Toms tied in & pea-size fruits

I am impressed with how very neat your allotment looks.
Well done :o)))

Thanks, TT! I do my best to keep things tidy & weed free. It's not easy but the soil improver used as mulch makes things a little easier. I put a thick layer on this bed to keep the weeds down & the water in especially as at the time of planting it seemed we might be in for a long, dry summer.

Even after all the rain we have had here, (probably over 2" during June!), the top couple of inches of soil is like grey sand! When you dig down a few inches then you do notice it is damp.

The bed where these Tomatoes are growing has had horse & chicken manure dug into it so it should hold on better to the water.

If only we had a few weeks of warm weather then the plants would grow very well.

Please can you explain any more about "soil improver used as mulch" .. thanks ..
A product you purchase ?

Hello Balc.......your toms are doing better than ours, Moneymaker, and some cherry ones, ours are pea-sized plants! With ours being a walled garden, there isn't so much light as with an open aspect, so they are always late ripening, but this year they are late growing, unless we get some settled sunny weather soon, not sure what's going to happen to them or the runner beans.
I agree with Tt, your allotment looks very well tended, I bet you really enjoy your time there.....let's hope the sun will be shining on us all soon...:0))

Looking very neat and tidy Balcony and all is doing well, as you say we do need a bit more sunshine, haven`t seen the forecast here but hoping its back to sunshine tomorrow as the torch is passing through, plus I want to get back to ordinary gardening chores....

Me too Lincs, I've been pruning my tamarix in between the rain showers, I can't believe the growth on everything!

Looks brill.... I'm getting tomato envy..... Going to keep my eye out for some plants, missed the boat this year, not grew toms for a few years, you're doing a great job with your plot xxx

Very impressive, Balcony - you must have put in a lot of work there.

There's nothing nicer than home grown tomatoes picked straight off the plants. I hope they'll be all right in this wet weather.

Juicy tomatoes after all this rain!
All looking so neat Balcony.

Your allotment looking great.

Thanks everyone for your comments :-))

TT: The "Soil conditioner" comes from the local council's recycling of the green waste it collects from everyone's green bins every fortnight. They have a big industrial plant which turns garden waste into "Soil conditioner". Here we can get as much as we like for free. In other places I believe it's sold in sacks.

Thanks Janey & I'm sorry to hear about your plants being so small this year. I hope if we get a few weeks of "reasonable warmth" that thinks will take off & really start to grow.

Lincslass I think we are forecast more rain for the rest of this week. That's on top of the all the rain we had in June. Official figures show we had DOUBLE the June average this year & it's also been the least sunny June in 20 years!

Thank you so much, Magnadoodle, for your kins comments & I hope you get back to growing your own tomatoes as there is nothing as nice as eating a sun-warmed Tom off the vine! :-))

@ Steragram: Yes, a whole lot of hard great has gone into making the plot look the way it is & it's been done in only 9 months, since September 2011. The help my brother gave me during March was a true Godsend!

I couldn't agree more, Hywel! Since working on the allotments I find I like my fruit sun-warmed, they taste so much better! The soil is still workable in spite of the rain - one of the advantages I suppose of gardening over sand & gravel subsoil is that the water drains away quickly! I'd hate to have to garden on clay soil during this wet weather!

I hope they will turn out to be juicy, Lulu, with or without any more rain as I put a lot of horse manure & some chicken manure below those beds!

Clarice I'd pleased you think my plot looks nice! :-)) I do my best to keep it as tidy & organized as much as possible - while tending to Gerry's as well! His are not looking as tidy as the 2 previous years I've shared his allotments.

Balcony ..
Is the garden waste treated so that it doesn't contain diseases or weed seeds etc ?

Well it is heated to a high temp & is actually steaming when it is on the piece of ground where it is dumped. It is like a manmade "hill" & even when it has been there for several days when you dig into the sides to get fresh conditioner out it comes with a lot of steam & you can feel the heat.

It is supposed to be sterile & so far it doesn't seem to have caused any harm. If it is put on thick enough it does seem to keep annual weeds at bay. However it seems propitious for the growth of new weed seeds, probably brought in by birds or the winds coupled with all the rain we have had during the last few months. These new weeds are easily pulled out - but they do form lovely root systems! LOL!