Planting out

What a lot of rain we had last weekend! I know bank holidays have a bit of a reputation, but that was just silly!

I was really worried for my newly-planted tomatoes, but on returning to the plot mid-week it looked like they enjoyed all the rain - they're looking much healthier already.

The rain did a nice job of settling in the petunias round the asparagus bed too. I planted them out a week ago but they didn't like the experience much - when I left them they were all limp and flopped over, and I thought they'd all die. They're growing strong now, apart from a little slug damage.
They're there essentially because I read somewhere that they repel asparagus beetles. I planted some there mid-season last year and saw a small decrease in my terrible infestation. This year I haven't seen a single beetle yet, so I'm wondering if just having had them in the soil previously has made a difference. The only other thing I did that could possibly have helped was to thoroughly weed and till the ground midwinter, to wake up any overwintering bugs early, but that wouldn't have stopped new ones arriving.
These petunias are a bright red variety (I hate those mixed-colour trays you get full of pinks and purples!) and grown from seed. Twenty four plants! I'm very proud of myself because my attempts last year failed completely!
I planted a row of parsley between the asparagus rows too, for the same reason. It'll all look rather pretty I think, when everything gets going!


The pond really enjoyed its rainwater top-up too. The level was getting worryingly low - I was starting to wonder how I could top it up myself without upsetting the balance of things, but there's no need now - it was actually overflowing after the rain!

Sadly the rain wasn't all good - it brought the slugs out in their droves and it has become painfully clear the tinfoil brassica collars make no difference to them whatsoever. Another bad year ahead for brassicas, I suspect...

I shall have to try nematodes again. I had a go last year but found the stuff really difficult to use and didn't notice much effect, but my Mum swears by them so perhaps I'll give them another go.

The wind snapped the stem of one of my courgette plants too. I heaped some earth up round the damage to give it a chance to put some more roots out and it seems to be doing all right so far. Time will tell...
And the wind and rain made a right mess of the broad beans - they'd flopped over all over the place. So I ran a couple of strings round them to hold the plants up together in a bunch. They're starting to grow little beanlets now - better late than never. Blackfly are making a meal of the tips, and dozens of ladybirds are making a meal of the blackfly!


I've been quite surprised at the beauty of the broad bean flowers, and the curious way the beans grow upright out of them! I don't think I've seen a broad bean plant before - I don't know what I was expecting.


I've been busy planting some other things out too; first the leeks in two rows alongside the parsnips, carrots and onions. I had trouble raising the seedlings last year (damn cats) so this year I bought a pack of 60 plants from Mr Fothergills; 20 'Lancia', for eating young in summer and autumn, 20 'Pandora' which mature in late summer and autumn, and 20 'Bandit' which should stand through winter and well into spring. I didn't have room for all of them (and I really don't think Eddie and I eat 60 leeks in a year!) so I just squished in as many as I could, alternating the 'Lancia' with the 'Pandora' in one row and with the 'Bandit' in the other. When I've pulled all the early 'Lancia', the later varieties will have more space to mature. Magic!


Next the cucumbers and butternut squash, which are to be trained up obelisks (fingers crossed). I've lost a couple of cucumber seedlings lately to damping-off and started some more which I'll plant out as soon as they're big enough. Looking on the bright side I guess it will spread my harvest a bit later. There are some spaghetti squash to go in the empty part of this bed too as soon as I have time to build the last two obelisks!

And finally, at long last, the beans. I started these at home ages ago and they've been getting so big they were trying to climb each other! Now all I have to do is pray the slugs don't kill them all off...

There are at least six plants each of six varieties. Not enough in my opinion; I LOVE french beans. I might start some in a pot at home too I think, since it doesn't look like I'll get round to doing everything I want to do on the plot this year, again. I'm starting to fear the 'spare' bed, which I was going to use for some extra squashes and beans, won't even get dug. And it's getting rather late in the season for my flower and herb borders.
It'll be different next year...

I wonder if I'll say that every year...

Tomatoes

Thanks for all your comments about the tomatoes! They were sown mid-March in brand new shop-bought multi-purpose compost, kept indoors on a sunny windowsill until daytime temperatures were decent, then put in the plastic greenhouse (open during the day) and brought in at night for a while, and then kept in the greenhouse permanently for the last month or so.
I have discarded the worst of the plants (I started far too many anyway!), pinched the spotted leaves off the rest, and planted them out (gulp). Some of them look perfectly healthy still, the others just had one or two spots. Hopefully the improved growing conditions wil sort them out. I'm going to try a homemade bicarbonate-of-soda-fungicide when I have time, too, and keep a close eye on them. And I've started a few more seeds in the garden, just in case!

I've planted them in three rows of six, with a row of garlic and a row of basil and parsley each side. And I've sunk a plastic bottle into the soil between each pair of plants for deep watering when they get bigger. I wasn't really sure what to do about support, but the 'Florida Weave' method sounds sensible so I've put up a cane either side of each pair to facilitate this. I put some canes at the top to stabilise things, both along and across the rows, and now the whole thing feels like a big cage! I realise I should probably be using something a bit sturdier than canes but for now it's all I've got, so I'll have to keep an eye on things and maybe bring some guy-ropes into play at a later stage...

Assuming the plants actually grow that is!


Yesterday I made a start on some 'comfrey tea' as well, which will be great for feeding the tomatoes in a few weeks. The comfrey plants are next to our bench, and so big right now they were starting to encroach on our sitting-space, so after cutting the plants down (not completely - the flowers are so pretty!) I had a big pile for the compost heap too!

