New Season Kicks Off

My lack of blog activity might indicate to you that nothing has been happening on the allotment. Nothing could be further from the truth - it's been a busy time preparing beds and getting seeds either in the ground or in modules and pots.

Here's the summary of developments:

• I have a new helper called Daniel, who is participating in the Duke of Edinburgh Award scheme. He has elected to choose allomenteering as his new skill, so I get 13 hours of his time over the coming months. So far he has experienced the joys of digging for an hour and the brain zombification of repotting fifty tomato plants (we have gone with six outdoor varieties this season - Gardeners Delight, Ferline, Harbinger, Roma, Marmande and Ailsa Craig). I shall be getting him to rework the plot plan as his next project.
• My mum & dad have more time to spend assisting, with my mum enthusiastically tidying up the plot and getting seeds in. A good family session up the plot the weekend before last resulting in three rows of Pentland Javelin first earlies going in, plus two rows of Gladiator parsnips and two rows of beetroot (the traditional Italian Barabietola di Chioggia, that has concentric pink & white rings within - a first time grow for me resulting from the tip in River Cottage Handbook No. 4 Veg Patch).
• We have broad beans on the go in the ground and in pots at home.
• We have three varieties of French Bean growing in pots - Dwarf Sun Gold, Climbing Cobra and Cosse Violette. 24 plants in total at the moment. We have Barlotti to come too.
• My Cayenne chili peppers have so far failed to germinate, but the Hungarian Hot Wax have again done well.
• A tray of salad laves, lettuce, perpetual spinach and chard await germination. A scattering of salad seeds have gone in the plot cold frame. We have a tray of flowers also sat awaiting germination.
• We still have to get our onions and shallots in the ground - a priority task!
• The daffodil crop has been disappointing. No sign of any alliums either.
• I have an A4 page of seeds that need to go in over the next couple of weeks. Vic has already given the green light to a decent session up there this weekend, and if the rain stops this week I will be up there after work in this critical planting period - a period we missed to a large degree this year due to me getting very unwell with my chest.
• Growing fever is spreading at work. I have half a dozen guys ready to swap tomato plants, an IT manager who has bought himself a greenhouse and has gone seed crazy - I've just been offering a tray of Purple Sprouting - and Suzanne has just taken up the offer of a large plot in West London. As a newbie she's got that mix of excitement, hopes, expectations and fear that is magical. I've already given her a load of seeds that we don't need and plan to off-load any spare seedlings, etc. I can on to her.

I feel much more organised than last year and feel as if we could do really well this season.

Feels like the opening to a football blog...

Fresh as a daisy

The cliche - most heard down the pub when the topic of grow your own crops up - is "you can't beat the freshness of homegrown vegetables... they taste so much better than produce you buy in the supermarket".

Many people, suckered in by the supermarket promises that items have been quality-checked, vacuum-packed and air-freighted off in refridgerated boxes within minutes of being picked, will naturally be a little sceptical of the claims of plot holders and kitchen gardeners.

It can be difficult to demonstrate the benefits of growing your own green beans over buying in Kenyan farmed offerings - taste can be subjective and, at least over the first couple of days sitting in the bottom drawer of your fridge, the Kenyan beans will probably look 'better'.

It is a lot easier though to demonstrate the benefits of homegrown using daffodils. We have been amazed at how long our allotment grown daffodils have lasted indoors, despite being cut in full bloom. Their colour has remained strong and the blooms large and healthy for the whole week. Compare this to air-freighted daffs flown in from Holland and further field - that arrive completely closed and only last a couple of days in bloom before quickly going brown and dying - and the difference is shocking.

You then have to conclude that if the quality, nutrient levels and longevity of daffodils grown on the plot is so much better than those shop-bought, then the same must be true of fruits and vegetables.

No sign of the alliums blooming yet, so as things stand, our over-wintering bulbs experiment has a clear winner. I can see us planting up more daffodils next September as the colour they bring to both the bare Spring plot and the home is extraordinary.

Sauce

Luke Skywalker is struggling to dig his allotment plot.
Obi Wan appears and tells him to "Use the forks, Luke! Use the forks!".

My kids obsession with Star Wars continues, so a run of silly made-up Star Wars jokes has been initiated, kicking off with:

Luke and Obi Wan are eating fish and chips.
Luke complains that his fish is dry.
Obi Wan says "Use the sauce, Luke! Use the sauce!".

Yesterday we managed to get up to the allotment as a family for a good hour or so. The sun made it a most pleasant experience. Our time was spent creating two raised beds for the kids: one 2' x 2' and the other 4' x 2'. Last year the kids missed having plots of their own, so these two little beds will become their focus for the growing seasons. The beds were populated with a couple of strawberry plants, some early sweetpeas, a rogue pea and a few lettuce plants. A sprinkling of a wide variety of quick-growing vegetables will soon follow over the coming weeks. Ever the optimist, my daughter expects to fit potatoes as well as *every* thing else in her 2' by 2'!

The harvest of the day was a bunch of daffodils.

Homegrown daffs - a mixed bunch

Dig for victory

I took the day off work yesterday in order to dig over the allotment.

Last year we were given the allotment in April. It was covered in grass and the remnants of brambles. The topsoil was thick with couch grass, bramble roots and general rubbish. By the time we got ourselves in a position to dig the plot over the unseasonaly hot and sunny May had baked the ground rock hard, making the chore of digging back and spade-breaking work. Our 2010 crops were hampered by the late hand-over: less than two-thirds of the plot was usable and so much of the seed that was planted either failed due to the enforced short-season or glutted us with produce as successional-planting was impossible. We did have success with robust broad beans, French climbing Cobra beans and most notably an envious crop of flavourful, juicy and storage-hardy Sturon white onions. Failures included red onions that failed to properly root before the dry summer and sweetcorn that just went in the ground too late - I've since learnt that this is a notoriously difficult plant to grow and to give it the best chance of success it needs to be grown early so it has the whole of the Summer to develop and ripen.

The aim of taking a day's holiday was to dig over the outstanding 30% of 'virgin' undug plot, turn the earth of those beds that we did manage to create last year, construct a raised bed for strawberries, salad and young plants, weed and generally tidy things up.

Digging in February - when the ground is relatively frost-free and softened by ample rain - is considerably easier than digging in May. Even in gusting 25 mph winds - our site is open to the elements - the spade and fork work was far more bearable than when sweating under the late Spring and early Summer sunshine of last year. Soft earth equals rapid progress - the only challenges to completing the digging being a distinct lack of strength and stamina in our muscles and bramble roots up to six feet long and two inches in diameter! In the end - before tiring and dreaming of a hot bath - we managed to virgin dig a 5m x 4.5m area (that's a decent 22% of the total plot and well on the way to clearing that 30%), clear and edge the existing beds (bringing them out to the edge of the plot boundaries), create a 1.8m x 0.9m 10cm deep raised bed for the strawberries (8 plants put in), hand-weed the allium and daffodil beds, check the garlic and red onions (doing well especially the purple wight garlic) and plant a few early broad beans under cloches.

But the digging and progress on opening up the plot ready for planting the mountain of seeds and sets that I've (over) ordered from E.W.Kings is almost secondary to the shear pleasure of just being outside in the fresh air, working on a plot of your own land, which you hope and dream will bring tasty bounties to your dinner table later in the year. The rich promise of harvest rings out, even at this bleak and grey time of year, through the green sproutings of garlic and onion, the sound of birdsong, the dull thud of steel against earth and the rhythmic beatings and rustlings of assorted scarecrows, sheds and strcutures in the wind.


What a great way to spend a day off from work.