2008 A somewhat different year!

Well I haven't blogged for some time, in fact about a year and a half. No I haven't emigrated. We had a busy 2007 with our eldest son and our daughter both deciding to marry. So, two weddings, no funerals, and a trip around the world just to blow the rest of our savings.


2008 got of to a busy start with lots of catching up at the allotment, and lots of organising as I was in charge of preparing our Allotment Associations 75th Anniversary celebrations.


It's difficult to catch up all that happened in just one blog, but I'll try and blog more often in 2009.

I suppose the highlights in chronological order would be; winning the plot judging competition on 13 July. It's nice to think that your plot is the best out of 120. Getting two 1sts, three 2nds and two 3rds at Driffield Show later in July was another success. I'll not say much about being disqualified with my entry for 10 pods of peas. I couldn't count. I only displayed 9 pods and got the dreaded NTS card (not to schedule).







August brought the Seaton and Sigglesthorne Horticultural Show and the Brandesburton and Leven Show and more tickets and the first of the silverware. A magnificent trophy from B&L for a pair of matching marrows; Table Dainty, grown suspended from wires in my 12' x 4' cold frame, and a cup for spray chrysanthemums. I also got 1st prize for my long carrots which was quite unexpected as it was the first time that I had grown them.


September was the 1st of the Driffield Chrysanthemum Society shows. From about February I had nurtured 25No. 10" pots checking them day and night for water, feed and side shoots, bagging the buds, changing to bloom bags and finally the day had come. Had it been worth it? It sure had. I won first prize in the both the novice cup and the amateur shield. But even more pleasing, I got an award of merit from the National Chrysanthemum Society. Photo to follow.


Disaster, my late blooms for the Driffield Chrysanthemum Society Late show were too late. Show date 15 November. My blooms ready for showing, two weeks later. Well, you can't win them all!


Vegetables that showed well for me in 2008:

Runner Bean - Stenna
Broad Bean - Medwyn Williams seed
Onion Large Exhibition - Kelsae
Onion under 250gm - Hi-tech
Carrot - Graeme Watson selected seed.
Parsnip - Javelin
Tomato - Shirley
Cucumber - Telegraph Improved
Courgette - Black Hawk
Marrow - Table Dainty
Cabbage - Brigadier
Sprout - Brilliant
Fennel - Orion
Peas - Show Perfection
Potatoes - Kestral & Lady Chrystl



I will publish a list of vegetables that I shall be growing for showing in 2009 in a new blog next month.

Cucumbers.

It has been a funny old year for my cucumbers. It didn't start well. I ordered 5 Passanda greenhouse cucumber plants from a well known seed supplier and when they eventually arrived 4 0f them were damaged beyond help. After complaining another 5 were dispatched, 3 were damaged this time. Anyway, I'd already decided to have a go at germinating my own so as well as planting the 3 Passanda variety in the greenhouse I sowed a dozen Marketmore organic outdoor cucumber seeds. The result is that 12 out of 12 seed germinated, a first for me, and I gave a healthy batch away to my fellow allotmenteers having planted 6 in my cold frame. We are now on a cucumber diet. The Passanda cucumber are a F1 Hybrid with all female flowers and other than regular watering, occasional feeding, pinching out the side shoots and regular tying to the vertical cane and horizontal wire they look after themselves. And what a cropper. See picture above and right. All female flowers!



The outdoor Marketmore are not F1's and as they are in a now open top cold frame, I have been pollinating the female flowers with the male stamens. Lots of watering and careful pinching out tendrils and we are starting to get a good crop. The taste of the Marketmore outdoor cucumbers if better than the Passanda but even the Passanda are 100% better than shop bought ones. Both Marketmore and Pasanda are a miniature fruiting type with the cucumbers being cut at their best when about 20cm long, that's 8" in old money! Sorry, that shows my age!


Left: Female with male flower.

Right: Marketmore almost ready for cutting!





I'm claiming cucumber growing 2006 a success. Just wish I had some recipes for cucumbers other than in salads.

Plot Judging

Would you believe it!

This is my 3rd year with an allotment, and following our plot judging day last Saturday I won 2nd prize! I'm dead chuffed with that as I didn't expect to win anything.

So here's some photos of the prize winning allotment!





Sprouts: Two rows of Brilliant and one of Bedfordshire Fill Basket.
Also a row of Drum Head red cabbage.

Lady Di Runner beans, Greyhound and Golden Acre cabbage, Tendergreen French Beans and Hurst Green Shaft peas.

Onions with Shallots pulled and drying in the sumeer sun.

Carotts, parsnips, garlic, pickling onions all surrounded with a ring of marigolds!

What a difference a month makes!

It's now a month since my last posting and the man made bog has finally dried out and allowed the planting of the cauli's and sprouts. I've also managed to transplant Swedes that were sown in cells in the coldframe. They seem to have taken well and are showing new growth, so fingers crossed!

