Do You Know Your Onions? We Don't!

Onions. Easy to grow. Reliable. But so cheap in the shops, why bother? There are very different schools of thought on the topic of growing your own onions....

Above is our "Avenue Of The Allium Sepa", a lovely view between our onion rows. We've gone for one row each of white and red, and we definitely think that an allotment ain't proper until there are some onions maturing nicely and quietly somewhere.

Our white onions are Senshyu Yellow, grown from sets. We planted 21 sets and miraculously all 21 of our white variety survived and thrived. So from a VFM point of view, Senshyu Yellows can't be beat. We're looking forward to trying one when they tell us that they're ready. Until then we just keep admiring them as they swell and look marvellous.

Our red onion variety this year is Electric. Of the 21 sets planted just 15 of them made it. And overall they are smaller than the white ones, but that's OK. Again, we can't wait to see how they taste.

The onions are housed between the swede and beetroot, and they seem to all be getting on very amiably. One good tip I have discovered is.....

....give the onions a top dressing of potash in June. If they get even better then brilliant, if they don't, nae bother! So, onions on the allotment, yes or no? For us it is the easiest answer - YES!

New Balls Please!

We all know that poking out your own eyeball on a stray cane is one of the perils of allotmenteering, thankfully a rare occurrence. But what do you use to prevent it happening? Old plastic bottles? Plasticine? Dolls' heads? (Is that too sinister?)

As previously described we have named our growing beds Tom, Dick and Harry. We wanted to have some eye protection but to make it a little individual and special to Plot 13D. After much discussion among the whole family I (the head gardener, obvs) decided that we would use cheap ping pong balls, and paint them to colour code the three beds. Everybody agreed, after I told them to do so....

The table tennis balls were obtained for a ridiculously low price on the Interweb, and we used our modelling paints to create our masterpieces - yellow for Tom, green for Dick and red for Harry. They certainly have brightened up our space, and I like them. We've had no opinion form our allotment neighbours yet....

Our First Attempt At Comfrey Tea

We'd heard all the rave reviews for this free wonder-food for plants, with the odd name of "comfrey tea" - what the heck is it? Well it turns out that you need a comfrey plant or two to get going (unsurprisingly) so we got one planted and it has come back thriving and healthy this year.

Step One - Find a nice clean bucket/container, with a tight lid. Alternatively a nice plastic milk bottle will do absolutely fine. Allow both parties to spend a little time together before the magic happens, so they can exchange family details etc, and generally feel comfortable in each other's company.

Remove comfrey leaves/stems about 20cm long (that's eight inches in old-fashioned), half a dozen is ideal. Comfrey leaves have a LOT of tiny soft prickles on the underside, so wearing gloves is recommended. Pop them into the bottle (or container).

Add water up to about a couple of centimetres from the top. You DO NOT need secateurs at this point, no idea why they are in this picture. Shake the bottle to agitate the leaf and water mixture.

 

Final step is to store somewhere secure. In five weeks there should be a lovely liquid plant feed, which you dilute in water to the ratio one part comfrey tea, ten parts water. What a brilliant, cheap, natural aid to help your garden grow!

 

16 Apr 17 - What's Growing?

 

This year "Tom" is for our root veg, there are three rows of potatoes in nearest the camera. Bit further away there are two rows of onions, one each of white and red varieties, and at the far end two rows of carrots which seem to be doing well. On the right we planted way too much garlic, and there's also half a row of spring onion just sown. We just want some lovely growing weather now!

 

In the middle is "Dick", this year's legumes bed. Nothing here so far except the bean frame that Sam built last week (good work dude) and next to that half a row of newly-sown cos lettuce.

However, the runner beans seedlings are going great guns at home and we're looking forward to seeing them in the ground at Plot 13D....

 

And finally there's "Harry", which in 2017 will be home to brassicas etc. Just one row of radish and half a row of spinach sown so far, within the last day or two.

