5th August 2006
All week I had been monitoring the gradual decline of my dwarf tomatoes as they succumbed to some kind of dark patches. We were informed today by Nigel and Gordon that it was almost definitely blight. Today was the day where we actually had to rip the affected plants from the ground. It was very sad for me because tomatoes are like my little babies. So far only three plants had shown signs of the disease so we pulled these up and threw them on what would eventually be a bonfire.
I spent some of the day weeding the top of the plot with Tim. I did it by hand while he used the hoe. I had to weed with a trowel because I was weeding in between the closely spaced leeks. I weeded between the beetroots and swedes as well. Tim chopped some of the leaves off the courgette plants to hopefully encourage them to fruit a bit more because it had become like a jungle with their big spikey leaves! The courgettes were thin on the ground now. I think we may have exhausted them as we have harvested so many courgettes that we have had to make fried courgettes, roasted courgettes, ratatouille, courgette pie, courgette cake, courgette pavlova etc.
I dug up a couple of potatoes plants to see how well they were doing and they were marvellous! There were around twenty potatoes with one Maris Piper plant and just over ten for one Desiree plant. Isn't it amazing that you just stick a tuber in the ground and you can get so much back? Although there are a few disappointments along the way with growing veg, such as tomato blight, the good things always seem to outweigh the bad. We are still amazed with what we have achieved with a patch of land that had just been a load of brambles.
12th August 2006
Blight. Who invented it? It's rubbish! It's ruining our tomatoes! Also, it seems that some creature has decided to eat our sweetcorn without our permission. Where's Dick Dastardley and Muttley to catch them bloody pigeons?
Tim had been up the plot earlier than I had today and cleared all the weeds and brambles that were at the bottom of our plot. We just had to go through the remnants of the bonfire we'd had. The soil within the bonfire pile looked great. We'll have to burn things more often.
After pulling up all my bush tomatoes, because they had all caught tomato flu, I gathered up all the un-blighted tomatoes in the vain hope that they might ripen. I then helped Tim who was cutting the foliage off the maincrop potatoes so that the potato skins will hopefully harden a little. We also cut some of the brambles back that had been growing through the fence.
Tim put some canes in with the raspberry plants to support them. It looked really good after he'd finished putting them in. It was like a wall of fruit. We'd been meaning to do this for ages but just never got round to it. Tim also tried digging the ground a bit to try and transplant a grapevine we found. The ground was so hard and dry that one of the prongs of his fork bent back.
We also found a little stowaway in the greenhouse in the way of a frog. It must be drawn to the pool of water that just doesn't drain away. We had done well and went home to eat some Swiss Chard.
The weather forecast for today was for rain ALL DAY. As a result, Tim and I decided to take the day off. We were very disappointed, however, when it didn't rain whatsoever. Despite our day off, we still managed to harvest some veg. Our fridge container has a load of tomatoes that we have been able to pick and they are absolutely delicious! It's nice to know that although we have had a tomato setback in the way of blight, we are still getting a good crop of tomatoes that have been unaffected by blight... touch wood!
Tim had been up at the allotment since 10am and I arrived at 3pm. I had the week off work and had wanted to do some work up on the allotment today. However, because I had been off elsewhere for my holiday I wasn't able to get there on time. Tim had weeded the plot thoroughly. We went round the plot and pulled some carrots and beetroots. We have found that Carrot Nelson F1 has produced much more reliable, thick and long carrots than Early Nantes did. I am looking forward to seeing how the Autumn Kings turn out so that we know what to grow for next year.
We also decided to pull some parsnips to see how they were doing. The first one we uncovered was massive. The other two we picked were a little straggly with lots of tendril like roots. We also picked some aubergines as we had a glossy black one and a neon purple one. They look beautiful and taste fabulous. We had a little crop of Red Baron onions and picked a load of different types of beans in the way of Cherokee Trail of Tears beans, runners and Borlotti Beans.
We have also been trying our best to save as many seeds as possible for next year. The Cherokee Trail of Tears beans, for example, have been left to go to seeds which in this case, has meant that the pods have turned a deep purple colour. Tim had started out two years ago with just eight beans to plant - they were a rare heirloom variety. Now we have managed to save a load of seed as we want to grow a LOT of this variety.
It's so nice to harvest so many different things. In fact, we even managed to swap a butternut squash for one of Roger's cabbages. This allotment malarkey is fabulous! It's just a shame that Tim did all the work today.
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AUGUST
2006 PART ONE
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AUGUST
2006 PART ONE
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AUGUST
2006 PART TWO
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AUGUST
2006 PART TWO