Checking in with the allotment

It's been a while since I've shared an allotment update and there's a very good reason for that. It's because I've not been to our allotment, until Sunday, that is. Unbelievably that was our first visit of the year. We should have gone before, but you know how it is, when you put something off, it's easier to keep putting off and that's the cycle we got ourselves into, until the previous weekend when MOH declared we would spend "all weekend next weekend doing the allotment."

And that sounded promising, although in reality it didn't quite work out like that as we spent Saturday at the Ideal Home Show and then on Sunday I didn't manage to persuade MOH out of the house until gone midday. So not quite all weekend, but we did get there. Well after we'd gone to the garden centre to buy some seed compost and some horse manure to help improve the soil.

That was a good call - the horse manure, not the garden centre which was super busy - as little did I realise just how much our plot needed it, but more on that in a moment. I was keen to see how some of the things we had planted had coped on their own. It turns out the honest answer is mixed, and that's a little disconcerting.

Let's start with the celeriac. Above ground it looked, well like celeriac. The bulb hadn't swelled and pushed itself out of the ground though, so I wasn't sure what I'd find beneath ground. 

And I was right to be cautious, as underneath there was a bunch of roots but no vegetable. Not even a tiny one. Not on any of the plants that had survived MOH's trampling, which was disappointing (both things were disappointing, I'm not sure which was more so). Especially as I'm quite partial to eating some celeriac. We'll try again next year I'm sure, and hopefully that horse manure will make a difference.

Some of the kale had gone to seed, and while it looked pretty, it's not very edible.

The red cabbages, well they've done better. They at least are starting to look like red cabbages, but just look at the weeds. I'm not sure if I should say it's a red cabbage among weeds, or weeds with a red cabbage.

Yes exactly.

All a bit demoralising really. And despair was starting to creep up on me. But I carried on looking around the plot. 

The crab apple tree caught my eye, with the ladybird and the lichen and I quickly remembered a conversation that MOH and I had after the lichen section on a recent Gardener's World programme, featuring lichen (obviously). One of those daft conversations where we talked about liking our lichen, and seeing it here immediately lifted my spirits.  

And yes, I liken my lichen. Especially this lichen, I'm liking it a lot. See I told you it was daft.

And once I saw this photo it made me pleased again, but of course it's not going to help get rid of those weeds...

Or the grass. Every bed we've dug over is once again full of weeds or grass, including around the rhubarb. But on the positive side, it looks like it won't be too long before we'll be eating our rhubarb.

Underneath the crab apple tree the random artichoke which seems so happy in the strangest of places, continues to thrive. I had meant to move it, but I'm too late it seems. We also appear to have lost our other artichoke which was one of the first plants we planted, and without a single artichoke from it. I'll be reading up on how to take cuttings from this one, as it seems happy and maybe I can persuade some of its offspring to move to the other side of the plot.

The weeds and grass are also growing through the lavender plants, which were supposed to be forming an edging. This is what I found the hardest to deal with, these are supposed to grow unaided and ideally unweeded. If we keep having to weed and de-grass every part of our plot, I can't see us making any progress at all.

That's not defeatist, but probably more realist than I've been about our plot until now. Wondering if it was all worth it only lasted a short while - most likely until I spotted the raspberry canes - and then I was back to coming up with a plan to help us avoid weeding these edging plants repeatedly. And that's quite simply to plant these edging plants through weed membrane. It's probably not usual for an allotment, but hopefully it will help. Obviously it's not something we can do for the whole plot, we'll need another plan for that, but that needs more thought.  Advice most definitely welcome if you've experienced anything similar.

But the sun was shining, and the raspberry canes were doing well. We'd cleared around these as much as we could at the end of last year and for the first time actually remembered to cut the canes, and the pay back is already clear.  So that's something at least.

Our other smallish success was the handful - or bunch - of cavolo nero that we picked, and will be eating. I'm not sure if that counts as our last crop of the growing year or our first one of this year, but either way it's a win.

So much more to do and many more weeds to conquer, but hopefully with a plan, renewed energy and some more zen-like digging we'll make some progress. And maybe this year will be the year I'll get my cut flower bed - I hope so, the flowers would most definitely help!

Dappled sun, lots of weeds and a productive day

Well Saturday was a productive day in the garden. We managed to make the most of the weather and it's just as well as Sunday while still warm was wet here. It was great though to spend a good few hours in the garden, for the first time this year. 