 

And on the other side nothing is happening apart from the rhubarb and strawberries - disappointingly, JP has so far done nothing with the area that he pestered us to let him have for himself....

15 Apr 17 - Long Day, Hard Work

I spent five hours working on the allotment on Saturday, the time flew by and the results are rather pleasing. The far end veg bed (aka "Harry") was completely overgrown when I arrived, but by the time I left it was cleared, levelled, fertilised and sown with a row of radish (Scarlet Globe).

We've placed some spare thick planks in between Tom, Dick and Harry, they act well as paths and add definition and good looks (in my opinion).

The strawberry box was weeded, fertilised and the strawbs given a nice new cosy bed of hay (90p per bag from the pet shop in Seaford).

The rhubarb is in full growth and was intruding onto JP's section of ground, so I dug a trench and boxed it in a little with yet another plank. I also plucked the first three stalks, and they'll be eaten later on Monday in a crumble for tea.

This chap was also spotted nestling bold as brass in amongst the garlic, we're not sure if it is harmful or not but as long as he doesn't cause any mischief we're happy for him to stay for a while...

Competition Win - And The Spuds Are In!

We struck it lucky on Friday when we won a packet of lovely Purple Prince zinnia seeds from Mister Fothergill's Seeds. There will be way too many for us so if you fancy some small plants to place in your own garden let us know!

We also popped our first earlies and maincrop potatoes in at the weekend, first earlies are Pentland Javelin and the mains are Maris Piper. Have you any experience of growing these for yourself?

Very chuffed to see our onions apparently romping away and loving being able to stretch their roots in open ground. All the white onions have taken but only 15 of 21 red onion sets have made it.

Fertiliser Experiment - Miracle-Gro Chicken Manure or Westland Jack's Magic?

 

We are experimenting! We're using two off the shelf fertilisers on our growing beds Tom, Dick and Harry, and are fascinated to see if there is a difference in performance. It's Miracle Gro's Chicken Manure versus Westland's Jack's Magic fertiliser....

The recommended amounts have been applied to the beds, splitting each in half, lengthways. Our rows will be crossways, so each crop will grow in equal amounts of both competitors.

You can barely see the dressing but it's there. So interested to see if there is a difference in yield.

Perfect Garden Day

What a beautiful day Sunday was, dawned warm and sunny and stayed that way all day long. For the first time this year I enjoyed the first cuppa of the day outside, among the feeding birds and a garden full of new season potential.

I just pottered in the home garden all day long (with a break to watch the Australian Grand Prix, obvs). We've decided to remove the rampant holly bushes this year, so I attacked the first blighter - which proved to be rather stronger than the aged fork that I have been using to work the compost! Ooops. Another one bites the dust.....

Next job was to empty out the pots then refill them with compost and fertiliser. Ruth will probably be all creative when it's time to plant them up.

We saved a lot of seeds from last year's tallest sunflower, so these were popped in today. Everybody loves a sunflower right? Wrong! My son Sam thinks they are the work of the devil! Hard lines Sam, we're growing them anyway.

The tomato bags were also refilled and fertilised, and moved into position. Our tomatoes last year were fabulous and gave us more fruit than we could manage. Same again in 2017 please.

My final little project was to turn the compost. Everyone else sees this as my crazy little scheme, but they will love it when we have a lovely source of homemade crumbly plant food. It's doing OK but is a little on the slimy side, so there will be much more brown stuff going in this week. Back in you go....

March Dawns

Beautiful day in South Lincolnshire and it coincided with a day off. Result! After heading to the farm shop for some high quality Lincolnshire sausages, popping to the storage to retrieve my orienteering kit for this weekend's big race, and popping to Sleaford for Friday tea for the family, I headed to the allotment. Plot 13D was warm and sunny.

We have experimented with carrots this year. We sowed seeds last summer and the seedlings have over-wintered outside, so they should - in theory - be capable of handling any weather from March onwards! We shall see. Here they are waiting to hop out of pops and into the ground.

