Grow Your Own Magazine

Rain, rain, rain, rain no rotovating today :-(

Took grandson to the Lottie again today its sunny a few clouds and dry. He was beavering away again today didnt have the heart to stop him but i will have my work cut out to undo what he has done.!!! planted some more raddish cherry belle, transplanted salad bowl lettuce, put net up for peas they are nearly ready to climb.
Grandson goes back to school tomorrow chicken pox over.

Rain this morning and fog cleared up by lunch time sun came out, went down and dug out another bed on Lottie and planted my potatoes, “at long last” been waiting since Sunday to get them in.
Re-potted some cabbages in to 3inch pots and sown some more seeds Swede & Beetroot, I’ve finely started to plant out on the allotment.

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Smile and the world smiles with you

Rain cleared by lunchtime, but couldnt rotovate, I do hope it passes us tonight tmorrow. This evening I repotted my baby tomato plants, put canes in for the big ones and planted my bareroot goji berries. Weeded....watered and sat contemplating with a brew on what I can do tmorrow.........

A good day today. Started in the greenhouse by sowing cukes and courgettes to take home and put in the propagator. Sowed Rudolph PSB and savoy cabbage. Sowed a packet sweetcorn into modules. Potted on my 10 Jalapeno plants.
Outside I managed to get a few panes of glass added to my half built greenhouse. I went to next doors plot which is vacant and seconded a small chicken hut for broody hens. It was going to be burned so I said I'd find a place for it in my run. Of course it was too wide to fit through the door to the run so I had to partly dismantle it to get it in. It needs a new floor anyway!
After that I shifted about half a ton of well rotted horse poo into one of my compost heaps as I had a shed to erect where the poo was. To cut a long story short, shed was erected but I need to screw it together tomorrow when I have my portable electric screwdriver with me.
Finished off by knocking up another pallet compost bin to give me three bins in total and digging some leeks and carrots to take home.

Oh nearly forgot, I became a mature fruiter on the vine!

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My Majesty made for him a garden anew in order
to present to him vegetables and all beautiful flowers.- Offerings of Thutmose III to Amon-Ra (1500 BCE)

planted out broccoli, sown turnips, leaf salad, and radishes

Yesterday -
Handed thesis to binders and then heard from someone else about a load of mistakes (fun for this morning!!)
Ran out to local authority - paid this year's rent and got new key
Flew home, changed into geardening gear and grabbed tools
Went to plot (1st visit in 5 weeks) - not too bad in terms of weeds etc although a sheet of corrugated had flown in from somewhere and landed on the caulis (they weren't doig well anyway and finders-keepers on the tin).
Planted the spuds - too close but in the ground
PLanted 4 loo rolls of peas
Harvested 3 tops of PSB!!! And a cabbage, and a lettuce thinning!! Eating the lettuce as I type (can't wait for lunch - sad I know!!), PSB tonight and cabbage tomorrow.

Need to go back at the weekend and plant onion sets, sow lettuce, carrot, pea, spring onion and radish seeds and do a big weed. And do some more seeds at home - pumpkin, peas, beans and sweetcorn. And plant a courgette into the garden.

Yesterday - Received, stroke, toyed with then sowed Seahorse's gift of King Tut peas with a couple of extras sent in the packet - a few each of Salmon Flowerd Pea and True Red Cranberry pole bean. Hope to get a decent seed crop from them all and pass on some of the goodies in Autumn. Many thanks, MOM. I also planted out my parsnips in their loo roll nests. Two full rows and no gaps - never managed that by direct sowing! Planted out the lovely Rose de Roscoff onions from Piglet - they look right at home there. They are in the home garden because onions 'don't do well' on out allotment site.
Today - just off to plant out the rest of my Sutton broadies at the allotment and to harvest more of the 'compulsory' spring cabbage and curly kale for tonight - got to get that bed empty for beans!
Just opened a package from the post - Heirloom Vegetables by Sue Stickland - the seed saving lady. Looks like a right good read!

