Allotment Finances
We’ve harvested a total of £805 of fruit veg this year
We’ve spent a total of £396 this year, mostly one time investments

What we’ve harvested and eaten
We harvested a total of £143 worth of veg this week, excluding everything from the store. We had 39 meals with ingredients from the allotment.

How many people are we feeding?
Our surplus continues to increase so we added another family to our deliveries, we are now feeding ourselves and six (Elena, Jennie, Tony, Diane, Anne, Kate) other families.

Here’s a photo of one of the five harvests we did this week. We picked calabrese, romanesco cauliflower, broccolini, purple sprouting broccoli, sprouts, sprout tops, romanesco leaves, calabrese leaves, red cabbage leaves, radish leaves, lots of types of kale, cabbage, spinach, perpetual spinach, mizuna, giant red mustard, chard, kalettes, spring onions, celery, rocket, claytonia, lots of bean tops and loads of lettuce. We also raided the store for: carrots, potatoes, onions, shallots, garlic, red beetroot, golden beetroot and dried pears/apples.

What we’ve bought this week
Slug pellets, we don’t use many, but there are times and places!

Videos published
I published two videos:

Foul Weather Allotment Harvest – it’s not always sunshine and smiles!

Update on the allotment and home rain water capture and storage project

What I’ve sowed

What I’ve planted
Unfortunatey it’s not been much of a planting week!

I’ve potted on
I’ve started to take cutting’s off the over-wintered tomatoes.  Some of these are unlikely to make great plants for summer (too leggy) but they are a good source of healthy side shoots.

I’ve also potted on all of the peppers that I sowed and germinated in the propagator a couple of weeks ago.

First harvests of the year
Nothing new this week.

Last harvests of the year
We don’t have any squash left in store, just a bit in the freezer

What’s left in store
Potatoes – 1.5 medium sized bags
Carrots – 2 1/3 big boxes
Onions – 1 large boxe
Shallots – 3/4 large box
Beets – 3 big boxes
Dried Apples – 1 big cool bag
Dried Pears – 1 big cool bag

Water reserves
Allotment reserves (Steve) : 2500 litres
Allotment reserves (Jennie): 450 litres
Allotment reserves (Debbie): 400 litres
Home reserves : 600 litres

We are not quite full to the brim as I watered all of the under-cover space on the allotment on Saturday, to make space to capture the next storms bounty.

What have we processed for preserving
Nothing

Highlights
We’ve had even more rain! This is a big deal as everything was getting quite dry under-cover due to the exceptionally hot February. The anticipated rain allowed me to fully hydrate the cold-frames, low and high tunnel and the water supply is nearly full again!

The food highlight continues to be the abundance of calabrese, broccolini, PSB and romanesco cauliflowers and their associated leaves!

Problems
We’ve had continuous storms and sunny spells, which makes it hard to manage the temperature under cover.  Harvesting has also been a bit of a challenge, next week looks even worse!

A quick update on some of the first veg we are harvesting this year. In some cases we’ve harvested from the polytunnel already, but these are outdoor/cold-frame highlights.

If you are new to my allotment videos you might find a bit of context useful. We live in the north west of England, in Lytham St Annes, which I believe is the equivalent of USA Zone 8.

We have three allotments in my family, mine (Steve), my wife’s (Debbie) and my middle daughter’s (Jennie). We also have a small kitchen garden at home. They are all managed in an integrated fashion, so don’t expect to see the usual mix of veg on each plot. I do most of the planning and seed starting. We each have our own plots, but we all help each other out.

Jennie’s plot has been designed as a traditional allotment, but we put a lot of focus on minimising the work we do there. It’s basically a plant and forget it plot, full of garlic, leeks, onions, potatoes, brassicas, squash, beans and fruit trees. It’s heavily mulched to reduce weeds and easy to water.

Debbie’s plot is mostly full of perennials, it’s a garden plot. Again we did a lot of work to keep the weeds down and Debbie’s approach is inspired by the TV programme The Ornamental Kitchen garden.

My plot is all about experimental growing, maxium productivity and year round abundance. As with all of the other plots I did a lot of work to control the weeds, but it’s a high maintenance plot. I’m always planting, harvesting, experimenting and generally having a great time.

Collectively the plots deliver an amazing abundance of fruit and veg all year round. Debbie, Jennie and I are effectively self sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit for much of the year. During winter we have enough surplus to feed a few more of our friends and during the rest of the year we feed up to 22 people.

This video provides an overview:

I do an update of the allotments, roughly twice a month, you can find the tours here:

Our approach to allotment life is to: grow as much as we possibly can, to be self-sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit in season, to give away our huge surplus to friends and family, and to have as much fun as possible. For more on self sufficiency check out these videos:

Debbie and I spend about 4 hours a day, 4 days a week on the plots (on average) and we keep nudging that down as we eliminate non-productive work: like grass cutting, weeding and watering as much as practical. We are both newbie gardeners, only starting the allotments in 2016.

I’m a bit obsessive about the nutrient density of the veg that we grow and making the plots easy to work because it’s through this allotment lifestyle and food that I’ve overcome a debilitating auto-immune disease.

I’m always aware though that it might not last so I make sure that I don’t work too hard, eat as much organic fruit and veg I can and design the plots so that I can still work them if I flare up again.

In this post I cover an oft-requested topic.  How my allotment centred life has helped me manage Adult Onset Still’s Disease (AOSD) and Fibromyalgia.  AOSD is a very rare auto-inflamatory disease, as a result the information on the web is drawn from a small sample of patients and isn’t very accurate, but this site is a reasonable place to start http://stillswebsite.tripod.com/still%27s_disease_info.htm.

