July Week 4

July Week Four Tuesday 24th 2007

This week’s visit to the allotment was one in which we envisaged the largest croppage yet, and we weren't to be disappointed.

Upon entering the allotment this week we were thrilled to see our gladioli bulbs have finally flowered with large five foot stems producing an abundance of flowers of all number of colours. These have doubled in size from the tiny bulbs which we planted on the plot last year, and when all of the stems have produced their flowers the flower section will look totally beautiful.

'Gladioli in flower'

The largest job of the day was to check on the second early potatoes and make sure that the blight which had affected every other plot hadn't got to ours. Luckily the signs were good and the blight hadn’t affected them at all, so we set about digging the last two rows up. These second earliest were different to the first earlies with more uniform round shaped potatoes being dug up. However there were definitely less actual potatoes compared to the first earlies, but the potato tubers themselves were again blight free thankfully.

'Spuds ready for the pot'

Once we had harvested these potatoes we brushed them down and let the mud start to dry off before we bag them up into Hessian sacks ready for transporting and of course eating.

The next harvest completed from the site this week was from the beetroots which seemed to have totally rocketed away this week with the warm damp weather that we have been having. With each of the three varieties that we had sown, in particular we were very impressed with the tubular variety which is specifically grown for pickling. These had grown to a very good size and a very good length too. Once boiled these will be pickled and kept for eating over the winter months.

'Summer Harvest'

after this we went to inspect the Swedes which we had been growing as these had not been looked at for a very long time. After lifting the horticultural fleece we were horrified to find orange and black caterpillars eating the foliage of the baby Swedes. Luckily we were able to pick these off and destroy them before they destroyed the crop entirely. Nevertheless the Swedes themselves are starting to swell and starting to become rounded in shape forming the final harvesting size.

'Creepy Crawlies'

Another crop definitely loving this warm wet weather is the squashes and pumpkins, these are really starting to romp away now in the foliage and the fruit department. Each of the three varieties (Atlantic giant, butternut, and crown prince) are forming fruits and each have about five fruits in total

all reaching the size of a fist. Hopefully if this wet weather stops these fruits wont rot and will form the winter soups which our families love on a cold winters night.

'Squashes in the swamp'

The cabbages are really starting to form also this week with them starting to form hearts. This means that the leaves inside are wrapped around each other tightly and when it forms a ball shape these will be ready for harvesting. At the moment this looks about one month away but these have really started taking shape in the past fortnight.

'Cabbage Hearts'

The Onion and shallot section is looking a little worse for wear this week. However this is because they have done all the growing they can and the leaves are starting to flop over the bulbs and then start to turn yellow as they die back. These will be kept in situ for around another two weeks for the leaves to fully turn yellow and then they will be lifted, dried and then hung for use all the way through winter until next years stocks go in.

'Sad Shallots'

A typical summer harvest also occurred this week with the first good sized harvest of beans, this consisted of runner beans and dwarf green beans, after seeing the crops from the dwarf beans this year these will definitely be back next year and with a whole row to themselves. The beans we picked were all very large and with no signs of the actual seed bean being formed at all. This means that the runner bean will be stringless making them taste that much better. Also they haven’t stopped growing yet with their tips curling round and round the canes and new flowers forming all the time, resulting in many more beans to come.

'Summer summed up'

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News and information from our allotment in Northamptonshire.