The Summer Allotments (July 2012)

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The Summer Allotments (July 2012)

This is the 2nd blog on the Summer Allotments. This time I will show you some of the things growing during the 7th month of the year on Gerry’s allotment.

Amaryllis

Everybody on here has seen my Amaryllis in flower but not many will have seen them during the summer months when I take them down to the allotment. So here are a couple of pictures:

Cucumber ‘Marketmore’

The Cucumbers ‘Marketmore’ I sowed a few months ago in the greenhouse have now started to yield their first fruits! Here is a couple of of photos of the first fruit to be picked:

They look quite cheerful when in flower in the greenhouse, as you can see here:

Garlic

I lifted these Garlic bulbs earlier than I had originally planned on doing as they were infected with Alluim Rust & with all the wet weather we were having I thought they might not last in the soil & also to stop the Rust from spreading into the bulbs:

Last year I lifted some Garlic bulbs from a different part of the plot but I didn’t realize at the time that I’d left a couple of heads in the ground! When I noticed them growing again that had been growing for some time. So I left them to grow! Here then is the result:

A fellow allotmenteer gave me some Leek seedlings he had left over last year. As I had no place to put them at that time he said it would be alright to just heel them in for a few weeks, which I did – only the weeks turned into months! Now you can see them here in flower!:

Lettuce ‘Paris Island Cos’

Here is a photo of the Lettuce ‘Paris Island Cos’, which I started off a few weeks earlier in the greenhouse, just planted out on the plot:

Just a few weeks later & look how they have grown!:

Onions ‘Sturon’ from sets

When my brother was here with us during March he helped me on the allotment & one of the first things we planted were these Onions ‘Sturon’ which we planted from sets in a bed in front of the greenhouse:

Pinto beans

The Pinto beans I planted in this bed have now put out their true leaves, these will grow till about the end of September when they will have dried enough to harvest:

Potatoes

Potatoes: ‘Arran Pilot’ & Gerry’s unknown variety

In the middle of March my brother & I planted out several bags of new potatoes, mine & Gerry’s. This photo shows Gerry’s unknown variety, though he says he thinks it maybe ‘Picaso’, on the right, & my ‘Arran Pilot’, on the left:

Here you can see just how well the new potatoes, ‘Rocket’, were doing at the beginning of the month:

At the end of the month we harvested them as blight was rampant on the allotments field & practically everybody’s potatoes had been affected:

Tomatoes

Gerry brought these Tomato plants down to the allotment from his greenhouse at home during June & I planted them out for him at one end of the bed that he had 3/4 filled with Sweetcorn plants. He didn’t have enough plants to fill the bed so I put his tomatoes in the remaining space. Here they are a few weeks later when I had finished tying them onto the bamboo canes.

Just a few weeks later they had died from blight!

All the tomatoes I’d planted on my own plot also died, except for two plants which have resisted the blight. So no tomatoes for either of us this year from the allotments! This is the third year for me on the allotments & the first that I haven’t been able to harvested any tomatoes!

Sweetcorn Swift F1

Gerry brought the plants down to the allotment after starting them off at home in his greenhouse & planted them out.

Now you can see the first flowers beginning to form:

Pumpkins at top of plot

I was given two Pumpkin plants by a fellow allotmenteer who said he had more than enough for his needs. I planted them out at the top of Gerry’s plot:

1st flower:

First fruit forming:

Runner beans White seeded

I don’t know where the seeds for these plants came from! They may have come from the plants that were growing on my allotment when I took it over from the previous tenant in September 2011.

Now they are flowering:

Sunflowers

This the very first of the self-sown Sunflowers to show its colour!

This self-sown one has multiple heads, the secondary flowers make excellent cut flowers. The main head is too big & heavy but these are just right!

Sweetpeas

I loved these Sweetpeas Royal Family from the day the first blooms started to open! I brought a big bunch home so my wife could arrange them in our living room & they had a wonderful perfume for days on end!

These self-sown Sweetpeas come from seed that must have dropped off the plants I had in the same place last year. They are absolutely lovely!

Unfortunately the Royal Family Sweetpeas became rather abandoned due to lots of work on other parts of both allotments & here is the result:

I shall save some seeds to grow in the autumn & overwinter for early flowers in 2013!

As I have no photo of the view along the plot from the shed this month I’m showing you some of the flowers that have come into bloom & make the cold, wet British summer a bright, cheery place, to end this month’s blog

Calendula Art Shades

These lovely compact Calendulas were planted at the top of the plot along with a few other flowers to add some colour & to attract bees & butterflies. They were very cheery especially when we had such cold, rainy weather for three months

Self sown Sunflowers

Further above I showed you the first of the Sunflowers to start blooming this year – well here are some more a few weeks later:

I notice that there are lots more flowers in this blog than usual! It was quite unintentional but on the other hand they serve to brighten our spirits during this awful summer of 2012.

See you all next month!

• 6 Oct, 2012
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