My video doesn’t focus too much on the disease and how it’s treated.  Instead it delves into the impact that a range of lifestyle factors can have on managing the disease.  This approach seemed to have worked for me, it might not work for you, in fact it might not have worked for me either – conincidences happen.

In the video I go through the diagram above in some detail.  If you are interested in reading more about my experiences you can check out my blog.  Follow this link for information on the disease and how I dealt with it:

http://steves.seasidelife.com/tag/aosd/

The following are links to my guides on various related topics:
Challenging Chronic Illness
My Simple Guide To Eating Well
My Guide To Living Well
My Strategy For Early Retirement
Guide To Making Progress
 

Allotment Finances
We’ve harvested a total of £960 of fruit veg this year
We’ve spent a total of £416 this year, mostly one time investments

What we’ve harvested and eaten
We harvested a total of £155 worth of veg this week, excluding everything from the store. We had 39 meals with ingredients from the allotment.

How many people are we feeding?
Our surplus continues to increase so we upped  our friends and family deliveries, we are now feeding ourselves and six (Elena, Jennie, Tony, Diane, Anne, Sally) other families.

Here’s a photo of one of the three harvests we did this week. We picked calabrese, romanesco cauliflower, broccolini, purple sprouting broccoli, sprouts, sprout tops, romanesco leaves, calabrese leaves, red cabbage leaves, radish, radish leaves, lots of types of kale, cabbage, true spinach, perpetual spinach, mizuna, giant red mustard, chard, kalettes, spring onions, celery, salad rocket, sorrel, claytonia, leeks, lots of bean tops and loads of lettuce. We also raided the store for: carrots, potatoes, onions, shallots, garlic, red beetroot, golden beetroot and dried pears/apples.

What we’ve bought this week
Food safe buckets for harvesting, which were surprisingly expensive compared to non-food-grade buckets.  We always harvest into water, to keep everything as fresh as possible and to get rid of soil, slugs and bugs!

Videos published
I published two videos:

March harvest highlights: calabrese, romanesco, radish, spinach, onions

Managing Arthritis With An Allotment Centric Life

What I’ve sowed

What I’ve planted
Unfortunatey it’s not been much of a planting week, the weather has been really bad, gales and rain for most of the week!

I’ve potted on
I’ve potted on another batch of tomatoes and moved them to the grow lights in an attempt to stop them getting too leggy!

First harvests of the year
Radish!!  It’s always such a treat to have lots of radish again, I managed to get these 2 weeks earlier than I’ve ever done before

Last harvests of the year
Nothing

What’s left in store
Potatoes – 1 medium sized bags
Carrots – 2 1/4 big boxes
Onions – 1 large box
Shallots – 3/4 large box
Beets – 3 big boxes
Dried Apples – 1 big cool bag
Dried Pears – 3/4 of a big cool bag

Water reserves
Allotment reserves (Steve) : 2500 litres
Allotment reserves (Jennie): 450 litres
Allotment reserves (Debbie): 400 litres
Home reserves : 750 litres

We are full to the brim.  I’ve taken advantage of all of these storms by keeping everything under cover well watered.

What have we processed for preserving
Nothing

Highlights

We have our first tomato fruits, last week we had our first flowers.  We also have our first asparagus breaking through, so we might be harvesting that in a week or two!

Abundance, despite the terrible weather I’ve harvested more this week than I did in the whole of March last year and that’s at least ten times as much as the previous year.

Carefully watching this year I’ve seen plenty of opportunities to do even better next year (weather permitting)

We’ve had even more rain! This is a big deal as everything was getting quite dry under-cover due to the exceptionally hot February.

Lowlights
We’ve had continuous storms and sunny spells, which makes it hard to manage the temperature under cover.  Harvesting has also been a bit of a challenge, next week looks better

This video takes a quick look at what we still have in our allotment store.  The store is definitely depleting, but more importantly as the weather warms, the quality of the stored product degrages rapidly, so it’s a race against time to get fresh produce to take it’s place!

In summary we have:

Potatoes – 1 medium sized bag
Carrots – 2 1/4 big boxes
Onions – 1 large box
Shallots – 3/4 large box
Beets – 3 large boxes
Dried Apples – 1 big cool bag
Dried Pears – 1/4 of a big cool bag

If you are new to my allotment videos you might find a bit of context useful. We live in the north west of England, in Lytham St Annes, which I believe is the equivalent of USA Zone 8.

We have three allotments in my family, mine (Steve), my wife’s (Debbie) and my middle daughter’s (Jennie). We also have a small kitchen garden at home. They are all managed in an integrated fashion, so don’t expect to see the usual mix of veg on each plot. I do most of the planning and seed starting. We each have our own plots, but we all help each other out.

Jennie’s plot has been designed as a traditional allotment, but we put a lot of focus on minimising the work we do there.  It’s basically a plant and forget it plot, full of garlic, leeks, onions, potatoes, brassicas, squash, beans and fruit trees. It’s heavily mulched to reduce weeds and easy to water.

Debbie’s plot is mostly full of perennials, it’s a garden plot.  Again we did a lot of work to keep the weeds down and Debbie’s approach is inspired by the TV programme The Ornamental Kitchen garden.

My plot is all about experimental growing, maxium productivity and year round abundance.  As with all of the other plots I did a lot of work to control the weeds, but it’s a high maintenance plot.  I’m always planting, harvesting, experimenting and generally having a great time.

Collectively the plots deliver an amazing abundance of fruit and veg all year round.  Debbie, Jennie and I are effectively self sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit for much of the year.  During winter we have enough surplus to feed a few more of our friends and during the rest of the year we feed up to 22 people.

