Septembers Spuddling

A relatively slow, quiet and relaxing month so far down my plots, apart from harvesting a variety of different vegetables, some for immediate use, with others prepped and crammed into my freezer. Due to potato blight still rearing its ugly head around the allotments, the mountain of potatoes stored in plastic trays in my garage have been checked regularly for it. Any potatoes showing signs of blight have been disposed of because if they were to come into contact with other tubers they would quickly pass the blight on, another reason the potatoes are stored in trays this year rather than in bags or sacks, less contact between tubers and the ease of being able to spot any disease at a glance. My early sowing of runner beans this year were not up to their usual standard but a second later sowing is now producing an excellent crop due to the much improved weather conditions of the past fortnight or so. With temperatures just short of 30 degrees C in my poly tunnel today, tomatoes and cucumbers are in abundance, although my water melons (sugar babe) are dire. Over the past couple of days more spring onions, along with lambs lettuce and senshu onion sets have been sown/planted at the upper end of N2 Plot into No. 2 bed. Daffodil bulbs have been added to the upper end of No 1 bed on N2 Plot with tulip bulbs being added to 1 of my raised beds, which will eventually be filled with more bulbs.

Another Good Harvest (Sept 2014)

 The re-designing work I have been doing to both plots this year is almost finished and a high percentage of the beds are, or soon will be ready for next years sowing/planting, after some compost or manure has been added to them. 2 areas from 3 where potatoes were grown this year will need the soil cleaning before they are used again, to guard against any blight spores that may remain. A relaxing afternoons painting last Sunday saw a new coat of paint/preserver mix applied to the shed on N2 Plot and at the same time to the adjacent water storage tank, which is now darkish brown rather than a light grey colour, (along with the t-shirt I was wearing at the time). The idea being for the tank to soak up more sunlight rather than reflecting it. If so, when the rainwater is applied to plants/seedlings it may be slightly warmer giving less "shock" to the plants. With a couple of days of pruning and general clearing up of rubbish and vegetation that cannot be composted the plots are looking in a reasonably tidy condition prior to the onset of Winter. I expect the Autumn leaf fall will alter that somewhat.

"Grilled" Cucumber September 2014

Keeping The Bugs Down in My Poly Tunnel Sept 2014

This Years Main Potato Bed Cleaned & Covered N2 Plot Sept 2014

Old Strawberry Bed N1 Plot Rotavated Sept 2014

Most Brassicas Looking Good Sept 2014

Water Tank Painting Sept 2014

Re-Designed N2 Plot September 2014

Re-Designed N1 Plot September 2014

There's Always Tomorrow!!