Beautiful Blossom on the allotment.

Posted May 14, 2018

A sunny day but still a cold wind. All of the apples are covered in amazing display of blossom. The saskatoon (Amelanchier alnifolia) is in full flower too.

The cold spring is definitely affecting germination. Carrot seed sown three weeks ago is still not showing and the beetroot, sown at the same time, has only a few seedlings just above ground. The first of the potatoes are just showing so time to earth them up and cover the leaves so they don’t get frosted.

We are a little late for sowing next winter’s brassicas and parsnips as well as the courgettes, marrows and squashes, so plants were bought in and the brassicas were planted out today – purple sprouting broccoli, winter cabbage, red cabbage and parsnips. These are good sized healthy plants and at the price of a packet of seeds, not a lot more expensive.

Parsnips, like carrots, are always a lot of work. They need the soil to be free of stones, so all the soil from the trench along with the compost that was added, needs sieved. But you do get good straight parsnips by doing this, so well worth it.

Beetroot, brought on at home, were planted out and swedes were sown. Another row of peas – mangetout – was sown. Only one row was sown, and another will be sown beside it in 2/3 weeks’ time to give succession.

The sweetcorn bed was dug over and given a good feed of dung and seaweed.

The cane frame was put up for the runner beans and climbing French beans, and a couple of runner bean seeds sown to see how they do. Seeds of both types of beans have already been planted at home but with climate change, we may get away with sowing the runners directly into the ground earlier.

The first job each work day is a walk round the plot to check on all the plantings and today we found a problem with one of the raspberries – variety Glen Dee – planted two years, a very vigorous variety which did well last year. There is no leaf growth on several of the canes and buds have dried out. It could be frost but that has never caused this before and it seems unlikely they are too dry. Anyway, they got a good watering and we shall watch how they get on.

Jobs for next week