This video provides an overview:

I do an update of the allotments, roughly one a week, you can find the tours here:

Our approach to allotment life is to: grow as much as we possibly can, to be self-sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit in season, to give away our huge surplus to friends and family, and to have as much fun as possible.  For more on self sufficiency check out these videos:

Debbie and I spend about 4 hours a day, 4 days a week on the plots (on average) and we keep nudging that down as we eliminate non-productive work: like grass cutting, weeding and watering as much as practical. We are both newbie gardeners, only starting the allotments in 2016.

I’m a bit obsessive about the nutrient density of the veg that we grow and making the plots easy to work because it’s through this allotment lifestyle and food that I’ve overcome a debilitating auto-immune disease.

I’m always aware though that it might not last so I make sure that I don’t work too hard, eat as much organic fruit and veg I can and design the plots so that I can still work them if I flare up again.

In this video I go through the allotment year from the perspective of the polytunnel.  I explain some of the key transitions and how to take best advantage of the space you have.  Key to my approach is the use of layers of vertical space and using lots of containers for getting an early start and keeping harvests going late into the season.  I also use large raised beds to provide more stable access to water and fertiliser.

In summary:

1. Winter: leafy brassicas, celery and salads.  Over wintering flowering brassicas, carrots, peas
2. Spring: early everything  — potatoes, courgettes, tomatoes, cucumbers, flowering brassicas, radish, seedlings, salads, celery, strawberries, peas, beans, beets, green garlic and carrots.  Note a lot of the early stuff is grown in pots and will be discarded or moved outside by summer
3. Summer: main crop peppers, tomatoes, ginger, chillies, cucumber, cucamelon, seedlings for planting in October
4. Autumn: late beans, tomatoes, cucumbers, leafy brassica greens for winter, over-wintering brassicas for spring, winter salads, spring onions, green garlic

If you are new to my allotment videos you might find a bit of context useful. We live in the north west of England, in Lytham St Annes, which I believe is the equivalent of USA Zone 8.

We have three allotments in my family, mine (Steve), my wife’s (Debbie) and my middle daughter’s (Jennie). We also have a small kitchen garden at home. They are all managed in an integrated fashion, so don’t expect to see the usual mix of veg on each plot. I do most of the planning and seed starting. We each have our own plots, but we all help each other out.

Jennie’s plot has been designed as a traditional allotment, but we put a lot of focus on minimising the work we do there.  It’s basically a plant and forget it plot, full of garlic, leeks, onions, potatoes, brassicas, squash, beans and fruit trees. It’s heavily mulched to reduce weeds and easy to water.

Debbie’s plot is mostly full of perennials, it’s a garden plot.  Again we did a lot of work to keep the weeds down and Debbie’s approach is inspired by the TV programme The Ornamental Kitchen garden.

My plot is all about experimental growing, maxium productivity and year round abundance.  As with all of the other plots I did a lot of work to control the weeds, but it’s a high maintenance plot.  I’m always planting, harvesting, experimenting and generally having a great time.

Collectively the plots deliver an amazing abundance of fruit and veg all year round.  Debbie, Jennie and I are effectively self sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit for much of the year.  During winter we have enough surplus to feed a few more of our friends and during the rest of the year we feed up to 22 people.

This video provides an overview:

I do an update of the allotments, roughly one a week, you can find the tours here:

Our approach to allotment life is to: grow as much as we possibly can, to be self-sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit in season, to give away our huge surplus to friends and family, and to have as much fun as possible.  For more on self sufficiency check out these videos:

Debbie and I spend about 4 hours a day, 4 days a week on the plots (on average) and we keep nudging that down as we eliminate non-productive work: like grass cutting, weeding and watering as much as practical. We are both newbie gardeners, only starting the allotments in 2016.

I’m a bit obsessive about the nutrient density of the veg that we grow and making the plots easy to work because it’s through this allotment lifestyle and food that I’ve overcome a debilitating auto-immune disease.

I’m always aware though that it might not last so I make sure that I don’t work too hard, eat as much organic fruit and veg I can and design the plots so that I can still work them if I flare up again.

It’s been three years since I planted my first few seeds on my allotment and a year since I put the poly on the new polytunnel. A lot has changed, let’s take a look around.

If you are new to my allotment videos you might find a bit of context useful. We live in the north west of England, in Lytham St Annes, which I believe is the equivalent of USA Zone 8.

We have three allotments in my family, mine (Steve), my wife’s (Debbie) and my middle daughter’s (Jennie). We also have a small kitchen garden at home. They are all managed in an integrated fashion, so don’t expect to see the usual mix of veg on each plot. I do most of the planning and seed starting. We each have our own plots, but we all help each other out.

Jennie’s plot has been designed as a traditional allotment, but we put a lot of focus on minimising the work we do there.  It’s basically a plant and forget it plot, full of garlic, leeks, onions, potatoes, brassicas, squash, beans and fruit trees. It’s heavily mulched to reduce weeds and easy to water.

Debbie’s plot is mostly full of perennials, it’s a garden plot.  Again we did a lot of work to keep the weeds down and Debbie’s approach is inspired by the TV programme The Ornamental Kitchen garden.

My plot is all about experimental growing, maxium productivity and year round abundance.  As with all of the other plots I did a lot of work to control the weeds, but it’s a high maintenance plot.  I’m always planting, harvesting, experimenting and generally having a great time.

Collectively the plots deliver an amazing abundance of fruit and veg all year round.  Debbie, Jennie and I are effectively self sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit for much of the year.  During winter we have enough surplus to feed a few more of our friends and during the rest of the year we feed up to 22 people.

