What I did today 2022

[ameno]

A couple days ago I cut all of the potato stems down and put the m on the compost - blight was spreading too much, and they were starting to turn yellow and die, anyway.
Today I raked up a load of grass clippings (the strimmer man came yesterday) and used them to mulch my runner beans.

[annie8]

Lots of weeding and deadheading . Cut back some of the trailing pumpkin and squash as don’t think they will set more now so want them to focus on what we have. Very disappointing this year.

[Sweet savory]

Sowed more spring cabbage. I am aiming for at least 8 good plants for the large cloche. I have thrown in the towel on the runner and french beans on the frame. Am just leaving them to dry now. The late sown dwarf beans are doing really well though and have tiny beanlets already.
The swede and turnips are up. I wish I had labelled the rows.
Sowed spinach and chard with labels.
Hand fertilised the Waltham squash’s only female flower. It may or may not have time to mature.
Hoed extensively.

[ameno]

Rained for most of the day today, finally. Everything has had a good soaking now and the water butts are full.
Instead of the watering I had planned to do, I went around slug hunting instead.

[annie8]

Back from 10 days holidays. The automatic watering system for the greenhouse tomatoes did enough to keep them alive, although a couple of them had fallen over. I think was just just the weight of the fruit. So gave them and the garden a good water. Otherwise most things look ok, apart from some cauliflowers in pots that were looking really sad. Have soaked them and hoping I can save them. Rhubarb was ridiculous so took a bunch and husband made cordial and jam. Started the deadheading and weeding but too hot to do much so will do more today.

[ameno]

Planted out a dozen purple sprouting broccoli plants.
Pulled the blighted leaves off my maincrop potatoes (the plants seem to be on their way out now, anyway. Probably the heat).
Lots of watering.

[ameno]

Planted out a gutter of mangetout seedling. Well, I say a gutter... germination was poor, so I only ended up with about 15 plants.
Also lots of watering.

[Bren In Pots]

Pulled up my Telephone peas now the pods are crispy, took down the frame and netting. Weeded the bed and chopped the pea vines adding them to a compost bin.

[Bren In Pots]

I weeded and harvested while MrP mowed the few areas of grass that have grown, its made the 'lawn' look much neater.

[ameno]

Got 10kg or so of used coffee grounds when I went to town.
Then later on I pruned my allotment fruit: plum, pear, quince, gooseberry and redcurrant.
And I finished digging over the patch were I had my onions, and added some poultry manure. It's now ready for the purple sprouting broccoli.

[Bren In Pots]

Watered my GH toms de arm pitted them again. Tied in cucs and picked sweet peas.

[ameno]

Dug over half of the patch where I had my onions and planted out some chicory plants.
Sprinkled some extra hot chilli powder around my sweetcorn to try and keep the badgers away. They all seem to have 3, 4 or even 5 cobs growing per plant, so I should get a bumper crop as long as the badgers don't attack.
Watering.

[Sweet savory]

Planted out some dwarf french beans Ferrari and chicory and radicchio from their modules.
Cleared the climbing peas and sowed a summer green manure.
I had great difficulty planting two psb and couldn’t set them as deep as I would have liked due to dry conditions.
Noticed butterbush squash had set 4 fruit so put tiles underneath. The 2 Waltham plants haven’t even produced any female flowers yet although they are roaming freely. No idea why they should be so different as pretty identical conditions.
Resowed a pot of lettuce that had been slugged.

[ameno]

Cut out the old fruited loganberry stems, and tied in the new ones.

[ameno]

De-blighted my potatoes again. Not much this time, presumably because of the hot, dry weather.
Did a lot of watering.
Pruned the other grape vine and took the prunings home. It was a massive tangled mess. Lots of good bunches of grapes coming, though.