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12 Comments
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waking up to a cold windy rainy January morning by the south coast to find yr vid-alls right with the world now.🫠So great to have yr lovely chummy little update- thank u Steve always to keeping us all up to date- you’ve become a necessary friend- take care+ heres to a successful spring/summer season to u+all other allotmenteers 😊
I’m 15 miles away from you and my losses due to the extended frost mirror yours. I am particularly upset by the collapse of my ESPB. I lost my kalettes prefrost due to club root. Suspect it came in on composted horse manure I’ve had to use since the unavailability of mushroom compost. Many weed seeds in it too. Not sure I used lime in that bed😢. I like your thoughts on cutting down on the work. Tried oca for 3 years – didn’t achieve a reasonable crop despite much research and effort. I’ve added it to the list of “stuff I can’t grow”. Life’s too short! Best wishes for this year’s growing.
I'm getting 2 14L watering cans for watering my allotment this year. Should be able to water at about triple the rate I was previously. If you have the strength it could save you time, good exercise too.
Yacon – what a super delicious crop! 2022 was my first year of growing it, and my only regret was not growing more. It did need watering during the hot spell, but at least the harvest size was more than the effort expended and i'm still munching my way through it now. Unlike some other crops (eg potatoes).
I guess if hot dry summers and freaky cold frost spells in winter are now the norm(???), we need to adjust accordingly. All i've thought of so far is to perhaps grow something like Cobra french beans rather than runner beans, but i probably need a whole host of other crop 'upgrades' as well, as I suffered a similar fate to you. My winter 'salads' are currently having to consist pretty much exclusively of finely shredded taunton deane leaves! And even that took an absolute beating in the freeze.
Thank you for sharing the bad as well as the good stuff. I too grew too many potatoes last year. We are still eating the early varieties that I grew in the ground, I harvested 3 tubs of main crop at the weekend to find lots of squishy ones. I have decided to use some of the tubs for carrots this year, they will be in the garden to save them from the badgers. 🙂
I grew the Terraine peas too Steve, after seeing you sow them, they did really well, so I'm doing them from now on. I start with Meteor and then Onward. I'm suffering a lot now with Alium Leaf Miner, two beds I'm Leeks riddled with it, so I'll have to start netting more. As always though I did some baby Leeks in pots, which meant it wasnt a total loss. I lost stuff through the frost, but it was a great year for my carrots. The ups and downs of gardening, it's just making sure you have more ups than downs 🙂 all the best, Steve. John, Hampshire, UK
A hard frost so early in the season was a bit of a shock. By some miracle, we didn't get much lower than about -4 and my oca survived well, I just leave it in the ground all year and harvest as and when I need some. It's funny how some years the different colours do better – the paler/yellow varieties were best this season. Enjoyed the update and your plans for the coming year, thank you.
My 'Rudolph' Early Purple Sprouting survived well here in N.Ireland for what it's worth but we didn't record anywhere near the temps you did on the mainland. -2.3 in my little cold frame was the coldest. PSB was outside under mesh obviously, no idea what the coldest outdoor temp was. -5, -7 maybe. Very windy site.
I feel your pain with the clubroot, I got it in a corner of one of my beds, lost most of my spring PSB. I'll use lime in that area to reduce any spreading and I'll not plant brassica there for the next 4-5 years. Very annoying disease! Have you not really rotated your brassicas until now Steve?
Great video,, I like these types where u show the good and bad. I'm not growing cucumber this year, I could grow them but didn't like the taste ive tried 4 or 5 different varieties but it wasn't for me. Going to cut down on cabbages. I'm going to grow carrots in the ground and not pots see if that works
Great rundown of your year Steve the one thing we cant ever predict in the UK is the weather, but there are usually gains and losses however it comes. It is more than 20 years since I grew veg on an allotment size scale in a very large garden I had so Im kind of starting over having forgotten most of what I learned 😁 but I do want to try new things like the Yacon, do you have a supplier for tubers I can look at. Regards..Loz.
I’m sure you’ve tried eating radicchio several ways. Probably you have a strong sensitivity to bitter. I find the outer leaves a bit bitter but the inner hearts are glorious. I find arugula much more bitter. However there is magic that happens once these things are put into a salad mixed with other things. Especially with something sweet such as fruit pieces or cooked squash or beetroot. I love a small drizzle of honey in my salad dressing when using bitter greens. The mix of sweet and bitter is so complex and interesting I crave it! Just a thought. Not trying to convince you hahahaha. Just ideas. ❤️. Happy new year Steve.