This video provides an overview:

I do an update of the allotments, roughly one a week, you can find the tours here:

Our approach to allotment life is to: grow as much as we possibly can, to be self-sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit in season, to give away our huge surplus to friends and family, and to have as much fun as possible.  For more on self sufficiency check out these videos:

Debbie and I spend about 4 hours a day, 4 days a week on the plots (on average) and we keep nudging that down as we eliminate non-productive work: like grass cutting, weeding and watering as much as practical. We are both newbie gardeners, only starting the allotments in 2016.

I’m a bit obsessive about the nutrient density of the veg that we grow and making the plots easy to work because it’s through this allotment lifestyle and food that I’ve overcome a debilitating auto-immune disease.

I’m always aware though that it might not last so I make sure that I don’t work too hard, eat as much organic fruit and veg I can and design the plots so that I can still work them if I flare up again.

Allotment Finances
We’ve harvested a total of £1150 of fruit veg this year
We’ve spent a total of £426 this year, mostly one time investments

What we’ve harvested and eaten
We harvested a total of £190 worth of veg this week, excluding everything from the store. We had 39 meals with ingredients from the allotment.

We picked: calabrese, romanesco cauliflower, broccolini, purple sprouting broccoli, sprouts, sprout tops, romanesco leaves, calabrese leaves, red cabbage leaves, radish, radish leaves, lots of types of kale, cabbage, true spinach, perpetual spinach, mizuna, giant red mustard, chard, kalettes, spring onions, celery, salad rocket, sorrel, claytonia, leeks, lots of bean tops and loads of lettuce. We also raided the store for: carrots, potatoes, onions, shallots, garlic, red beetroot, golden beetroot and dried pears/apples

How many people are we feeding?
Our surplus continues to increase so we upped  our friends and family deliveries, we are now feeding ourselves and Seven (Elena, Jennie, Tony, Diane, Anne, Sally, Christine) other families.

What we’ve bought this week
Compost for planting potatoes in tubs

Videos published
I published two videos:

What to plant in a polytunnel?

3 Year Anniversary Allotment Tour

What I’ve sowed

What I’ve planted

It’s been a good week for planting!

1. One large bed of early kale, under cover: Hungry Gap, Nero and Dazzling Blue!  These were inter-planted with French Breakfast radish
2. A small bed of salad rocket and a large bed of mange tou Stereo Broad Beans
3. A small bed of Grenoble Red lettuce, under a mesh tunnel and fleece.  I also interplanted the sprouts with Valdor lettuce
4. A tub of Amythst French beans in the tunnel
5. A bed of mini-savoy and cauliflower
6. Four tubs of Sarpo Una were planted outside and I moved two tubs of Charlotte potatoes that have been growing in the conservatory outside
7. Two courgettes into tubs in the polytunnel
8. A row of celery into the main bed in the polytunnel.  This was planted on the same day as last year’s row, which has been harvested in a cut-and-come-again fashion all year and is still going strong!

Debbie also put in support frames for the broad beans.

I’ve potted on
I’ve potted on another batch of brassica seedlings, which are now under lights, until I get around to moving them to the polytunnel.  I also potted on a batch of brassica plugs into larger pots where they will live until May, when I have space for them.

First harvests of the year
Radish again, last week it was Scarlet Globe and this week it’s French Breakfast.  I managed to harvest these on the same day as last year, however last year’s were pampered in a hot bed, this years were in an unheated cold-frame.  The difference? this year I started them at home in plugs, much easier than building a hot bed!

What are we running out of?

Nothing yet

Last harvests of the year
Nothing

What’s left in store
Potatoes – 1 medium sized bags
Carrots – 2 big boxes
Onions – 1 large box
Shallots – 3/4 large box
Beets – 3 big boxes
Dried Apples – 1 big cool bag
Dried Pears – 1/2 of a big cool bag

Water reserves
Allotment reserves (Steve) : 2500 litres
Allotment reserves (Jennie): 450 litres
Allotment reserves (Debbie): 400 litres
Home reserves : 750 litres

We are full to the brim, but I’ve had to move some surplus water from the site IBCs to mine, they will fill up again very soon.

What have we processed for preserving
Nothing

Highlights

The weather has been great, so everything is growing very well and it’s been ideal for planting and harvesting!

More of our early plants now have tomatoes, however these plants are not really for fruits, we are just using them as a source of side shoots that we pinch out, drop in water and plant a week later.

Abundance, despite the terrible weather I’ve harvested more this week than I did in May last year and that’s 5 times as much as the previous year.

I’ve been trying to figure out how to fill the summer onion bed next year.  This bed sits empty all winter, to be finally planted in April.  It’s the bed that has the summer squash in it.  This year I’m planning to fill it with cabbages, that can be harvested loose for spring greens and florrets in March/April.

I finally got around to tidying up the polytunnel, shed and plot.  Debbie and I weeded everything.  So we are well ahead now and it’s very relaxing to be in that position so early.

Lowlights
The mild winter means we still have white fly and a few dots of cabbage aphid around.

It’s too cold and windy to take the cold-frame lids off, so we still need to water.  That said, it’s not rained all week anyway, so we would have had to water regardless.

A quick update on my plans for making sure that we don’t run out of brassicas during the spring ‘hungry gap’. I do a quick review of the current situation, show you my full range of brassica seedlings and plant a nice range of Kales.

I also have a few other videos on avoiding a hungry gap, if you are interested:

If you are new to my allotment videos you might find a bit of context useful. We live in the north west of England, in Lytham St Annes, which I believe is the equivalent of USA Zone 8.

We have three allotments in my family, mine (Steve), my wife’s (Debbie) and my middle daughter’s (Jennie). We also have a small kitchen garden at home. They are all managed in an integrated fashion, so don’t expect to see the usual mix of veg on each plot. I do most of the planning and seed starting. We each have our own plots, but we all help each other out.

