The big clear up has started on No 53. We have rather neglected the plot as we have been concentrating on the ducks so much. Ther are loads of apples forming on the trees although I would imaging that they will shed most of them as they are such young trees. The currents have quite a crop that we didn't expect and the gooseberries are plumping out nicely.
The strawberries love their hay bed courtesy of the duck bedding. It smells a bit as you come in the gate but is self fertilising. It seems that duck poo is good for strawberries.
Nick and Matt did a fantastic job finishing the duck compound and I can sleep well now knowing that they have a netting roof to stop the pigeons and magpies getting in a pinching their food. It also gives them greater protection form unmentionable preditors.
Back to gardening on 51 and 52 and the pumpkin, two butternut squash and two scallop squash have gone into the bath. I am confident of a bumper crop as they are growing in pure manure. The rain has done its job and the bucket under the bath plug-hole is steaming away with a lovely dark, thick liquid manure which will be used on the squash that is being planted elsewhere.
Not everything in the greenhouse is edible. I have also been thinking ahead to Basingstoke Gardening show and trying to exceed out rosette number from last year so I am cultivating a couple of hanging baskets to be able to enter one in the show. This is the pink and purple option. There is also a red and yellow, a red and while and an everything that was left over option. I am not sure that they will keep going until the end of July but fingers crossed there will be one that will make the grade.
Rebecca and I had a bottle and tomato planting session. We got 14 in the bed next to the small greenhouse, interspersed with marigolds to keep the greenfly away. There are also 30 in the big bed that has been heavily manured. I am worried how we are going to keep 44 tomato plants watered in the hot summer that we are expecting but we will do our best.
We also planted 48 celery plants in the space between the canes from the beans. There is one bed of butter beans and another with the barlotto beans and black and white kidney beans. The theory is that the celery will grow more slowly so by the time the beans are finished the celery will be growing well underneath and ready to pull lush heads of crunchy celery. That is the theory anyway.
I have been showing off my heritage purple podded peas. You may remember that I got the seeds at the potato festival. You will need to click on the image to see them properly but they really do look unusual.
Back to 53 and we cut the lovage back to find that the fig has about a dozen figs forming. It is at the bottom of the plot where the water drains so fingers crossed they will not drop. The size that they are now would indicate that they will ripen well and we will have fully grown ripe figs by August.
That is about it for the update from this weekend except to add that there is someone on the allotment who has the right idea - Molly the allotment cat. She lives here and who can blame her as Ted feeds her such luxuries as chicken, salmon and gammon to supplement her diet of baby rabbit which she seems an expert at catching and depositing outside peoples gates. She has found that black membrane fabric absorbs the sun and it is her favourite place for her afternoon nap.
The big clear up has started on No 53. We have rather neglected the plot as we have been concentrating on the ducks so much. Ther are loads of apples forming on the trees although I would imaging that they will shed most of them as they are such young trees. The currents have quite a crop that we didn't expect and the gooseberries are plumping out nicely.
The strawberries love their hay bed courtesy of the duck bedding. It smells a bit as you come in the gate but is self fertilising. It seems that duck poo is good for strawberries.
Nick and Matt did a fantastic job finishing the duck compound and I can sleep well now knowing that they have a netting roof to stop the pigeons and magpies getting in a pinching their food. It also gives them greater protection form unmentionable preditors.
Back to gardening on 51 and 52 and the pumpkin, two butternut squash and two scallop squash have gone into the bath. I am confident of a bumper crop as they are growing in pure manure. The rain has done its job and the bucket under the bath plug-hole is steaming away with a lovely dark, thick liquid manure which will be used on the squash that is being planted elsewhere.
Not everything in the greenhouse is edible. I have also been thinking ahead to Basingstoke Gardening show and trying to exceed out rosette number from last year so I am cultivating a couple of hanging baskets to be able to enter one in the show. This is the pink and purple option. There is also a red and yellow, a red and while and an everything that was left over option. I am not sure that they will keep going until the end of July but fingers crossed there will be one that will make the grade.
Rebecca and I had a bottle and tomato planting session. We got 14 in the bed next to the small greenhouse, interspersed with marigolds to keep the greenfly away. There are also 30 in the big bed that has been heavily manured. I am worried how we are going to keep 44 tomato plants watered in the hot summer that we are expecting but we will do our best.
We also planted 48 celery plants in the space between the canes from the beans. There is one bed of butter beans and another with the barlotto beans and black and white kidney beans. The theory is that the celery will grow more slowly so by the time the beans are finished the celery will be growing well underneath and ready to pull lush heads of crunchy celery. That is the theory anyway.
I have been showing off my heritage purple podded peas. You may remember that I got the seeds at the potato festival. You will need to click on the image to see them properly but they really do look unusual.
Back to 53 and we cut the lovage back to find that the fig has about a dozen figs forming. It is at the bottom of the plot where the water drains so fingers crossed they will not drop. The size that they are now would indicate that they will ripen well and we will have fully grown ripe figs by August. 
That is about it for the update from this weekend except to add that there is someone on the allotment who has the right idea - Molly the allotment cat. She lives here and who can blame her as Ted feeds her such luxuries as chicken, salmon and gammon to supplement her diet of baby rabbit which she seems an expert at catching and depositing outside peoples gates. She has found that black membrane fabric absorbs the sun and it is her favourite place for her afternoon nap.