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Earth laughs in flowers. Ralph Waldo Emerson

www.vegheaven.blogspot.com

Updated November 30th - Mr Stinky's Excellent Adventure (and a Christmas Cake)

Raining here again last night :-( hoping the sunshine will stick around and dry off so i can rotovate tonight! Well behind with my sowing........broad beans are through, so is the carrots yiphee!

Off to go and collect new car .....

Today i managed to finish the construction of my long raised bed and i've nearly finished topping up with seived soil , just a couple of barrow loads to go.

I have gone with the blue pipe / debris netting to cover it and made some weights to hold it down using white waste pipe filled with concrete and a metal rod bent in the shape of a hook .

The white pipe used is about 40mm and 7" long.

I also weeded the garlic and onion beds and put bonfire ash around fruit trees and the formentioned garlic and onions.

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---) CARL (----
ILFRACOMBE
NORTH DEVON

a seed planted today makes a meal tomorrow!

www.freewebs.com/carlseawolf

now in blog form ! UPDATED 01 / 04 / 08

Cleaned out the wood burning stove and put the ash around my soft fruit bushes.
Made some edging for a raised bed, edged the bed, raked the bed and planted 24 caramba F1 hybrid (sweetheart) cabbage plants that I'd grown in modules into position.
I was going to go away to the chippie for my lunch when I noticed a trio of flying rats(woodpigeons) sitting in the tree nearby watching me. Decided I'd better net the cabbages straight away or else they would be in tatters when I got back from lunch! I got the netting out the shed to find a mouse must have chewed a large hole in it so I had to do a bit of ad lib patching up before I could use net. I put some slug pellets round the plants, assuring myself the birds couldn't get at them through the netting. I watered each plant in with a week solution of Armillatox.

Put a few more panes of glass in my ongoing greenhouse project and reminded myself I must purchase a glass cutter to make some of the makeshift panes fit.

Planted approximately 60 gladioli corms in front of my apple cordon with a bulb planter. I still have another 60 to plant out later for succession.
Although I practice a 'no dig' philosophy I had to dig over a bed which didn't get dug a couple of years ago, hopefully i'll never need dig it again once i gert it mulched up!
Came home with a large carrier bag full of Desiree potatoes which had overwintered in my clamp and three large sticks of very clean rhubarb which poked its head through the straw around it!
I was also given all the bumph off the previous allotment secretary, should make for interesting reading as some of the stuff dates back to WW2!

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My Majesty made for him a garden anew in order
to present to him vegetables and all beautiful flowers.- Offerings of Thutmose III to Amon-Ra (1500 BCE)

Last night - planted courgette into garden as it was too far along in its pot.
Planted 3 toms (2 moneymaker, 1 gardeners delight) into garden as well (to see ifg they survive the trashing they got when falling down!!).
Planted beetroot modules (the very early sowing which wasn't great TBH) into garden.
Got a couple of shovels of partially done compost for the base of the 2 large planting holes - need to turn over the bin at weekend.
Moved all the tomato, basil and pepper seedlings to the mingreenhouse

Then went in and had our own PSB for dinner!! What a great way to celebrate OH and I both finishing the academic year yesterday (he teaches parttime and I hand in thesis today - it is FINALLY done - sorry, I really will stop about that today).

Just back from jollies so planted remaining 1st early potatoes into large pots in the garage (Vales Emerald & Pentland Javelin) and then got the 2nd earlies & main crop into the veg patch (Yukon Gold & Sante), sorted through seeds & put some up for swapsies (go on, have a look - you know you want to!? Not got anything else sown yet except for sunflowers - feel so far behind!