Jennie’s plot has been designed as a traditional allotment, but we put a lot of focus on minimising the work we do there.  It’s basically a plant and forget it plot, full of garlic, leeks, onions, potatoes, brassicas, squash, beans and fruit trees. It’s heavily mulched to reduce weeds and easy to water.

Debbie’s plot is mostly full of perennials, it’s a garden plot.  Again we did a lot of work to keep the weeds down and Debbie’s approach is inspired by the TV programme The Ornamental Kitchen garden.

My plot is all about experimental growing, maxium productivity and year round abundance.  As with all of the other plots I did a lot of work to control the weeds, but it’s a high maintenance plot.  I’m always planting, harvesting, experimenting and generally having a great time.

Collectively the plots deliver an amazing abundance of fruit and veg all year round.  Debbie, Jennie and I are effectively self sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit for much of the year.  During winter we have enough surplus to feed a few more of our friends and during the rest of the year we feed up to 22 people.

This video provides an overview:

I do an update of the allotments, roughly one a week, you can find the tours here:

Our approach to allotment life is to: grow as much as we possibly can, to be self-sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit in season, to give away our huge surplus to friends and family, and to have as much fun as possible.  For more on self sufficiency check out these videos:

Debbie and I spend about 4 hours a day, 4 days a week on the plots (on average) and we keep nudging that down as we eliminate non-productive work: like grass cutting, weeding and watering as much as practical. We are both newbie gardeners, only starting the allotments in 2016.

I’m a bit obsessive about the nutrient density of the veg that we grow and making the plots easy to work because it’s through this allotment lifestyle and food that I’ve overcome a debilitating auto-immune disease.

I’m always aware though that it might not last so I make sure that I don’t work too hard, eat as much organic fruit and veg I can and design the plots so that I can still work them if I flare up again.

In this video I go through some of the basic strategies that we follow to harvest a huge amount of organic fruit and veg off our 250 sq meters of growing area.

If you are new to my allotment videos you might find a bit of context useful. We live in the north west of England, in Lytham St Annes, which I believe is the equivalent of USA Zone 8.

We have three allotments in my family, mine (Steve), my wife’s (Debbie) and my middle daughter’s (Jennie). We also have a small kitchen garden at home. They are all managed in an integrated fashion, so don’t expect to see the usual mix of veg on each plot. I do most of the planning and seed starting. We each have our own plots, but we all help each other out.

Jennie’s plot has been designed as a traditional allotment, but we put a lot of focus on minimising the work we do there.  It’s basically a plant and forget it plot, full of garlic, leeks, onions, potatoes, brassicas, squash, beans and fruit trees. It’s heavily mulched to reduce weeds and easy to water.

Debbie’s plot is mostly full of perennials, it’s a garden plot.  Again we did a lot of work to keep the weeds down and Debbie’s approach is inspired by the TV programme The Ornamental Kitchen garden.

My plot is all about experimental growing, maxium productivity and year round abundance.  As with all of the other plots I did a lot of work to control the weeds, but it’s a high maintenance plot.  I’m always planting, harvesting, experimenting and generally having a great time.

Collectively the plots deliver an amazing abundance of fruit and veg all year round.  Debbie, Jennie and I are effectively self sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit for much of the year.  During winter we have enough surplus to feed a few more of our friends and during the rest of the year we feed up to 22 people.

This video provides an overview:

I do an update of the allotments, roughly one a week, you can find the tours here:

Our approach to allotment life is to: grow as much as we possibly can, to be self-sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit in season, to give away our huge surplus to friends and family, and to have as much fun as possible.  For more on self sufficiency check out these videos:

Debbie and I spend about 4 hours a day, 4 days a week on the plots (on average) and we keep nudging that down as we eliminate non-productive work: like grass cutting, weeding and watering as much as practical. We are both newbie gardeners, only starting the allotments in 2016.

I’m a bit obsessive about the nutrient density of the veg that we grow and making the plots easy to work because it’s through this allotment lifestyle and food that I’ve overcome a debilitating auto-immune disease.

I’m always aware though that it might not last so I make sure that I don’t work too hard, eat as much organic fruit and veg I can and design the plots so that I can still work them if I flare up again.

A quick update on what we’ve been planting in the last week or so. After so much time sowing seeds, it’s lovely to start planting them in the open ground again!

If you are new to my allotment videos you might find a bit of context useful. We live in the north west of England, in Lytham St Annes, which I believe is the equivalent of USA Zone 8.

We have three allotments in my family, mine (Steve), my wife’s (Debbie) and my middle daughter’s (Jennie). We also have a small kitchen garden at home. They are all managed in an integrated fashion, so don’t expect to see the usual mix of veg on each plot. I do most of the planning and seed starting. We each have our own plots, but we all help each other out.

Jennie’s plot has been designed as a traditional allotment, but we put a lot of focus on minimising the work we do there.  It’s basically a plant and forget it plot, full of garlic, leeks, onions, potatoes, brassicas, squash, beans and fruit trees. It’s heavily mulched to reduce weeds and easy to water.

Debbie’s plot is mostly full of perennials, it’s a garden plot.  Again we did a lot of work to keep the weeds down and Debbie’s approach is inspired by the TV programme The Ornamental Kitchen garden.

My plot is all about experimental growing, maxium productivity and year round abundance.  As with all of the other plots I did a lot of work to control the weeds, but it’s a high maintenance plot.  I’m always planting, harvesting, experimenting and generally having a great time.

Collectively the plots deliver an amazing abundance of fruit and veg all year round.  Debbie, Jennie and I are effectively self sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit for much of the year.  During winter we have enough surplus to feed a few more of our friends and during the rest of the year we feed up to 22 people.

