Allotment Tales 24th September 2026

A lovely sunny day at Bridgend Caley with a few blustery gusts, the heavy rain the previous day had clearly given the grass and pesky weeds a great boost!!!
It’s been a very good year for apples, there has been such an abundance of beautifully coloured apples it’s a lovely sight to see when you enter the plot…before the hard work begins! More apples were harvested today, and the stored apples checked for any rotten apples, these were removed to prevent them from spoiling the remaining fresh apples.

The raspberries and soft fruit had a summer prune, a wee bit later than usual but nevertheless an important job, to make sure we get more delicious fruit next year.
We harvested a bumper crop from the last of our potato beds including Maris Piper & Cara – with a couple of monster tatties which, would have done us proud at the last Show and Grow event at Saughton. We even managed to harvest some pink fir apple potatoes from a small crop we had last year, which was lucky, as apparently there was no supply of this delicious nutty flavoured potato across the UK!

We harvested runner beans, french beans, beetroot, baby swede, raspberries and blueberries, cleared the sweet pea bed and tackled as much weeding as we could.

The previous weekend we hosted a keen cohort who attended the Preparing for Autumn & Winter workshop. The activities included sowing field bean green manure. The field beans will fix nitrogen into the soil, break up any heavy clay soil with its deep roots and suppress winter weeds (hurray!!). Plus Garcua garlic and Senshyu onions – an over wintering Japanese variety – were planted to use empty ground and hopefully provide an early crop nest year.
We discussed making good compost, the importance of keeping tools clean and sharp and even managed to apply mulch around the blackcurrant and redcurrant bushes. Always good to be able to encourage and support other growers!

Jobs for next week
Check apples for ripeness
Clean and sharpen tools
Mow the grass
Weeding beds and paths
Prepare for winter