Ongoing Update

Broad Beans almost done - had 3 weeks of pretty solid performance. Have cut most of the plants back, reputedly they may sprout again and give a late extra crop

Peas - turned out to be doing ok. Early peas didn't do too well, but were probably nicer, main crop peas ended up being very vigorous, bigger peas, and a little starchy versus the younger ones. Still going

French Beans - Just beginning the yellow ones, a few cobras (i think), yin yangs forming, climbing beans a bit slower. Have been having more success with sowing at home and planting out when pretty small than direct sowings.

Arran Pilots - dug and eaten - we harvested on the early side starting at the end of june, they were super tasty but surprisingly big and few in number vs. small and lots.

Garlic - picked, about 4-6 really good ones, and then a decent number of pretty small ones.

Squash - plants are small, but looks like squashes are forming well. Looks like that's about right for this time of year. Leeks doing ok, Parsnips ditto, Amaranth went out, still small, Chard might have bolted (some of it), Kale looks ok, ate some PSB, but not much, sowed some more spinach under the garlic, Borlottos look like they're dwarf not climbing, sweetcorn doing pretty well, picked a few courgettes.

Status Updatus

Harvesting broad beans (still very small beans), Kailan (growing at pace), Walking Onions (creating mayhem), First Early Potatoes (arran pilots). Potatoes are still a couple of weeks ahead of official readiness - there were relatively few potatoes, but they were quite large. Also salad has been pretty successful.

Parsnips looking pretty good- germinated and growing larger, PSB (summer purple) doing ok, not huge but going well, Chard healthy and growing but still small, Kale alive but not obviously growing much, Garlic - the ones which didn't resprout after the dry spell look pretty good, the rest less so, Shallots - diabolical, Leeks - skinny but growing, Squash/Courgettes looking like they're starting to snake out, Sweetcorn - short still but going on healthily, French Beans - climbing beans looking pretty tenuous, the dwarves that were pre-germinated and planted out, the ones that were straight sowed are failing, peas - some flowers and pods, still disappointing growth, Potatoes - huge,

Photo update

180A:

and the other one (179B?):

Parsnips (after a pretty good weed):

Leeks (tiny), shallots (a write off, I fear), and Garlic (a mixed bag, fingers crossed for the good ones):

Sweetcorn:


Kailaan (prior to being harvested):


Newly planted chard/Kale:

And 6 beds of squash/courgettes, all of which look roughly like this:



Broadbeans, climbing beans (soso), peas (bit of a disaster):

Some french beans, potatoes:





Siberian honeysuckle & walking onions, and then the raspberries:

Squash

Planted out squash and courgettes. There was a clear variation in the amount of top growth but even more notable differences in the root development.

Planted out some French beans, a mix of some fairly well grown ones, and some grown in very small pots and still only just emerging.

Asparagus beetle the thing growing the best on the plot, broad beans big plants but the flowers look like they might be suffering from a shortage of rain, shallots ditto, garlic a bit better, but still suffering from the weird sprouting of other shoots that i think was the result of the previous drought/rain cycle. Potatoes looking great, raspberries doing ok, Kailan & Summer purple PSB both thriving, spinach doing pretty well, parsnips well germinated but a bit weedy, leeks doing little yet, haskap/siberian honeysuckle, walking onions both looking pretty good, peas look like they're a bust this year.

At home, tomatoes looking ok - first flowers but still quite small plants in ghouse, smaller outside, salad looking pretty solid, strawberries look good but a bit slugged, blackberries about to pick, asparagus survived the tree surgeons. Figs also looking pretty good.

Planting and Sowing

Planted out 8 yinyangs, 24 sweetcorn, 6 Kailan, some trail of tears climbing french beans.

Cobra french beans that were planted out earlier look like they have just about survived the cold, but it's a close run thing, and they're not thriving. Ditto borlottos.

Broad beans are flowering well, but not huge, Potatoes are going hell for leather, Parsnips are just showing, Spinach ok, Summer PSB is hanging in there.

Apsaragus Beetle looks like it's thriving :(

Walking Onions are going ballistic.