This video provides an overview:

I do an update of the allotments, roughly one a week, you can find the tours here:

Our approach to allotment life is to: grow as much as we possibly can, to be self-sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit in season, to give away our huge surplus to friends and family, and to have as much fun as possible.  For more on self sufficiency check out these videos:

Debbie and I spend about 4 hours a day, 4 days a week on the plots (on average) and we keep nudging that down as we eliminate non-productive work: like grass cutting, weeding and watering as much as practical. We are both newbie gardeners, only starting the allotments in 2016.

I’m a bit obsessive about the nutrient density of the veg that we grow and making the plots easy to work because it’s through this allotment lifestyle and food that I’ve overcome a debilitating auto-immune disease.

I’m always aware though that it might not last so I make sure that I don’t work too hard, eat as much organic fruit and veg I can and design the plots so that I can still work them if I flare up again.

Allotment Finances
We’ve harvested a total of £1323 of fruit veg this year
We’ve spent a total of £446 this year, mostly one time investments

What we’ve harvested and eaten
We harvested a total of £173 worth of veg this week, excluding everything from the store.  This is actually lower than last week, but that’s because we have been, and still are, on holiday for a few days.  We had 37 meals with ingredients from the allotment.

We picked: calabrese, romanesco cauliflower, broccolini, purple sprouting broccoli, sprouts, sprout tops, romanesco leaves, calabrese leaves, red cabbage leaves, radish, radish leaves, lots of types of kale, cabbage, true spinach, perpetual spinach, mizuna, giant red mustard, chard, kalettes, spring onions, celery, salad rocket, sorrel, claytonia, leeks, lots of bean tops and loads of lettuce. We also raided the store for: carrots, potatoes, onions, shallots, garlic, red beetroot, golden beetroot and dried pears/apples

How many people are we feeding?

We are stable for now at seven families (Elena, Jennie, Tony, Diane, Anne, Chris, Christine) about 20 people and we will probably stay at this level for a few weeks now, sharing any extra surplus with fellow allotmenteers (Lesley, Caroline and Anne).

What we’ve bought this week
Compost for planting potatoes in tubs

Videos published
I published three videos:

Planting Early Kale for Spring

How To Harvest A HUGE Amount of Organic Fruit and Veg in Spring

It’s Time To Start Planting Again!

What I’ve sowed

What I’ve planted

It’s been a slow week for planting!

1. Two beds of lettuce made up of Cantrix, Tesy and Navara, in a mesh tunnel and under fleece for a few weeks

I’ve potted on
Nothing

First harvests of the year
Nothing new unfortunately, but then again we have so much already

What are we running out of?

Dried pears, but I might find a few more bags if I have a rummage

Last harvests of the year
Nothing

What’s left in store
Potatoes – 1 medium sized bags
Garlic – a few bulbs
Carrots – 2 big boxes
Onions – 1 large box
Shallots – 3/4 large box
Beets – 3 big boxes
Dried Apples – 1 big cool bag
Dried Pears – maybe none!

Water reserves
Allotment reserves (Steve) : 2200 litres, down by 300 litres
Allotment reserves (Jennie): 300 litres,  down by 150 litres
Allotment reserves (Debbie): 400 litres
Home reserves : 750 litres

We are starting to eat into our reserves as we have had no rain for a couple of weeks and lots of sun, everything is very dry now.  Ironically trhe under cover beds – that I’ve been watering – are better hydrated than the uncovered soil.

What have we processed for preserving
Nothing

Highlights

The weather has been great, so everything is growing very well and it’s been ideal for planting and harvesting!

More of our early plants now have tomatoes, however these plants are not really for fruits, we are just using them as a source of side shoots that we pinch out, drop in water and plant a week or two later.

Abundance, despite the terrible weather I’ve harvested more this week than I did in May last year and that’s 5 times as much as the previous year.

As everything is in good shape we’ve gone away for a few days holiday and had two day trips.

Lowlights
I had to clear a bed of lettuce that had a mild infestation of greenfly, it would only get worse and I have plenty.  In fact it helped me out because this is the painful time of year when I need to clear productive winter beds for new seedlings for summer.

It’s too cold and windy to take the cold-frame lids off, so we still need to water.  That said, it’s not rained for two weeks anyway, so we would have had to water regardless.

March is my busiest sowing month, so it’s quite a relief to get to April.  I have dozens of seed trays full of healthy plants now and many of the February and early March sowings are in the ground.  The main challenge has been the onions, I’ve had a couple of bad batches of seeds and I’ve had to re-sow, fortunately with good results!

A lot of my sowing decisions are driven by having enough space to germinate and pot on seeds/seedlings and as we start April that’s definitely the case.  The little greenhouse and seedling bench in the polytunnel are full as are all of the window sills.  Within two weeks though a lot of space will have been cleared and I will be well on with the April sowings.

In this video I show you the progress of my February and March sowings which are doing very well.  The peppers are all doing well, the early tomatoes seem to have been worth the effort and the main tomato sowing destined for the polytunnel has all germinated well.  The early courgettes and cucumbers are planted or potted too.  The early brassicas are in the ground and succession sowings are growing strong.

In the video I also spend a few minutes on the computer to show you the databases that I’m using to capture all of my knowledge about the 250+ varieties of fruit and veg that I grow and also the details of what I’m sowing.

Before we get to the video though you might like to cheack out my latest tour, which shows everything that’s growing.

You might also like to see some of my March harvest highlights you can check out the following video:

So finally we get to the video for April sowing and growing.

This video shows several databases that I’m using to manage my allotment this year.If you would like to find out more about these databases please take a look at the following video, and it’s associated description:

If you want to get a copy of the tools that I demonstrate in this video please click on this link and create an account.  Once you have an account then click on this link to browse all of my databases, if you want, you can take a copy of the databases to use for yourself.

