Anyone with an allotment?

I’ve planted some spinach called Good King Henry. It’s supposed to have very few pests.

Obviously if there’s nothing left to eat they might eat it

Don’t do it!!!!

I won't... probably. I've got little kids up on the plot so saftey first, and am also a tightarse, so prefer not to spend too much if possible. I am pretty mifed, though. :(

Crushed eggshells (need to know someone who likes eggs. A lot. You need a fair amount to spread around the plant base.)
Or sharp sand I think also annoys them enough to move along?

I'm sure my pond residents help control the sl*gs .

Which green manure are you using? I think I'll need to give my patch some this year. Everything seems to be slow growing so I think I've taken to much out without putting any goodness back in the soil.

It was just a manure seed mix from the local garden centre. Mostly sweet pea and rye from the looks of it. I foolishly planted enough to fill a meadow in a 6x3ft bed, then left it til it was waist high as had other stuff to focus on.
Eventually strimmed it down, raked most off and dug it all in. It’s been covered for a few months and the root clods are nearly all gone now.

I’m sure if you read the packet you’d be able to use the bed straight away(that’s the idea) instead of losing the bed for a whole year...

Thanks.

I’m considering a small pond at the allotment for this exact reason

L-R
Half a row of first earlies (foremost)
Half a row of second earlies (Sagitta)
A full row of second earlies (Apache - saved seed potato with the comically long chits)

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The seed-saving with apache potatoes was a bit disappointing yield-wise. Not sure whether that was down to saving the seed or the fact they chitted so much - some were over a foot long. Possibly just the weather/disease - the lack of rain and cold in april didn't help and the entirity of may was one long smith/hutton period.

The ones that got more shade (for all the spuds I lifted) seemed to do better. Half the row of the Apache just pretty much wilted off and didn'd do a lot. I've got some saved-seed sarpo mira maincrop which appear to be doing well and they have the most shaed of all. So we'll see how they go.

/csb

Looks good, interesting to see what you got from the long chits. I’m not looking forward to lifting ours (in the next few days). Plants look rubbish compared to previous years.

Forgot to put the Sagitta (which I’d bought) out to chit in the light for a while and they had pretty long chits too, nowhere near as long as the Apache I’d saved myself but certainly not ‘normal’ style chits. They have cropped the best out of all the varieties I planted, more weight from fewer plants lifted. The think I noticed with the long chits was that the plants sprouted much quicker than they have before.

I think the issue with the ones I saved may have been how dry the spuds had got. They didn’t have the energy to keep growing through April’s drought and the more exposed ones (less shade) just couldn’t out compete the weeds, plus they all seemed to get a bit of disease. Still produced some spuds, though. Potatoes are a great survivor.

Found a photo of the Sagitta going in.

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Here are my potatoes. We had a harvest festival. 6 people, 4 dishes and they were all gone. So tasty.

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• IMG_3183.HEIC

Nice! Any recipes?

Gooseberries picked, made some mini crumbles as only had 600g of them :(

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We started with a potato based breakfast skillet, then for lunch, had potato dauphinois, a potato salad and goose fat potatoes.
I'm not new to gardening but am new to growing veges so yesterday, took up more of the paving slabs down the back of the garden (and 10 rubble bags of all sorts of waste! ) so I could double the size of the potato patch and dug in 200l of homemade compost. Maybe, we'll have enough for a 2 day festival next year!

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With artichokes do you cut them back to the ground or leave them?

Small but importantly varied allotment haul :) and round cucumbers!

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Nice haul. Went up yesterday after a week off. One squash has got huge and the rest of the plants are getting battered by slugs. Sweetcorn doing well, onions have fallen over so will harvest fairly soon.

round cucumbers!

They look like Lemon Cucumbers - I grew them a few years ago but they were either tasteless (even for a cucumber) or very bitter.
Hope yours aren't.

Tried one, they’re really nice!

they’re really nice!
👍

These Rondo de Nice are a handy size.

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Those are cool

Not a pretty sight ...

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