dog said, "We think a seating area is one of the most important items on an allotment!" With all the digging and makeshift seats we’ve deployed they had four willing ears with Chris and I…

So Chris got 4 posts for his birthday and with a quick trip to Wickes (there are other DIY stores available 😀) we secured some trellis to complement the posts. And off we go, the first post installed on the 30th June 2021. Not much sign of a terrace yet, you’ll have to wait a bit longer for that one!!

Next picture is exposing our two recycled chairs. Apart from the legs sinking into the mud and resembling a bucking bronco, very serviceable, and more so as solid ground to sit on appears.

The inverted Heineken bottles are not the end game of a boozy night during the summer solstice. These are markers for different elements of the terrace to be referred to, as construction proceeds.

The next picture is a quick shot across the front of the plot. We are approaching the very edge of our “terrain” and we do have to be careful of the water pipe (blue) which passes close by. The rather lush large leaf plant is Horseradish which seems to like it there and will pose a real challenge later on. However, Horseradish is good, if controlled! 

Next image - half complete compost heap with a good side-shot of the runner beans (the 3rd time of planting) which we think are going to make it, just planted straight into the soil, no faffing about!

The next picture looking across our potatoes - a picture of health - and you can see how the terrace will perch on the end of the plot, so that we can look out at the work we’ve done! 

Final two pictures for this post - check out the butternuts and the courgettes all adding to this quadrant along with 7 tomatoes. The orange peel and eggshells are an attempt at keeping the slugs at bay (mmm not very effective). Also, check out the brassicas (cabbages, caulis, sprouts, kale) under the white netting. And a blue ghost in the polytunnel 👻...

the ‘Haven’ comes alive

Back end of June 2021, the ‘Haven’ comes alive!

Seeds starting at home. We’re not really kitted out for seed propagation at the ‘Haven’ right now, and we've got the added challenge of furry friends! Best to get things going at home and get the seeds germinate and grow to small seedlings before we take them to the allotment for now. Next year will be different. Here we have lettuces and some self set tomatoes that we might be able to plant somewhere outdoors in pots.

With all the hassle over germinating seeds coupled with getting the soil all ready for a growing season, we’re a little behind and playing catch up. Hopefully we’re not too late to the party and things will fruit in time. We had problems with our brassicas and in the end we bought a lot of seedlings from the garden centre! Next year we will do better.

In an effort to prevent airborne disease and pests we are deploying some essential oils, hopefully these static diffusers will do the trick. Well, you have to try things! 

 

While sorting out the area where Chris will begin to build a terrace / trellis / raised flower bed, he came across this root network! Well, it was a rather large Stinging Nettles plant which had managed to grow fairly uncontrolled right where the path between allotments is, and, under the manure pile we recently dug into the allotment. This wasn’t all of it though! This is about ⅓ of it! A little bit of drying out and before long, back in the ground as ash… 

Two piles to distribute: one is the last of the manure, the second one is soil harvested from the roots we dried out on the pallets (mainly couch grass, bind weed and horseradish) mixed with an emptied fire which was full of ash. The area they are situated on, is slightly low in soil so it will be distributed on this quadrant.

Next week is the last day of June and beginning of July. We begin the construction phase of the ‘Haven’ (as if we haven’t been doing loads already) Plenty more to come!

June 2021, and summer continues!

As the good weather shines down on us, the work proceeds unabated. The plot is starting to fill up although there is a long way to go.

The potatoes are doing really well, some flowers even beginning to show on one or two. The outside tomatoes are doing well, as are the courgettes and butternuts. Hard to tell at the moment what is what in the Brassica section but everything seems to be growing well, with only the odd one or two signs of slugs… 

We have a small mound of sifted soil, on the fire quadrant and we still have the last dregs of manure left to move from where it was piled up as work will start there soon, after the compost heaps are finished.

Another picture of the top ⅓ of the plot. We have now relocated the pallets to here and arranged 5 of them into our basic structure for the compost heap. The other two still laying down are for the doors which will close the structure and keep everything inside. We will need a further two pallets for the two lids which will sit on top of these vertical pallets.

You can see the remains of the manure we had which was piled up from the water tap to the remnants you can see here. The rather nice looking long leaved green plant on the leftmost side of our plot is Horseradish. It is the root of this plant that you harvest (if you can wrestle it out of the ground), peel, mash, add some other bits and pieces and you've made a potent condiment for beef or eggs, or to add a bit of oomph to something like mayonnaise. Anyway we’re not harvesting any right now. It’s a bit of a prolific grower, so getting rid of some of it might be the first port of call.

Notice the sheet of corrugated plastic roofing material inside the polytunnel - an innovation designed to keep some furry intruders out who seem to have developed a penchant for seeds pots inside. 3 sets of courgettes needed sowing as previous attempts had been systematically consumed.

In the next picture the runner beans finally have taken and are reaching out for their poles. You can see the compost heap construction a little better in this one: just pallets tied together with electric wiring, but will be screwed together as more work is undertaken. 

The last of the dehydrating couch grass, bind weed, and horseradish on spare remaining pallets. Most of this has now been dried, burnt and returned to the soil in the form of ash. These weeds are not easy to compost and we’ve had a lot of them! 

Note the horseradish is going well over here as well. We can see us doing battle with this little lot during the summer / autumn seasons. Our seating area consisting of pallets and buckets has been relocated now to this area, away from the growing sections.

Grow, grow, grow!

 3rd Week of June 2021

Some tomato seeds planted, and a few lettuce - more of those will follow. Nice to be getting off into the growing season, proper. So far we have dug, dug, and done more digging, so the primary work on forming the outline of the allotment is complete!

The next stage is to begin the building phase to make the plot fully operational.

You can see under the white netting (just about see) plenty of cabbages are now planted, as well as cauliflower, sprouts, kale and broccoli. Outside of the netting, in that small patch, we have leeks, which are just tiny thin strips at the moment.

The potatoes are flourishing with lots of greenery going on there, although a couple of rows just haven’t emerged at all. We are thinking that the potatoes we used for seed were just not up to the task, maybe… Never mind, next year!

The one radish we left for seeds is also galloping ahead, carrots are up, as are a few parsnips too. The courgettes have also been planted out behind the pallets, although it is difficult to see them at the moment. All in all, a good start.

Notice the Orange peel laying on the ground. It is supposed to help keep slugs at bay, but to be honest, we haven’t seen a lot of evidence of that yet!

The renewed / repaired polytunnel is doing its thing - the tomatoes are doing really well in there with blossoms already appearing. We’re hoping for a bumper crop of beef tomatoes this year! 

We only managed four French beans this year. Here are two of them, the others were planted out behind the polytunnel on some spare stakes we had put in for the runner beans, that we didn’t need in the end. (Some more Orange peel to act as a decoy, not very successfully...)

A random shot of “roadside” not much been going on here thus far, but the incumbent horseradish are making a play already by the “weed drying-out area”. Nice Tap!!
More to see here as we begin to develop things. There are “loose” plans!