If you want to download any of the following views to a spreadsheet you can clock ‘download CSV’ to get your own private copy, or use the web based database I’m using by watching the video above.

When looking at these databases please bear in mind that they are live views onto rapidly evolving data. The content and design is being constantly improved. If you want to look at snapshots and/or take your own copies, please look at the video above and it’s associated description.

Here’s a complete read-only view of the sowing log and varieities database with all of my data:

Here’s a read-only view of everything that I sowed in March:

Here’s a view of everything I’m planning to sow in April:

For completeness here’s a view of my sowing database with all the details!

Watch out for the next video showing what I’m sowing in May!

It was only three short years ago now that I got my first allotment plot. Debbie wasn’t so sure, as she looked at the scrappy patch of weeds, but it was too late, I was already in love!

In this video I give a brief overview of our family journey to allotment heaven. I got the first plot, then Debbie got hers and then Jennie, our middle daughter got one too.

My plot was a bare slate, not too bad. It took three weeks to transform it from a patch of annual weeds growing in sandy soil to a year round productivity powerhouse. Debbie’s plot was a nightmare of the worst weeds growing through a mix of rubble, old carpet and landscape fabric, it took months of hard graft. Jennie’s plot wasn’t too bad, but it was high maintenance with lots of ground elder, but we got it sorted by the end of the first year.

If you are new to my allotment videos you might find a bit of context useful. We live in the north west of England, in Lytham St Annes, which I believe is the equivalent of USA Zone 8.

We have three allotments in my family, mine (Steve), my wife’s (Debbie) and my middle daughter’s (Jennie). We also have a small kitchen garden at home. They are all managed in an integrated fashion, so don’t expect to see the usual mix of veg on each plot. I do most of the planning and seed starting. We each have our own plots, but we all help each other out.

Jennie’s plot has been designed as a traditional allotment, but we put a lot of focus on minimising the work we do there.  It’s basically a plant and forget it plot, full of garlic, leeks, onions, potatoes, brassicas, squash, beans and fruit trees. It’s heavily mulched to reduce weeds and easy to water.

Debbie’s plot is mostly full of perennials, it’s a garden plot.  Again we did a lot of work to keep the weeds down and Debbie’s approach is inspired by the TV programme The Ornamental Kitchen garden.

My plot is all about experimental growing, maxium productivity and year round abundance.  As with all of the other plots I did a lot of work to control the weeds, but it’s a high maintenance plot.  I’m always planting, harvesting, experimenting and generally having a great time.

Collectively the plots deliver an amazing abundance of fruit and veg all year round.  Debbie, Jennie and I are effectively self sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit for much of the year.  During winter we have enough surplus to feed a few more of our friends and during the rest of the year we feed up to 22 people.

This video provides an overview:

I do an update of the allotments, roughly one a week, you can find the tours here:

Our approach to allotment life is to: grow as much as we possibly can, to be self-sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit in season, to give away our huge surplus to friends and family, and to have as much fun as possible.  For more on self sufficiency check out these videos:

Debbie and I spend about 4 hours a day, 4 days a week on the plots (on average) and we keep nudging that down as we eliminate non-productive work: like grass cutting, weeding and watering as much as practical. We are both newbie gardeners, only starting the allotments in 2016.

I’m a bit obsessive about the nutrient density of the veg that we grow and making the plots easy to work because it’s through this allotment lifestyle and food that I’ve overcome a debilitating auto-immune disease.

I’m always aware though that it might not last so I make sure that I don’t work too hard, eat as much organic fruit and veg I can and design the plots so that I can still work them if I flare up again.

This video is the introduction to a series on climate change. It covers some of the impacts of climate change on our allotments in North West England and what we can do about them.

Allotment Finances
We’ve harvested a total of £1503 of fruit veg this year
We’ve spent a total of £458 this year, mostly one time investments

What we’ve harvested and eaten
We harvested a total of £180 worth of veg this week, excluding everything from the store. This is slightly higher than last week, we could have picked more, but one of our regulars doesn’t need veg at the moment.  We had 39 meals with ingredients from the allotment.

We picked: calabrese, broccolini, purple sprouting broccoli, sprouts, sprout tops, romanesco leaves, calabrese leaves, red cabbage leaves, radish, radish leaves, lots of types of kale, cabbage, true spinach, perpetual spinach, mizuna, giant red mustard, chard, kalettes, spring onions, celery, salad rocket, sorrel, claytonia, lambs lettuce, leeks, pea shoots, lots of bean tops and loads of lettuce. We also raided the store for: carrots, potatoes, onions, shallots, garlic, red beetroot, golden beetroot and dried pears/apples.

How many people are we feeding?

We are stable for now at eight families (Us, Elena, Jennie, Tony, Diane, Anne, Chris, Christine) about 20 people and we will probably stay at this level for a few weeks now, sharing any extra surplus with fellow allotmenteers (Dave).

What we’ve bought this week
Garlic Spray for controlling pests in the polytunnel

Videos published
I published two videos:

Building 3 Allotments in 3 Years and Loving It

Preparing for Climate Change on the Allotment

What I’ve sown

What I’ve planted

It’s been a slow week for planting!  I’ve only planted runner beans, in a fleece tent in a big pot in the polytunnel

I’ve potted on

1. Ildi and Yellow Delight cordon tomatoes, well on and hopefully very early in pots
2. Tumbling Tom Yellow and Tumbling Tom Red tomatoes, not so well on but ok.

Notice a theme, apart from one Tumbling Tom Red, all the very early tomatoes that did well are yellow varieties

I’ve also potted on 6 Oca tubers.