Asparagus seeds have germinated.

Sowed and epic lot more french beans, some PSB, and some amaranth

Planting out

Planted out some borlotto beans, Cobra climbing french beans, leeks, Summer PSB, and also planted a final row of potatoes, plus a few tomato plants on the off chance.

Leeks were pretty small, but we've had problems in previous years with them never getting going properly, so we're trying putting them out earlier this year. It was quite cold for a change, so maybe the beans might be going out too early.

Broad beans are flowering but small, Salad, spinach, parsnips coming up, Shallots, garlic looking ok, only seen 6 or so asparagus beetle, potatoes doing really well. Transplanted a load of squash, kale, chard.

The ground has been dry for a long time - we've been watering 1-2 times per weekend when we went there and for the most part things seemed to be doing ok. There was a big downpour on Saturday night; we went to the plot on Sunday and several of the plants finally looked like they had suffered a bit from the dry - the early potatoes seem to have suffered a fair amount of browning on their top growth, with subsequent regrowth coming, some broad beans showing a little discolouration on their leaves, ditto the peas sprouts, some of the garlics have done something weird where it looks like they have split into cloves and then the individual cloves started to grow again.

Had a lot of problems getting squash to germinate - it turns out that they need heat, and not too much water. I think therefore they have boon too cold and I have overwatered to compensate. We now have 3 generations of Squash/Courgettes - the first the Anna Schwartz all germinated well, plus one other plant, the second it looks like we have 1 Tennessee Sweet Potato and maybe 1 Crown Prince, the third is only just in and I've forgotten what they all are, but 1 has come up already.

oops update

Sowed a lot of things: Beans - climbing french (cherokee and cobra), dwarf (Yin Yang, Irish Creek, 2xyellow beans) Squash, Courgettes,

Spinach, Parsnips, Salad, Chives direct in the ground

Bought/Given Kailan and summer PSB, which are in pots now.

Tomatoes in grow bags (gardeners delight plus two other types) 5 inside and 4 ouside, and one cucumber indoors.

Had trouble with the squash - looks like they were not hot enough, and then got over watered. Trying again, under glass, with moderate water.

Planting

Planted two rows of Pink Fir Apples, planted out broad beans.

Sweetcorn was chitted, and planted into cat litter tray.

Tomatoes doing well, Arran Pilots beginning to show, Peas out, shallots, garlic doing well. Harvested more rhubarb, egyptian walking onions showing seed heads, asparagus storming away.

Weather very hot, little rain - watered everything.

Planting

More potatoes, Desirees - 2 x 10ft rows for 16 potatoes total. (Arran Pilots and Charlottes were 10 potatoes each in 1x10ft row).

Asparagus crown count now officially 15 - 9 at the allotment, 6 at home. 5 at the allotment are pretty thick and solid looking, the rest are pretty spindly.

Sowings, Harvestings

Sowed climbing beans (cobra), dwarf french beans (ireland creek, something yellow), squash (Anna S, Crown Prince, Tennessee Sweet Potato) earlier in the week.

Sowed peas (Onward, Onward advanced, Progress #9) last weekend, along with Arran Pilot and charlottes.

Began to harden off broad beans today, Asparagus doing pretty well - up to 9(?) plants out of 10 crowns from E's mum, and something like 8 (very thin) ones from the seeds sowed ourselves.

Harvested second load of Rhubarb

Earliest of the potatoes

First earlies and seconds both planted - arran pilots (very well chitted) and charlottes.  Elsewhere, garlic, shalots on the go, rhubarb harvested 4 stems, broad bean doing meh, siberian haksap ok, Egyptian onions ok, tomatoes  ok, cucumbers came in from greenhouse - looking unhappy, leeks a bit slow.

Planting

More Broad Beans in the ground, direct, no soaking, some Red Sun shallots in, Haksap/Honeysuckle in.

2011 the beginning

Planted some broad beans, after 24 soaking, directly in soil. No cover/cloche yet.
Garlic planted in nov., 2 rows of shallots planted last week.