2nd Stint!

Today I spent about an hour on my second stint at the gooseberry bushes of doom! Here's my progress:


I have to post progress, otherwise I'll just lose heart at how little progress I seem to be making! Can you see the difference? (See how I talk as though someone is listening?!)

I also pruned the grapevine and blackcurrant bushes. The blackcurrant bushes only needed dead wood taking off, and there wasn't very much of that. Here's a picture of the grapevine, just for the record:

I need to weed around it sometime. Yet more digging. I hope the pruning is done OK. It's not quite how I thought it would be. Oh well, we'll see.

Garlic in the Ground

The Garlic that arrived recently had instructions to put into the ground by early december, or else in the new year. I don't trust me keeping it until the new year, so I wanted to get it in now. Once again though, events are getting in the way! Lil'Girly came down with a bug, so playgroup was out last week. It's Christmas events for the next 2 Wednesdays, so I have to give up a Monday to get the Garlic in. So instead of Christmas shopping, I headed up in the freezing cold (and it was *cold*!) to lift up the mixed lettuces, and put the garlic in.

The garlic variety is 'Solent Wight', and when planted in November it should be ready in July - once the foliage turns yellow and dry. I'm assuming that I can take a couple of the bulbs from this years crop as next years starters. So much learning!


Here's a picture of them before I covered up the cloves. I hope they are far enough apart. I also put them possibly a bit too far in the ground, but the onions sets are showing bulb so I have put the garlic a little lower.
The garlic is in next to the big gal's wall flowers. One of them is flowering - in December! Awww.

The onions are growing well - here's how far they've got. I'm really pleased to think that I might get something useful from the allotment this year!

Next Year's Seeds!

Here's next year's seeds - it's just so exiting!!! I know, I'm going a bit overboard with it all, but I am excited!!

For next year I have carrots (on a seed tape - I'll see how it goes), peppers (DH's choice), sweetcorn (extra sweet - I'm hoping to convert Big Girlie), pumpkins, tomatoes and leeks.

I also have some garlic that's in the picture too, and some seed potatoes comings. Oh, and some Rhubarb!

I'm so exited, and I just can't hide it, La La la la la etc

I just hope I get enough allotment dug over to get it all in!!

So it's gonna take a while.....

I thought to myself, let's get all those weeds out from the gooseberry bushes. It won't take too long, and then I'll have better access to them for pruning. Hey, it can only take one 'stint'. Won't it?

Well, no. It won't. It's going to take quite a few stints. I started today, and in just over an hour, this is how much I got done:



Not a lot.

Oh well, at least it's a start. Can you see the bushes? There's even the blackcurrant bushes in the foreground. Gotta keep going!

Strawberries In And Update!

I haven't been up to the allotment nearly as much as I would like over the last few weeks. It has been half term, followed by one thing and another. The latest has been marking - it takes priority over most things.

Today however the strawberries arrived, with instructions to put into the ground immediatly! And so I went to the allotment this savo with the mission of putting the strawberries in. I have put them into the bed that had the failed potatoes. I am a little worried that there may be a few baby potatoes in there even though the plants didn't grow too well. Every now and then I come across some teeny spuds. I hope they don't grow into 'weeds' next year in between my strawberries.


Here is a picture of the strawberry plants as they cam from Suttons in the post this morning. They look very bare and small. Let's hope that they know what they are doing and they grow up big and strong.


The leaflet says that I should remove all flowers for the first year. What! No strawberries next year? I want strawberries! Boo Hoo..... (I think I'm going to be a bit naughty and let a few flowers through....)

In other news.......

The lettuces are still strong, although the frost has taken it's toll. I think the time has come to dig them out. Still, I'm pleased at how well the raised bed/copper tape worked at at stopping the slugs.

Talking of copper tape, on the strawberry bed the tape is hanging off in places (see the strawberries pic). So I definately need to do something to make it stay put.

In the background of the letttuce bed is the onion bed. Can you see a few onions sticking up? Yay - the onions (or at least some of them) are growing. As well as lots of grass. I tried digging up some of the grass, but it looks like it is a little tuft on the top, attached to a huge couch grass root underneath. I think I need the onions to be more established before I have a proper go at digging it all up......

That's all for now, Folks!

Daffs in! Potatoes Died :-(

The title says it all really.

I wasn't expecting much from the potatoes really - it was the wrong time of year, but it was worth a shot. It means that I can now use the potato bed for the strawberries when they arrive - always a silver lining.....

The raspberry canes that I put in are looking healthy, so that's good. The picture in the previous post was actually taken today, so they have been in 2 weeks and are looking healthy.

The blackcurrant cuttings are also looking healthy. The buds are green, so that's good, and I'm assuming that spring is when they will spring. Can't wait to see if they do!

And I should have some daffs for the kitchen in spring!

Raspberry Canes

I have very kindly been given some offshoots from a friends raspberry canes, which I have duly got into the ground. Unfortunately, I didn't get up to the allotment on Wednesday, so I didn't get things done that I was hoping to do. On Thursday morning I dragged lil'girly up, but she was pretty unimpressed at being there in the cold. I therefore created a much smaller area for the raspberries than I should have, and they are crammed in a little too tightly. Oh well, if they grow big and strong I'll separate them some more next autumn.