“Live and let live” on the Allotment

Another lovely day, with lots of watering required.

Planting continues. Today it was the turn of dwarf French beans (Purple Teepee) and cabbage (Rodema and Tantour Pointed). We heeled around these firmly. The carrots and shallots were both thinned – rejects taken home, so no waste. With the shallots, our aim was to leave 3 bulbs in each crown to fatten up. After some debate, we tried to be ruthless with thinning the plums. The apples have performed their own June Drop since last week. On arrival today, the grass was littered with tiny green volunteers, though we’ll still need to thin them further.

Weeding was concentrated along the woodchipped paths, around the picnic bench and in the communal bed, where we’re trying to slow the march of the bindweed.

A lucky volunteer got to spend most of the day restoring sharp edges to the bed ends using quite a blunt implement – Zen-like patience required.  We must do some sharpening!

“Live and let live” is a challenging mantra on the allotment. Along with burgeoning crops come a burgeoning army of competitors. The Brochette peas planted last week, and left un-netted, have been shredded (rabbits?). The Pak Choi is looking luscious, so we took preventative measures. Having had last year’s crop decimated, we placed slug traps amongst these very inviting plants. Fat pigeons have been using the un-netted redcurrant as a landing pad, snapping new growth in the process. We discussed possibly netting, however as redcurrants are not our favourite berry we may keep our finite supply of netting for the more precious ones. Whilst writing up the notice board, a tap, tapping was heard and investigated. An opportunistic sharp-eyed crow had noticed an unzipped rucksack. It managed to open someone’s lunch box, ignoring the sandwiches but nicking an apple. This was found stashed under a bush possibly for a treat once we’d all left. Rumbled!

—————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————–

Harvesting today: the first of the plump little gooseberries, bucket-loads of glorious strawberries, sweet peas and rhubarb.

We have a Risk Assessment Review – after this, thinning the apples; tying in the Loch Ness bramble; plant leeks; cut back the comfrey which is flowering and ready to make into a plant feed or add to the compost bins; sharpen the edgers mow, weed and water.