And they're in! Good luck little plants. Eat you (hopefully) in a few months.

As with most allotmenteers we are getting the place into shape right now. We're splitting into three beds for crop rotation, which will be named Tom, Dick and Harry, a la Great Escape. Tom is at the far end here and will be home to our root veg this year. Dick is currently empty, and Harry houses our greenhouse Meccano set.

Today also saw two varieties of onion sets popping in, one red, one white. Yes it's cheap and easy to buy veg such as onions, but NOWHERE near as satisfying....

So here we are. Garlic, carrots, onions and strawberries in the ground. It's such an exciting time on the allotment!

A Shambles - And A List

I spent a relaxed couple of hours at Plot 13D yesterday, did some "very" gentle pottering then sat down to compose a list of jobs that need to be done. As you can see, the place looks terrible at the moment.

The list is as follows:

Rubbish to tip

Cut back raspberries and lift

Plant onion sets

Mark out Tom, Dick and Harry

Sort greenhouse frame into sizes

Email council - thank for cutting back trees and ask re composter

Repair strawberry netting

Repair racks and assess if OK to use

Plant 2 X strawberries in box

Plant carrot seedlings

Buy and chit potatoes

Move slabs, table and chairs and green box to Plot 13D

Pay for 2017-18

Pea spirals to house?

But 2 X steel stakes and strong wire for raspberries

Plastic protection on "public side" of greenhouse?

Sieve home made compost

More straw on strawberries

Dead rhubarb?

Weed resistant membrane under greenhouse

Buy the wheelbarrow

Bookcase from storage for greenhouse

Measure garlic plot and adjust planting plan

 

Quite a list to get the year up and running....

Too Cold - Frustration Abounds!

It's been so cold, foggy and claggy for what seems like weeks now. Typical winter weather of course but very frustrating for the Plot 13D team! We're just itching to get down to preparing the allotment for the start of the growing season.

Instead I have to make do with the odd little job here and there. Today was washing the plant pots ready for the growing season, to get rid of any possible lingering pests or diseases lurking in dried-on soil. Didn't use fresh water of course, we used last night's bath water, nice recycling....

The compost has also been turned over and it looks like a decent drop of stuff is developing. Added the contents of the shredder to add some "brown" and put it back to bed.

Garlic Progress?

We planted quite a lot of garlic last autumn....and it seems to be doing OK so far. If we manage to harvest all this lot our breath is going to be REALLY pongy....

Of course we couldn't resist digging one up to see how it's getting on - and it looks good. Nicely formed root, all we need is for them so survive winter then fill out before we harvest.

Here We Are In 2017!

And so we enter the second year of Plot 13D. The allotment hasn't done too badly, unattended, for a month or two, so we're now ready to get it prepared for spring.

From the east....with the dismantled greenhouse lurking threateningly in the foreground....

The the fence side from the east, featuring JP! The council have chopped back the huge bush just over the fence (thank you), but a lot of the branches fell onto our side (no thanks at all). Nothing there this winter so nae borra....

And from the west, with bolted spinach and spring onions closest to camera.

And the fence side from the west, sorry about the glare. The strawbs don't look great in their box....

After a couple of hours I had prepped the area and joined the bits on the top left and top centre. In between them is our garlic bed.

The greenhouse will be a real asset when it's up....but for now it just lies there, intimidatingly.

Next job is to move these aluminium struts and prep this area too.

JP has been allowed his own area this year. He marked it out today, forked it over, and can be seen here peering through the fence. No idea why!

5 September 2016 - Looking at Christmas Dinner & Beyond

We planted four nice rows of garlic cloves - wonder how many of them will make it?

There were a few unwanted visitors - tortoiseshell perhaps?

We had confusion with the carrots we sowed for winter - which were the carrot seedlings and which were weeds?

In a bid to have home-grown new potatoes we planted half a dozen maris piper tubers.

Good luck little potatoes, see you in three months!