The Good Life

Except we ended up with an odd number after some of the buggers mysteriously died.

After four days rain of biblical proportions, we managed to get the rest of our seedlings planted. It was a good afternoon of digging today. Rob got the Brassica plot dug over (I was exempt from digging due to a cool sounding inflamation called Scholars Elbow which I managed to get) so I weeded the rest of the plot and planted out more tomatoes, the cucumbers and squash and our exotica, a peanut bush.

The Brassicas had a bit of a nightmare. Over the course of a few days, some of the seedlings just curled up and died. There appeared to be no fungal or insect attack, they just gave up on life. The rest were a sorry bunch but we got them stuck in anyway, so fingers crossed.

Everything else is doing well. The sweetcorn are well on their way and the lettuce are starting to look more like salad ingredients. Everything we planted out today got a boost with some organic feed pellets, kindly donated by Moira.

I planted out a peanut bush which I’ve been growing at home. I never knew this, but they grow underground, like potatoes. It needed planting out so I thought I’d risk the English weather by letting it fend for itself on our allotment. Hopefully the pigeons won’t take a fancy to it and eat it. If they do I hope they are allergic to nuts.

Moira also warned us of a thief on the allotment. She didn’t give any specifics but told us not to leave anything lying about. Luckily we only own a fork and spade which we hide behind all the shiny things in Judy’s shed so I think we will be ok. She said she’d given him a piece of her mind, hopefully not the part that reminds her to give us more honey.

Bee attacks appear to be on the wane. We got mithered by a few but nothing that resulted in flapping about and shouting.

Here’s the Sweetcorn. Peas are coming on well in the background.

 The new row of tomatoes:

 And finally the brassicas.

Please note, the cans of pop and lager are integral to our netting shield.

But we dug anyway, like real men do.

What a lovely day it’s been today, just perfect for spending time outside. I survived the stag do in Poland, Rob appeared to have survived an all day bike ride in the Peak district yesterday – though I don’t recall him walking like John Wayne so much previously – so we headed down the farm to get some good honest work in.

Plenty of weeding needed doing and we also built some wigwam frames for the peas. I noticed we have red aphids on some of the peas, must remember to look up how to kill them. I’ve got some Marigolds growing at home which are good (should that be bad?) for aphids so maybe that will suffice.

Rob got busy with the strimmer while I weeded:

It’s always good fun shouting someones attention when they are handling a power tool.

The sweet corn are poking up but we’ve got a few blank spots where there should be some. Luckily Judy and jealous woman gave us some of theirs to fill the gap, so now our corn plot looks like some sort of advert for Miracle-Gro - ‘we doused one half in corn-a-grow and left the other half to fend for itself – look at the difference’.

I learned something about potatoes today. I always thought new potatoes were a different variety to normal ones. No, you just pick them earlier. Makes sense when you think about it.

I went over to chat with fag bloke about when to pick them, as we’d had a sneaky look at our crop and they were coming on well and it’s then I learned the truth. If you want new potatoes, pick them early (usually when the flowers are dying off) and if you don’t, leave them until the leaves start dying and thats when they become normal (old?) potatoes. Anyhow, we unearthed one potato plant – just enough for my lamb chops tonight.

We also decided to cull the remaining lettuce, so it’s salad sarnies for the next few days:

Digging wise we got the next plot dug for the brassicas, though the bees started to get a bit frisky later in the afternoon, so we called it a day.

Next dig is sometime this week.

It is, really. There’s a lot of on-the-hoof learning to do, plenty of advance preparation and of course it dies if you don’t water it. Luckily social services aren’t too fussed about shrivelled vegetables.

After our poor performance this weekend, we’ve got some mega digging to get done, which will be hampered somewhat by me going off to a stag do in Poland. There’s also a lot of post-planting care coming up, as most of our crops for the first year will be going out in the next few weeks, if we get the ground dug for them.

The crop roll call:

• Brassicas - Cabbage, Cauliflower and Broccoli.

• Tomatoes - cherry and normal ones .

• Gourds - Cucumber and Squash.

Yum yum, can’t wait.

Went to Sub Dub last night. Ouch. Too hung over to do anything substantial, we did some weeding and kicked some stones around – I guess which is the horticultural equivalent of stirring your food round your plate when you’re not hungry.

The new lettuces and radish are coming up and the sweetcorn has poked its head above ground. The pea frame is ok and we’ve removed the protective fleece from the other peas.

The lettuce which survived the slug attacks is doing very well, shame the other 29 didn’t. Here’s a picture for posterity, before we eat it.

And here’s the peas …