Potatoes Are In
I spent a few hours down on the plot this Saturday morning and planted all my potatoes out. I’m growing Estima again (see last years plant out) and I’m also growing Maris Piper this year too.
Frank and Dave were next door planting their’s out and they were using a pogo-stick type thingy to simply make the holes to plonk the seed potato in. If my plot didn’t need a good dig over and weed I would have done it that way myself. As it was I had a jolly good time with my best spade digging away all morning - I’m hoping to be able to stand up straight again soon!
Chitting Potatoes
Got my spuds chitting in readiness for planting at the end of the month or so. Estima and Maris Piper this year. Not sure if I’ve got enough …might get some more. Here’s a few of them huddled together. Monty Don reckons it’s worth doing …chitting was mentioned during last Friday evenings Gardeners World.
As any Hoylake local will know, it’s been as windy as only Hoylake can be last few days. Off to the plot later to see if my new shed is still there/in one piece.
Fruits Of The Season
Well, it’s been pouring down at plot 69 (as well as everywhere else of course)!
Contents of the fruit cage is wild. Raspberries, tayberries (or are they logan berries?) all doing very well and we’ve picked quite a few too. As you can see from this photo (just!) the red currants have been ready for picking, so we’ve had some of them too - my two young daughters had great fun. Gooseberry bush has gone mad and will need a damn good prune at the appropriate time.
Elsewhere on the plot, the potatoes need digging up as the foliage is now dying off. In fact, I bumped into plot 60 owner Jenny this afternoon and she mentioned that George said that potatoe blight could be a problem.
Suspect my onions need to come out now too I reckon, well guess to be honest. I’ve got no idea yet about you plant in the ground where the potatoe and onions have resided for several weeks?
Stuff in the greenhouse is growing well and several tomatoes are now showing. Something is attracted to the cucumber plants, a black tiny aphid or something - not sure if this is a problem, plants still growing well?
Back outside, either my water butt at the front of the greenhouse is leaking, vandals are messing about or someone is helping themselves. I’m guessing it’s kids messing about.
Spuds Are In!
Spent an enjoyable couple of hours down on the plot this sunny afternoon planting my first attempt at potatoes. Second earlies I think they are - so they’ll be ready in the summer.
I just about managed to fill the section behind the fruit cage - a portion of which has been taken over by the rampant raspberry bush. Need to do something with this at the end of the growing season.
I made some wooden spaces yesterday (with the help of my 6 year old daughter) and I used the 12 inch and 6 inch today. Potatoes went in 6 inches deep, 12 inches apart. Each row 18 inches apart. I’d been chitting the potatoes at home in the garage, though they’d only sprouted a little. Please grow!
The idea for the spacers came from watching a recent telly programme where a blind allotmenteer used wooden spacers. He hung them up on the back of shed door. Like a good scout I’ve prepared… I’ve drilled holes in the spacers even though I haven’t yet got a shed door to hand them on.
Onions are coming on - slowly. A few more have sprouted. And a few more have been pulled up by the birds. Just stuck ‘em back in.
I’ve developed a bad habit …eyeing up the contents of skips. Happened to spot a decent wooden pallet this week, so I rescued it and barrowed it down to the plot. Need to crack on with my compost bins.
Met another neighbour today. Eddie manages the plot behind mine for about 5 years.
Also met Rose and Fil and managed to get a freebie plastic tray with lid that should make a useful propogator. And just as I was leaving Simon from next door turned up.
Well My Onions Are Growing
Well, since my last post about finally getting around to planting something, things are on the up - the onion sets are starting to sprout. Only just, but it’s great to see something growing. Actually, I’ve had quite a few of these small onion bulbs popping out of my light soil and I’ve simply been plonking them back into the soil. Broadbeans are doing okay I think?
My potatoes that I’m chitting have only sprouted a little whilst they’ve been sat in my garage. Plan to plant them in a week or so - looking forward to that.
On recent visits I’ve been digging up more of that bleedin’ couch grass. I had a fire a week or so ago to burn some of the dryer weeds and stuff but the couch grass is way too green to burn so I’ll keep on bagging it up and bringing it home to brown bin.
Spent an hour on the plot this afternoon and met my neighbours Simon and Sabina. We’ve not seen each other on our plot for weeks. They’ve made some progress too and have managed to get some stuff planted including some onions and some raspberry canes. Talking of which, my raspberry plant in the fruit cage is looking a tad wild and maybe I need to prune it some more - am I too late?
Getting a little concerned that I’ve not got seeds etc ready for sowing. Beetroot, carrot and the like can all start going in now and I’m not really geared up for it yet! Think I need to be getting a bit more organised.
Other thoughts: Need to get the glass back in the roof (at least) of the small greenhouse to catch some rainwater. Need to come up with a way of guttering my side of the main greenhouse to catch a lot of rain that is currently going to waste. Also want to create a flickr account to have all my plot 69 photos available to the world.
Enjoying it all a lot!
Finally Planted Something
After several weeks were each visit has simply been a weeding session I finally got around to planting something on Saturday (yesterday). I’d spoken to Dave at Friday nights AGM and he told me that he had a 1lb of onion sets left to sell and also a few kg of seed potatoes.
So on Saturday afternoon I met Dave and his wife Sally down at the site and bought myself the Sturon onions (for 80p) and about 6kg of seed potatoes for a fiver. Dave also kindly gave me 6 broadbean plants.
So I weeded again the back section of the plot and planted the broadbeans and all the onions. Should be alright for onions for a while if they grow well ! I planted them at about every 6 inches - I understand that planting them further apart gives rise to bigger onions.
Here are the broadbeans; obviously need to stick some canes in at some point.
Here are the Sturon onions, spaced at about 6 inch intervals. I’ve got quite a few rows, 5 I think. I pushed them into the soil with the tops just peeking out. I think that they should be ready to harvest around August.
I’m hoping to plant out the potatoes toward the end of the month, though I gather the traditional day is St Patricks day. Today, Sunday, I placed all of these seed potatoes in plastic trays so that they’ll start to sprout - chitting as it’s called. I’ve just put them in my garage where they’ll get light but not direct sunlight.
Also today I popped down to the plot to pick up the spuds that I’d forgotten to bring home yesterday. I did a bit of pruning on the big raspberry bush in the left of the fruit cage. Not quite sure what to prune really so I sort of tidied it up a bit and removed any branches that were heading off along the ground. Need some advice next season on how to prune it and train it properly.
-
Seed Shopping
-
-