We picked up where we'd left off on adding edging to our circles. That wasn't quite so productive though, we hit a complicated section - for complicated read root-ridden - and it took a fair bit of hacksaw wizardry by MOH to get it to sit properly. And a fair bit of time was needed using the tree saw to carve some of the roots into shape, and even then for some we needed to resort to a chisel. 

Definitely resourceful, but the tricky piece is in. Phew. 

The bad news is we expect the next three or four pieces to be equally as tricky, but I'm hoping with the tools (quite literally) at our disposal we'll make quicker progress, spurred on by an easy stretch near the patio. We've a deadline of mid-June to meet now, so need to get our skates on.

It seems though that everywhere in the garden the weeds had grown. A lot. While MOH was faffing with his hacksaw I filled four trugs with weeds and various sticks that had blown down, and even found time to squeeze in some of my own faffing - taking some pictures.

My hanging basket of succulents hadn't fared well over the winter, unbelievably it had dried out, and so I needed to intervene. I managed to rescue those that were just about clinging onto life and plant them alongside my succulent babies in a more traditional trough.  

It's only a small plastic trough, but if they grow and multiply as succulents do then I think it'll look quite pretty. It's currently in the greenhouse, not because it needs to be, but for its own protection. I've a feeling the local squirrel population is likely to dig these up before they get settled if I leave it outside.  They've been helping themselves to my tulips in the pots on the patio, which I'm none too happy about.  

And those poor tulips, their start in life wasn't so good anyway, let alone with any squirrel interference. 

Soon though I distracted by the lime green flowers of the euphorbias, which at this time of year are dazzling bright and dotted around the garden. They're not a favourite of MOH's and annoy him  just by being there and right now for being more visible than normal. I like them though, because of the colour they bring, so they're staying. And he knows this. 

They're joined under one of our large plane trees by the pink flowering hostas, which so far don't seem that nibbled. There is quite a bit of colour in our garden at the moment which is good - even the lime green counts as colour, you'll know that MOH has a long standing wish for there to be more colour in our garden of large trees and bushes. So when he walked onto the patio and said our garden looked quite colourful, I felt like it was almost mission accomplished. 

I'd left the sedum heads over winter, partly because I'm a bit of a lazy gardener and mostly for the birds. But they're done now and needed clearing away. When they're like this it's easy to twist them away from the base where new plants are already growing, and looking a bit like brussels sprouts. I pulled a couple of new plants up as I went about this task a little too enthusiastically it seems, so found a pot and stuck them, hoping for the best.

I'm sure they'll come through and I'll have another clump to plant in the garden some time soon. I think using the same plant in several spots throughout the garden is a good policy to have, it brings continuation and it's even better if you've got the extra clumps for free from existing plants.

Just in front of the greenhouse the currant berry was basking in the sun and looked to be enjoying it as much as we were. In the sun it really was quite warm, the temperature in the greenhouse was nineteen degrees, but it's already been as high as twenty eight. 

The hellebores are continuing to flower, but their colour has deepened and more are setting seed. I've already spotted a few tiny plants growing so I'm hopeful that there'll be more plants for free here, now I just need to find a way to stop MOH stepping on them or pulling them out as weeds.

The yellow primulas continue to flower, and are now joined by this pretty white version among one of the many aquilegias already growing. For now I'll leave all the aquilegias, or granny's bonnet, but as they finish flowering I'll pull them up as they are prolific self-seeders, and well, even for me there's only so many you can have.

My yellow daffodils have been joined by the more delicate coloured almost cream and pale yellow daffodils, and there's many of their cheery heads dotted around the garden. These two growing through the pastel phormium looked both pretty and interested in the work that MOH was doing. He was working alongside them and in front of the yucca, who was clearly less impressed with being interfered with and so got its own back by stabbing MOH's forehead several times, drawing blood.

Gardening's not for the faint-hearted, not where the yucca's concerned anyway. I'm just hoping for all its stubbornness that this year it'll flower again, I think we're due some payback for the pain it dishes out.

With the single - but tricky - piece of edging in place, and the rugby close to starting a decision needed to be made - carry on, give the grass its first cut, or give up completely. It was too nice to be inside, so the TV was paused and out came the lawnmower. The grass is MOH's pride and joy and I knew that however pretty these iris-like flowers are, they wouldn't stand a chance of being saved once grass cutting season arrived. I'll never be one to have a naturalised lawn, well not this lawn anyway.

So it's just as well I got a picture hey? But it was oh so nice to get out into the garden, I'd planned to do more on Sunday, but the weather said not. Maybe that's a good thing and was nature's way of easing me back in gently, who knows?