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Newbie,
keen but clueless

Went to the Garden Centre with the purpose of buying some opium poppies to grow for their seeds. Mangaed to get a packet of Shirley mixed which supposedly fit the bill. Was on the lookout for a pumpkin plant as I thought I'd lost my seeds somewhere. The plants looked crap so I didn't bother. Just as well as I found my Dills Atlantic Giant when I got to the allotment and sowed three seeds in seperate pots to take home and put in the propagator. Also sowed the poppy seeds in a large pot.
Managed to have a wander around the plots and got some of the plotholders details for the records.
Took all the straw off my strawberry patch, weeded it and tickled it over with a fork and replaced the straw.
Did half an hours hand weeding until I got sick.
I bought a book in the reduced sale at the GC called Berries which I'm looking forward to reading.
Well that's me set for tonight, a bottle of wine and a good book........bliss!

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My Majesty made for him a garden anew in order
to present to him vegetables and all beautiful flowers.- Offerings of Thutmose III to Amon-Ra (1500 BCE)

Been to my kids school for the last two days sorting out the reception class garden and tying in their willow wigwam thing so that it doesn't keep spearing me in the head in the afternoons waiting for the little darling to come out. I am so tired and achey looking forward to curry and wine.

potted on the few squash that have germinated and seem to have sprouted massively overnight. Really really looking forward to tomorrow - its going to be 19 degrees and not windy - a whole day of bed preparing and planting strawberries to do

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We plant the seed, nature grows the seed, we eat the seed - Neil, The Young Ones

http://countersthorpeallotment.blogspot.com/
Updated 8 June 2008

I finally got up the allotment today. Had everything prepared ready to go (seed spuds, tools etc) after a quick delivery job at lunchtime....

...came home to find my dog had eaten literally half my seed spuds I was only gone about half hour.
Luckily the bloke in the next plot had some spuds left over and kindly gave them to me

Went to the lottie and put down:
Cardboard and plastic weighed with brickes on one bed.
Newspaper and weed fabric pegged down on another bed [trying different methods to see what works].
dug over and planted out the second earlies potatoes.

That's 2 beds planted up, and 2 covered up; in 3 days work. Plus anther started with shallots and garlic so far. That's very nearly halfway!

It's going to be weedy though, need to keep on top of it as the twitch is starting to come back to life again.

Ordered my shed as well yesterday.

Noticed loads of seedlings have finally come to life.

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Andrea :wavehello

http://www.growfruitandveg.co.uk/gra...logs/zazen999/

moon trials completed:
tomatoes
[46% increase in crop per seed sown and 10% increase in crop per plant]

currently underway:
calabrese
garlic

http://linearlegume.blogspot.com/

day off today, weather was good, but was finally taking last of demolished garage to the tip! no time for garden duties...however weather supposed to be promising tomorrow so will be in the garden all day! can't wait!

Oooh it has been a while... Recently I have:

Watched things germinating in the plastic planthouse - pleased with the cauli grafitti and sunset but last year's leftover snowball seed hasn't germinated. Last year's Gardeners' delight tomato seeds have had about a 20% germination rate so far but the sub-arctic plenty have done well. Allotment mate has sown some moneymaker so we should have enough.

Got childishly excited by the emergence of Anya and Arran Pilot leaves above the soil - they can get to 4" then I'll earth up.

Planted up a couple of hanging baskets and potted on some plug plants (climbing petunias - had to be tried out!) from T&M.

Was delighted to find that allotment mate has spent some time at the plot and has dug over the bean & pea beds, removed the JAs and planted the raspberry canes donated by a fellow gardeneer.

Failed to do the first of my planned successional sowings because the plastic planthouse was groaning at the very weak seams. However, the broad beans, French beans and peas are big enough to be planted out now so there will be a bit of space later today. Need to buy some canes and more netting because we have pigeons and I don't want to share.

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You are a child of the universe,
no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
Max Ehrmann, Desiderata

blog: http://allyheebiejeebie.blogspot.com/ and my (basic!) page: http://www.allythegardener.co.uk/

Weather was soooo poor today, it felt like winter here! helped my dad with some stuff, i'm sure he thinks I'm a labourer!!! however, still managed to move some mangetoutes...hope they survive! Re-netted my raised bed and did a general tidy up! potted on some chilli and now in my pyramid glasshouse. feel quite satisfied now!