In an attempt of making amends for failing to blog throughout the whole of the second half of last year. I have rifled through a few of the photos I took down the allotment and put together a couple of collages of my first allotment growing season...The first collage is of my first harvest, a rather eclectic mix of mixed success. The winner by far this year were the squashes. Over 20 Festival squashes (top right) for the second successive year (we had a good crop in our garden last year to). The secret with these colourful critters is too keep them well watered during the dry months and feed them with epsom salts if the leaves start to go yellow. This treatment has worked wonders for me the last two years... Just starting to get tired of Squash soup >;-) Just found this recipe for a spicy version which I might give a try...
The french beans were a real disapointment this year. I planted them in the same bed as the squash and the sweetcorn (the three sisters I mentioned in the article One month in...). I think they were just squeezed out by the other two. If I try this again I will make sure I give them more room and sturdiercanes to grow up. As you can see I did resue a few for replanting this year.
The potatoes were another success, I had only just caught the planting time so only planted a small crop. I had been told I would be lucky to save them from the wireworms. However I kept a close eye on them and once I noticed a few had been eaten by the little critters in early september I dug up the whole crop. This meant the potatoes were on the smaller side, but they did last me till christmas, which gave me a sense of achievement!The sweetcorn grew very well and as you can see looked good when picked. However in hindsight I think I picked them too early as the kernels were quite pale and not as sweet as you would hope. However my hand was forced by the badgers. As you can see by the two samples below the green box. The badgers had decided they were ready for eating so I had to harvest. I notice that everyone else in the allotment who grew sweetcorn had it very well protected with chicken-wire fencing. I had foolishly hoped to get away without it. I should have guessed they didn't go to that effort just for fun!
Finally the second collage show a few photos taken during the growing season around July and August. Notice the contrast between the large image in the top right corner and the photo of the allotment in February I posted earlier.
