I've grown too much AGAIN !!!!

Last year I vowed not to grow excess amounts of veg on the plot this year, but I'm not sure how it happened but I have done it again.  Although it's lovely to share with the neighbours (which I did today !) but it all takes time to look after such vast amounts of plants. Trouble is I can't bring myself to compost healthy plants so even though I give away lot's of plants every year, I still have way too many.

I had a good harvest today and It's scary to know that although my fridge is full there will be more to harvest on my next visit. Next year I have to get it right !! how do you manage to just grow enough ? or do you also do as I do and grow too much ?

Here is some photo's taken on the plot today, it's all looking very lush. I dug up some garlic from the second bed  and this variety 'Cristo' is huge, it fit's into the palm of my hand.

The Globe Artichokes are enormous and growing like crazy.

The onions are growing well, they looked like blades of grass when I put them in as I grew them from seed.

I have lots of  self seeded Sunflowers and Calendulas, all brightening up the plot

The pumpkin and squashes are in

The Spinach has been amazing, but is slowly going to seed now so I have sown some more today.

The Runner beans and French beans have now reached the top of the wigwams and are all in flower.

The Tayberry has quite a few fruits now and I have been eating some for a couple of days.

The gooseberries have loads of fruit, the green ones are huge and the red ones are just turning from green to red and are delicious.

I am growing Cape Gooseberries in the greenhouse and this one is really getting big now and has quite a few fruits forming

And finally  here is the Broad beans, Mangetout, and Calabrese that I harvest today. I haven't grown calabrese before and I am so pleased with it as the heads have grown so big over the last week, I will definitely grow it every year.

It's been an amazing year so far, and there is so much more to come. All the potatoes are dug up now as I only grew first earlies. I will post the results on the varieties soon, as they were unusual  and I haven't grown them before.

A long overdue update

It's over a week since I last did a post and seeing as I spent part of today working on the allotment, I thought I would share some photo's of the plot. Austin helped me dig over my two largest beds, one where the pumpkin and squashes were growing and in the other bed the french and runner beans were. As we cleared the beds and weeded, we covered the ground with black plastic to smother any weeds that had any thoughts of sneaking up on me over the winter.

I have to say I lose interest at this time of year, it happened last year around this time as well, but come the spring my enthusiasm will return. I still have the following growing : curly Kale, perpetual spinach, parsnips, beetroots, Florence fennel (which are swelling nicely) and a couple of cabbages. Oh and purple sprouting broccoli and brussel sprouts, but they have to grow through the winter and hopefully we will have some sprouts for Christmas.

The best thing I ever did was grow so many flowers up there because it's so colourful and many flowers still have lots of buds to open for a while yet. I have stored all the squashes and the pumpkin in the greenhouse, where I also have more little chillies growing, in fact lot's of little chillies !

I must get that Pumpkin weighed ! it was very heavy.

The 'Pink Giraffe' Dahlia is still a lovely sight, I have three up on the plot.

Dahlias and Echinacea, grown from seed this year and still looking lovely

Covering the beds for winter.

Clearing the beds, and planning for next year.

Not so tidy, but still lots of colour.

Florence Fennel, almost ready to harvest.

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My hydrangea from the garden. faded and looking delicate and so pretty

The colour from the front, such delicate colours as they age and fade.

Colours from behind, a nice minty green, I like this better.

I have actually been spending more time working on the garden than the allotment just recently. I have widened a couple of my borders so I can plant more annual flowers such as Cosmos, I bought a packet of seeds recently that are double flowering and they look stunning, so can't wait to sow them next year. The borders already have lot's of perennials, so I thought it would be nice to add some annuals as well, especially cornflowers which looked really nice with the colours of the Cosmos this year. We also cut down a couple of large shrubs which were old and very woody, we now have to try and get the roots out.

That's about all for this update. I hope you are all enjoying your gardens and allotments and getting on with the preparations for the winter months. The best thing is the planning for next year, and looking through the seed catalogues deciding what to grow next.

It's that time of year again !

It's that time of year again when beds have to be cleared, the last of the harvesting done for vegetables that had run their course, and plants dug up or into the soil and weeding where it's been impossible to weed whilst some crops were growing.

Personally I look forward to this time. I love clearing the beds, weeding and raking them and covering them with black plastic to keep down the weeds over winter. There are beds that have to be left uncovered, for growing Brussel sprouts, Purple sprouting broccoli and cabbages to see us through the winter and Spring, not forgetting the garlic and leeks.

We spent 3 hours yesterday harvesting the remains of the sweetcorn. I then cleared the bed and dug it over and weeded it. I also dug up the last of my carrots and a very large and deformed parsnip. I blanched the sweetcorn ( 8 cobs) for 2 mins and then froze them. The carrots and parsnip I cut up and blanched and froze them in a bag together, ready to put into soups or casseroles. I bought back a small trug/bucket of runner beans. I have enough frozen to see us through the winter, so these are going to neighbours as we are sick of eating them now.

