Karen's Cauliflowers

Arrived at the plot where Karen was just leaving. She was over the moon with these really nice cauliflowers.

Now if you don't understand how someone can be so happy with 3 cauliflowers, then you're on the wrong web site!!

Brassica Bed

The brassicas on plot 29 within a protective cage to keep the pigeons off. Without the cage they'd be lucky to last a day with the pigeons that live in the woods next to the site and seem think we grow to feed them!

It helps, a little, to keep the butterflies out but to be really effective I'd need a finer meshed netting system.

There's sprouts, cabbages and cauliflowers in there.

Main Greenhouse

The tomatoes have taken off in the main greenhouse along with a few lettuces. The peppers are quite small but they have fruits developing so they must be a dwarf variety.

This year I was so behind that I bought plants from a nursery rather than raising my own from seed as I usually do, so I don't know what variety they are.

Onions Drying on Plot 5

I'd scrounged some scrap wood from a builder who also gave me the decking an some weldmesh covered gates.  I stupidly gave one of those away as I could have used 2 of them to lay the onions out on.

Not a bad crop from the spring planted sets. Once again, I usually do onions from seeds but sets are a great backstop if you're behind as you can get away with a slightly later planting.

Onions Drying on Plot 29

Val's sizing up the strawberry beds - we had 6 lbs in one picking and have had small pickings since, which are just right with some cream as a pudding.

The onions are drying on a frame I built from some 2" x 1" and chicken wire a few years back. In front of them are some dwarf French beans.

Harvesting Potatoes

I love harvesting potatoes. You never know what the fork is going to turn up. This is a sight to gladden the heart, some nice sized spuds in there.

It's a bit like playing cards.. will it be an ace or will it be a joker?

Results of a row of potatoes

This is one row of Swift first early potatoes in the barrow. A little slug damage on a few and a few 'splits' but not a bad result.

The fork is my flat-tined long-handled potato fork that was given me by my father-in-law. It must be lucky, I only stabbed one potato on the row!

Split Potatoes

I had a plotholder ask what had gone wrong with her potatoes as they came out like these. These split potatoes were from a plant on the end of the row.

The problem is uneven watering. The plant gets dry and then when watered grows like mad, causing the skins to split and fissures to appear. We'll still be able to use the majority of the potato although they won't store for long.

Brassica Bed on Plot 5

Dodging between the rain showers, I managed to get the rest of the brassicas planted out and netted up to keep the dreaded pigeons off.

These are all club-root resistant varieties so I'm hoping they'll do OK despite there being some club-root on this bed.