Comfrey

12. MAY

/ Allotment Queen / 2 Comments

Finally I had a dry day and managed to go to the allotment to cut the grass on the path. It needed it very badly but the weather was against me.

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I kept the comfrey plant as it is nearly ready to flower, the bees like it and I always cut it after they had a good go at it. It doesn’t get wasted, I will put it in my comfrey barrel of water and have some more fertiliser. Everything is used on our plot.

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The path looks better but if the weather continues like this I’ll be cutting it soon enough again.

My friend Dave found a large number of tomato seedlings in his greenhouse, his cherry tomatoes from last year did well! He potted a lot of them and told me to help myself to some. I did that and planted them in the glazed part of the latest greenhouse. I’ve got them in pots on the bench and also in the ground. The front part which is covered by a green netting and is partially glazed will have chard and radishes there.

The radishes amaze me, I picked another bunch of them. I have a couple of rows coming up in the greenhouse at home so if I sow another few rows over the weekend we can have a continuous supply.

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All the climbing beans that I planted out a few days ago are doing fine and I think I might start hardening off some squashes and pumpkins. 

LEEKS

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I think I’ve finally got it right when it comes to growing leeks. In the past I usually put the seeds in a seed tray, they grew but were rather spindly and when I wanted to plant them out, all their roots got tangled and the result was disappointing.

Not so this year. I’ve got a small raised bed next to the greenhouse in my back garden so I decided to raise the leeks there. The seeds went in, I erected a small protective “fence” out of thick because the birds would have loved to sample the seedlings and then forgot about them.

Today I pulled them out and was delighted – lovely strong plants and enough to fill an empty space on the allotment.

001This work done I had a bit of time to inspect my squashes. They too are doing fine, it certainly helps that I have been watering them with either comfrey tea or diluted liquid from my wormery.

WORMERY

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As much as I can I compost everything to give me eventually some rich compost; for that purpose I have two large black composter bins on the allotment. Apart from cooked food or meat I put everything there; not weeds though, they go on a separate pile and there they can rot. I add shredded paper and torn egg boxes to the bins as well.

It follows then that I don’t like to use chemicals as fertilisers. I have a large barrel of comfrey tea ready, use it diluted when I’m watering and my latest innovation is the liquid from my wormery.

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The wormery is in my back garden and I put in any kitchen waste, the worms seem to get on with anything and everything and the end result is bottles of dark liquid and I use it the same way as I would the comfrey tea – diluted in my watering can.

worm tea