In my last post I'd mentioned that club root had killed off my summer cabbage (greyhound and golden acre) and that I was potting up some more to try again. Well, after a little research on the www, I found an interesting article on how the EC had banned many preventitive cures for club root. Some fungicides were taken off the market because of the astonomical cost involved in providing test data for the EC to grant approval. One of these was a product that had been used for years in helping reduce the effect of club root and is called "Armillatox". On reading their website I found that Armillatox had been reclassified as a greenhouse cleaned but the formula had not been changed. I applied the diluted Armillatox, as recommended, over the affected area, waited three weeks, as recommended, and planted out my rather healthy looking replacements. This was two weeks ago and all seems well. The plants are putting on new growth and look to be strong and healthy. Looks like we'll be have some late summer cabbage afterall.

what's done well!

Spinach..... We've already had three pickings ( two large spanokopita pies and more than a dozen blocks in the freezer. Unfortunately with the dry spell we've had the spinach is now running to seed so it looks like we'll be re-sowing another row for the winter cutting.

Carrots.... I've never had much success due to the pesky carrot fly. Not until this year that is. I've really gone overboard and planted a complete border of marigolds with an inner row of pickling onions and garlic and in between the rows of carrots I've placed 20x20 laths that were painted with neat Jeyes fluid. Not only do the carrots look healthy, but the patch smells clinically clean. Fingers crossed!

Lady Christl...... First early potatoes, we've only had two boilings as I was a bit late with planting but they are delicious.

Lettuce...... I've been told not bring any more home and give them a rest. Well I had planted 20 in the cold frame and about 30 in the boarders. A mixture of Lakeland (Iceberg) and Romano (Cos). The cos won by a mile. Full of flavor, crisp and quite large.


Sarpo Axona.... A potato variety that is supposed to be blight resistant.
Well, they are looking good, no signs of blight but it's still a bit early to claim as a success.







I tried planting the onions at 5" spacing with 12" between the rows this year. I'll be back to 9" with 15" between rows next year as they've been a devil to keep clean of weeds!
Also, the shallots will be spaced at 18" so that I can plant my St George winter cauli's in between. Pete recommended this to me as a space saving idea as the shallots will be ready for lifting by August and the cauli's won't have bulked out too much by then and once the shallots are up they'll have plenty of room. Sounds good and worth a try next year.

That's all for now, more photos with the next posting.

Its stopped raining.

I can't believe the rain we've had this year, and to think that it's less than a month to the longest day and the days getting shorter again. Anyway, it's not raining now and I've had a full day at the allotment.

Jobs done today

1. Managed to rotavate the man made bog; see my first blog and you'll understand!
2. Planted out the sweetcorn.
3. Sowed two rows of Autumn King carrots.
4. Transferred nearly all of the trays of basil, parsley and brassica's from the green house into the coldframe.
5. Planted another six tomato plants into growbags and wired in growing canes.
6. Cut our first lettuce of the season from the growing coldframe; and had it for lunch. Tasted great!

Things that have gone wrong. Not a bad day only one disaster.

1. Looks like the summer cabbage and cauli's have been infected with club root.

I've had a chat with one of my fellow allotmenteers, a man of many years experience, and he has told me of and old fashion remedy. Sounds strange but worth a try! When dibbling in your brassicas, place a small piece of Rhubarb at the bottom of the hole. He was smiling when he said it, but I'll give it a go!

I've had a go at taking some photos of my allotment so here goes.

Row of peas with spaces, damned mice! I've heard of the old saying "when planting peas, sow four, one to rot, one to grow, and one for the pigeon and one for the crow" but where does the mouse come into it? And they're hungry. The next sowing which you can see under the wire protection are being attacked as well. No problem though, as I've planted in fives this time. So hopefully, no row spaces.

Welcome to "the Bog".

This is the patch that I'd left farmyard muck on top of the winter digging to rotavate in this spring. I still can't walk on it without sinking and I recon it will be at least another two week before I can use it.

Big mistake.

And as for tomorrow.

Will probably have it off as the forecast is for more rain! That's gardening.

This is my first post; I'm quite a novice when it comes to "Blogging" so please bear with me!

If this works I hope to publish a weekly report from my allotment in East Yorkshire with what's growing well and what's not! I don't class myself as an expert gardener, so I'll be confessing to my mistakes and, hopefully, showing some of my best produce.

First confession: I spread a thick layer of farmyard manure on top of my winter digging last year. The idea was to rotavate it in this spring. I'll not do that again. I've managed to rotavate it in, at last, but the land is still to wet to walk on and with all of the rain we've had in East Yorkshire I still haven't managed to plant anything on this patch of land. Lesson learnt. Dig in your manure as you go along during the winter.

I'll be sending some photographs with my next submission.