broccoli

10. AUGUST

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We seem to have another heat wave so I am doing a reduced amount of work on the allotment. But even the reduced amount takes quite a while before I manage to water my four greenhouses. Of course that usually leads to tidying up inside, picking ripe tomatoes and anything else I might see.

By the time I have done all that I didn’t feel tired yet so I picked my blackberries, some apples, plums and a few courgettes. Then there were the last few potatoes in the ground, got them out and decided to have them for lunch with the few heads of broccoli. By now I certainly had enough and thought of going home. The harvest was so good I had to load it all in my wheelbarrow to take it home.

Of course I had to make something out of all this . On top of that I picked some beautiful long green peppers in my greenhouse at home so I added them to the oven roasted tomatoes and bottled them . All ready for the winter.

I had so many plums I was able to make a number of jars of plum chutney. It will be interesting as I have never made this one.20220809_093005

5. JULY

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The plan for today was to do more weeding in two of my net cages where I planted the blackcurrants. First of all I had to follow the usual routine – open all my greenhouses and then start working. I had a very pleasant surprise in one of them – my very first red tomato.

The cucumber and radishes were in another greenhouse but I had to pick them to add to our evening green salad. I still  have some lettuce in the greenhouse, one is more than enough for the two of us.

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My plan for tomorrow’s lunch is new potatoes, broccoli and oven baked fish. The potatoes are very tasty and they were nothing special,  just what we had left from last year’s harvest.

I will certainly grow the broccoli again next year, this is the third picking – the little rosettes grow quite fast and soon are ready to harvest.

Of course there were more raspberries, I only picked this one box. I haven’t got any sugar to  make jam, this will  be just for us two to have as a desert.

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I am amazed how many raspberries I have this year, I’m sure this is thanks to the bees we have on the allotment now, thanks to Mary and Wayne.

19. JUNE

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Only one more week and we shall  have the summer solstice – where is the time gone??

After the brief heat wave we had some rain yesterday and I was very glad, because not only the vegetables liked it but the weeds did too, even more. Today in the morning I had another weeding session in the same place that I did not too long ago. On the positive note though I was able to harvest my very first broccoli and enough new potatoes to have for lunch tomorrow.

This is my first time growing broccoli, I grew the plants from seed and they all look very healthy. The potatoes were just some that my friend had from last year, he didn’t have any more space to plant them so I gave them a good home on my plot. I’m looking forward to our lunch tomorrow.

29. APRIL

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It has been very dry and quite cold during April, I have been mainly working in the greenhouses and weeding. The lack of rain certainly didn’t stop the weeds growing. The same goes for the grass on the paths. One of my paths is covered with woodchip but the other two have got grass. That has grown suddenly and I decided to tackle it. I borrowed a strimmer and got down to it.

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I was used to do it with my shears in the past but they are quite blunt so it had to be the strimmer. I’m pleased with the result.

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Of course my friendly robin was very close to me, not sure though if he managed to get any worms.

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The sun came out in the afternoon and as it will be the last day of April tomorrow I’m hopeful that the weather will improve. I will be planting some more cabbages and kale plants. They have been standing in the open veranda so they are quite used to the weather by now.

18. JANUARY

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There are going to be some changes on the farm this year.

As a very first structure I built was a polytunnel – nothing special, a metal frame and a green plastic cover. It was quite big, it was as long as the width of one plot. It was fine for the first few years but then things started going wrong. First of all the zip on the door broke and very soon small holes were appearing in the plastic. I didn’t give up because the frame was sound so I just pulled the plastic cover off and instead of that covered it with green netting. It has been working very well all this time, I have been growing vegetables there every year, rotating the crops regularly.

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A new idea came to me this year – to enlarge my soft fruit area. The fruit cage is full but I have decided to use this tunnel to put my blackcurrants there. To make it accessible for the bees and other pollinators I’ve taken the fine mesh off that was the door and will install a new door made out of pea netting.

All I had to do today was to dig it over, spread a few sacks of compost over and next time I can move the bushes. 

There will be a couple of new ones there, two chuckleberry bushes,and the blackcurrants. The two new bushes will be delivered on Thursday together with a new apple tree.

After I’ve done this I’ll just have one more net cage to sort out and all these structures will be ready.

The next task are strawberry beds. I have started already, all I need to do is to move some plants from another net cage (an old greenhouse covered with fine netting) complete one new bed and then just thin out and weed the others.

The net covered greenhouse will be used to grow broccoli as I never grew broccoli there yet.