Sadly my favourite French beans are finished and I picked the last handful today and pulled up the plants. I also pulled up the last remaining cabbages. We managed to save three firm heads, the dark outer leaves were munched by slugs and caterpillars, so we stripped them back to the middle and composted the outer leaves.

The plot already looks tidier with the sweetcorn all gone.

Parsnip, carrots and the last remaining cabbage heads. A new batch has been sown.

Sweetcorn, blanched and ready for the freezer.

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PUMPKINS GALORE

This is the largest, I could just about lift it to put the wood underneath it. I can't wait to weigh it.

I found this one growing under a leaf.

This is going to be a whopper as well. Great, lovely pumpkin soup & pumpkin pie.



This one is beautiful

The 'Munchkin' squashes are scaling the wire perimeter fence. They are unstoppable.


This squash is amazing, I bought one to eat from the supermarket last year and saved the seeds. I cut off a large one and it's ripening, (the original was yellow when I bought it.) I found three more growing today.

These photo's are for KELLA, as she is keen to grow 'Munchkin' next year. I found that is I leave them to ripen and become a deep orangey yellow they aren't good to eat. They go green near the skin and as they are so small, if you cut that away there is hardly anything left to cook. So I am going back to what I did last year when I first grew them and that is to pick them when they are still a creamy yellow. I scoop the seeds out, cut them up with the skin still on and roast them in a small amount of olive oil and garlic until the flesh is soft. The skin then peels off easily with a knife and they can be eaten or made into soup with other veg added.

Just right

Too ripe

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Two photo's from the Garden.

Thunbergia 'Mango' I know I showed this on a previous post, but many flowers are opening now and it looks amazing, it's such a vibrant colour.

A friend gave me a rooted cutting of this Goji berry bush and it's doing so well and flowering.

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And finally (sorry about the long post) I have made some beetroot and apple chutney. I have so much beetroot I didn't know what to do with it. I even bought home a bucketful yesterday and there is still more on the plot. I Really have to get my planting amounts sorted, I grow too much of everything.

Fruits of my labour.

I was away for a couple of days, and got back late this evening, so I had to go up to the plot to water the plants in the greenhouse. I have cucumbers, tomatoes, sweet peppers and all sorts of chillies growing in there. They are all thirsty plants that need lots of water, and were so dry it took me ages to give them a good soaking.

Whilst up there I picked french and runner beans and tomatoes and yellow courgettes. I swapped the beans with a friend who has masses of blackberries on her plot and her raspberries are always earlier than mine, so she said to pick what I needed, great swap !! my raspberries are just beginning to ripen very slowly.

As you can see by the photo's below I have lots of squashes around the plot. The only trouble is there are so many too close together and I don't know what some of them are.

The plot looks very full now and a bit untidy everything has grown so tall

Florence fennel just starting to to swell nicely.

One of the squashes

The sweetcorn has grown to well over 4 foot tall, you can see the squash I planted underneath it just rambling through.

Nice and ripe and this one is ready to pick.

The squash beneath the sweetcorn.

Munchkin squash

Pumpkin

I don't know if this will ripen as I grew it from a seed I saved from a squash I bought from the supermarket last year which was grown in Cyprus, so we may not have enough sunshine to ripen it.

I've learnt to plait garlic.

Below is my first Italian red onion, with the round courgette, all ready to go into a stir fry. I bent over the foliage on lot's of the onions today ready to dig them up at the week-end, or whenever they look ready to come out. I should be self sufficient with garlic and red and white onions until well into next year. That's providing they all keep well. I grew all the onions from seed as I read that they store better for longer than onion grown from sets, we shall see !!

I went onto the Internet and googled 'plaiting garlic' , I found a good site that had really clear instructions and diagrams, so printed it off and had a go as i want to store the garlic traditionally. Below is the first and final attempt, it was fiddly but worth the effort as it looks nice as well as being good for the garlic as the air circulates well and help preserve it for longer.

This is how the garlic started out, it had just been dug up.

Dry, clean and roots trimmed.

My first attempt at plaiting, it's trickier than you think.

I got better on the second attempt

And below is the link for the instructions and diagrams for plaiting your own garlic.

http://www.powen.freeserve.co.uk/veg/BraidGarlic/braiding%20garlic.htm

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PHOTO'S OF THE PLOT TAKEN TODAY.

Nasturtium's, 'tom thumb'

French bean flower, 'Fasold'

A Squash flower, they are so beautiful.

First squash.

The sunflower hedge, 'Velvet Queen'

As you can see from this photo the plot opposite has been strimmed of all the tall weeds, it looks so much better.

The blue painted wheelbarrow that was given to me by Ken, another plot holder. I planted it up and it looks great.

Cosmos and dahlias

Dahlia 'Pink Giraffe'