Just live.

You live and learn, so goes the old saying; that is oft appended in our house with "but in my case, you just live." Went to the plot in shorts recently because it was a lovely day, and got bitten twice by whatever bug it is that I have an allergic reaction to (I think it's ants). Now every warm day I have to change back into long trousers to visit the plot. One day I will learn my lesson.

We've had a mild winter and I was able to keep up well with the plot until we went on holiday in May. The warm weather and rain made the weeds grow like mad and I had a real job on my hands when I got back, things only now getting back under control. 

Over-run with weeds in late May. Note bike trailer in background

I planted some French beans direct in the soil in mid-May, judging it to be warm enough, but I didn't bank on the solid week of cold rain that followed, it was more like March than late May. As a result all my beans rotted in the soil. 

I was wondering how to get my compost bin and some plants down to the plot when I didn't have use of the car, and hit upon the brain wave of using the Tiny Human's bike trailer. This worked well for the compost bin but when I went to check the four courgette plants, I found they had tipped upside down in the trailer and scattered the contents. I couldn't have destroyed the seedlings more effectively if I had taken them out and stamped on them. Luckily I left a couple of spare plants at home that wouldn't fit in the trailer.

My disasters have been made up for by generosity on the part of my gardening friends, family and colleagues. I received three home grown cucumber plants from Wise Mike, which are now doing well under a plastic tunnel. I also received 14 sweetcorn plants from Derek, which came in 'Rootrainer' pots which I was very impressed with. I planted up the sweetcorn the same day and bought my own rootrainer pots to start off some replacement French beans at home, which are also coming along nicely. Derek also donated some lovely chilli plants, which have been planted at home in the garden where I can keep a closer eye on them.

No more bare knees

I learned not to wear sandals to the allotment last year when I got bitten by ants, this year I have also learned not to wear shorts.  I was bitten by a solitary (and now very dead) ant on Saturday morning that crawled up onto my kneeling pad, and my knee has subsequently swelled up quite dramatically in reaction. Ants are now top of my hit list. Hopefully, many of them will be taken care of by application of the new Grow Your Own nematodes, which apparently contain a microscopic worm that ants cannot stand. Whilst it doesn't actually kill them, it makes them move out!  It also covers a host of other pests, so I'm going to give it a go.  Another weapon in the armoury against little beasties that want to eat my crops before me.

Failure Count

I have had lots of congratulations from various people on my successes this year, so Moog thought I should let reality have a look in and share some of my failures:

1. Cut and Come Again salad leaves. These all bolted to seed. In fairness, not really a failure, because the reason they bolted was that I chose not to pick them - they didn't taste very nice!

2. Wild Rocket. All germinated, and then all completely wiped out by flea beetle. Almost overnight there was nothing left, not even a stalk.

3. Radishes and Pak Choi have been riddled with holes by flea beetle. This is probably due to me eradicating their favoured food source, which is Oilseed Rape. I can't win.

4. Tomatoes. I don't know why I bother. One minute they're fine, the next minute, the stems and fruits are brown with blight. John pointed it out to me this week and I was forced to burn all my allotment tomatoes. Greenhouse crop is still going steady at home. For now.

5. Leek rust. This covered my garlic, but luckily didn't spoil the crop. It has now graduated on to my leeks. Hopefully the white parts under the soil will be saved from destruction (apparently you can still eat rusty leeks if it doesn't get too bad) but after seeing how fast it spread I have decided to resort to a chemical spray of dithane (fungicide) on this crop to try and save them.

6. Split carrots. I avoided carrot fly, but quite a few carrots got too big and split, so I've had to harvest them all to stop them growing any bigger. Hopefully I'll be able to store them for long enough, only time will tell.

I blame all these problems squarly on the weather - a bit more sunshine and warmth in August wouldn't go amiss! The only time we did get any sun, I went to the plot in shorts and got attacked by my next pest:

7. Red ants. These aggressive little blighters managed to get into my boot and bit me 4-5 times, making my whole foot swell up to about twice normal size! And it itched like mad!

So there you go; it's not all rosy down at the plot, even if I make it look that way sometimes.