For those that don't know, comfrey leaves are incredibly rich in nutrients because the roots go so deep and draw up nutrients deep in the soil that few other plants can reach (nettles are similar in this way, and make great fertiliser too). They're great for the compost heap, or can be made into a high-potash liquid feed, or 'comfrey tea', by soaking the leaves in a bucket of water for a few weeks. (Beware though; I'm told it stinks to high heaven...) I actually bought my plants for this purpose a year ago when I first got my plot, only to find out later there's a whole plot at the far end of my allotment site given over to the stuff !

Tomato Trouble

I've been further assessing the health of the tomatoes this morning and it doesn't look good.

Early blight? Septoria leaf spot? I've looked at pictures and descriptions of both and it doesn't quite fit the bill for either, plus they usually strike when the plant is setting fruit, and these are way off! You can't really see it in the picture, but some of the leaf tips are tinged very blue as well. If I'm lucky it's just a deficiency of some kind and they'll recover when I plant them out in the big wide soil, but I won't get my hopes up. Around half the plants are affected, with a few not-sures, so I've separated them out so that it doesn't spread any further.

So now I'm wondering if I should make a late sowing to replace these plants if they don't make it. By my calculations we've got 131 days until the end of September, so I reckon there's time. And if I've infected the soil by then I could plant them in growbags instead.

I've got another gripe with my tomato seedlings too; they're still tiny! I suspected it was because I hadn't potted them up to bigger containers and they needed more rootspace, but when I received my tumbling tomato plants in the post from Suttons they were big healthy plants but with rootballs a fraction of the size of mine!


So where did I go wrong?!

Foiled!

Well I hope so anyway... I recently read a letter in a gardening magazine from a woman who swore that putting tin-foil round her plants kept the slugs off them. So I have made brassica collars out of foil for my newly-transplanted winter cabbages, brussels and broccolis, as well as the swedes I sowed direct here back in April. We'll see what happens...

In this bed I have also sowed kale seeds, and left some room for spring cabbage which will be sown later on in the summer.

There's so much to transplant now, I don't know when I'm going to get it all done. I held off planting out the tomatoes last weekend when I heard we were due a few cold nights, but I think I'll take the plunge on Friday when I have a day off. I'm really fearing for their health now; some have developed tiny black spots on the leaves, which is surely a sign that I'm doomed to fail yet again. Perhaps next year I'll skip the toilet rolls and go for good old-fashioned flower pots, where there's less risk of fungus developing.
Then there's the cucumbers and squashes. We're going to grow the cukes, butternut and spaghetti squashes up obelisks, so we've been busy building them and seiving bucketloads of compost to mulch the bed.
And I got home this evening to find my 60 young leeks and 16 free sweetcorn plants had arrived from Mr Fothergills! I've bunged them all in a trough in the garden temporarily, but I'll have to plant them out on Friday too.


And then there's the beans! I've had mixed germination success - I think I let one half of the tray dry out at a critical moment during the hot weather - so some will have to be resown, and I don't have any more space at home but I know the slugs will get them if I sow them direct, and anyway the bean patch is covered in self-seeded borage and last year's leftover potatoes sprouting, which I'll have to sort out before I do anything else there! Aaargh!

I thought it was high time I took the final step with mushrooms (a month after leaving the grains to spawn), and when I checked under the damp newspaper I found the manure was covered in these mould-like strands, as it should be.


It's covered now with a good layer of sterile soil, well firmed down, and with a few criss-crossing sticks over the top to try to keep the cats off! Can't wait to start picking my very own mushrooms...

And on a windy day over the weekend I noticed how much the asparagus is beginning to suffer (we're only picking a little this year - its second year - so some has grown into quite tall ferns already, and the wind damaged it quite badly last year) so I set up canes at the ends of each row with string running between the two to try to give it some support.


As you can see we're still fighting the weeds in the asparagus patch, but it's doing pretty well otherwise, with still no sign of any asparagus beetles yet (sssshh)!

Pests, pests and more pests...

I noticed the other day that where I had pushed a second squash seed into the modules that hadn't germinated first time, the mice had dug them all up! Grrrr!

I've restarted these in pots indoors instead, but last night the mice had a go at my newly-sown peas (the third attempt!) as well! GRRR!

The roots you can see are garlic roots - this is the soil I started my garlic in, and now it smells really strongly of the stuff. I sowed the peas in it to try to put the slugs off, but obviously the mice aren't so bothered...
I've put new peas in the holes and covered them with propogator lids to try to keep the rascals out, but if this carries on I will have to take measures - we had them in our house last summer and they were a nightmare to get rid of. I never thought they'd become a pest in the garden too!

On the plot, I've been doing a lot of hand weeding among the salads and the onions and carrots. The shallots are amazing me, dividing before my very eyes:

The salad patch is not looking so happy; it's rife with flea beetle which I've been putting off dealing with and still needs a lot of thinning. I always sow salad seed too thickly. I never learn...

I noticed some rather large holes in the apple tree leaves, and on investigation found several caterpillars.


They were hiding in pockets made by leaves folded in half and held with web, and have done quite a bit of damage. Luckily, the trees are so small it's easy to check every leaf and squish the blighters, and I'll be keeping a close eye out for more from now on.


The pond continues to distract us constantly from all the hard work. Frogs pop their noses up to enjoy the sun...


And there are damselflies hatching all over the place, as well as dragonfly and great diving beetle larvae still roaming the pond. I think I saw a slinky newt-tail disappearing into the weeds the other day too.

And the water crowfoot is opening pretty little flowers all over the surface.