First harvests of the year
Pea shoots, and they were surprisingly good

What are we running out of?

Dried pears
Very little garlic now

Last harvests of the year
Romanesco Cauliflower, until autumn

What’s left in store
Potatoes – 1 medium sized bags
Garlic – a few bulbs
Carrots – 2 big boxes
Onions – 1 large box
Shallots – 3/4 large box
Beets – 3 big boxes
Dried Apples – 1 big cool bag
Dried Pears – none!

Water Reserves and Rainfall
Allotment reserves (Steve) : 2400 litres, down by 100 litres
Allotment reserves (Jennie): 450 litres
Allotment reserves (Debbie): 400 litres
Home reserves : 750 litres

We’ve had a little rain that has topped up our water supplies and hydrated the outdoor beds a little, but they are still quite dry.

What have we processed for preserving
Nothing

Highlights

We took our first cold-frame top off to unleash the early peas and trained them onto a new support frame.

Checking videos from last year most things are 2-3 weeks ahead of where they were last year in the unprotected beds.

The salad quality is amazing at this time of year.  Brassica florrets of all types are amazing.

Lowlights

All of the brassicas are going to seed incredbly quickly.  We have only a few weeks of quality leaves left from the mature over-wintered plants and the spring greens are not quite ready for harvest, so we might not have much of a surplus soon, but we will be ok. That’s why when you are self-sufficient in veg you need to grow a surplus, then it things don’t go to plan we don’t go hungry.

Some of the over-wintered peppers had greenfly.  This seems to be one of the challenges with over-wintering plants and I don’t think I will be moving them into the polytunnel because of that.

We are self-sufficient in veg and seasonal fruit so if I want to eat something, I have to grow it. Sometimes I take this seriously, because I really want food to eat every day, sometimes it’s just a bit of fun, or an experiment to test out an idea that I will take seriously next year.

In this video I take a look at early beans, peas and carrots. They all start out germinated at home, move to the polytunnel and eventually end up outside.

If you are new to my allotment videos you might find a bit of context useful. We live in the north west of England, in Lytham St Annes, which I believe is the equivalent of USA Zone 8.

We have three allotments in my family, mine (Steve), my wife’s (Debbie) and my middle daughter’s (Jennie). We also have a small kitchen garden at home. They are all managed in an integrated fashion, so don’t expect to see the usual mix of veg on each plot. I do most of the planning and seed starting. We each have our own plots, but we all help each other out.

Jennie’s plot has been designed as a traditional allotment, but we put a lot of focus on minimising the work we do there.  It’s basically a plant and forget it plot, full of garlic, leeks, onions, potatoes, brassicas, squash, beans and fruit trees. It’s heavily mulched to reduce weeds and easy to water.

Debbie’s plot is mostly full of perennials, it’s a garden plot.  Again we did a lot of work to keep the weeds down and Debbie’s approach is inspired by the TV programme The Ornamental Kitchen garden.

My plot is all about experimental growing, maxium productivity and year round abundance.  As with all of the other plots I did a lot of work to control the weeds, but it’s a high maintenance plot.  I’m always planting, harvesting, experimenting and generally having a great time.

Collectively the plots deliver an amazing abundance of fruit and veg all year round.  Debbie, Jennie and I are effectively self sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit for much of the year.  During winter we have enough surplus to feed a few more of our friends and during the rest of the year we feed up to 22 people.

This video provides an overview:

I do an update of the allotments, roughly one a week, you can find the tours here:

Our approach to allotment life is to: grow as much as we possibly can, to be self-sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit in season, to give away our huge surplus to friends and family, and to have as much fun as possible.  For more on self sufficiency check out these videos:

Debbie and I spend about 4 hours a day, 4 days a week on the plots (on average) and we keep nudging that down as we eliminate non-productive work: like grass cutting, weeding and watering as much as practical. We are both newbie gardeners, only starting the allotments in 2016.

I’m a bit obsessive about the nutrient density of the veg that we grow and making the plots easy to work because it’s through this allotment lifestyle and food that I’ve overcome a debilitating auto-immune disease.

I’m always aware though that it might not last so I make sure that I don’t work too hard, eat as much organic fruit and veg I can and design the plots so that I can still work them if I flare up again.

We are self-sufficient in veg and seasonal fruit so if I want to eat something, I have to grow it. Sometimes I take this seriously, because I really want food to eat every day, sometimes it’s just a bit of fun, or an experiment to test out an idea that I will take seriously next year.

In this video I take a look at early tomatoes. Some of the tomatoes have been grown from seed planted early, others have over-wintered as cuttings. Over-wintering is the best way to get early fruit, but not necessarily very healthy plants. Cuttings however are a great way to get plants for a late crop, I harvested my last tomatoes in mid-January!

If you are new to my allotment videos you might find a bit of context useful. We live in the north west of England, in Lytham St Annes, which I believe is the equivalent of USA Zone 8.

We have three allotments in my family, mine (Steve), my wife’s (Debbie) and my middle daughter’s (Jennie). We also have a small kitchen garden at home. They are all managed in an integrated fashion, so don’t expect to see the usual mix of veg on each plot. I do most of the planning and seed starting. We each have our own plots, but we all help each other out.

Jennie’s plot has been designed as a traditional allotment, but we put a lot of focus on minimising the work we do there.  It’s basically a plant and forget it plot, full of garlic, leeks, onions, potatoes, brassicas, squash, beans and fruit trees. It’s heavily mulched to reduce weeds and easy to water.

Debbie’s plot is mostly full of perennials, it’s a garden plot.  Again we did a lot of work to keep the weeds down and Debbie’s approach is inspired by the TV programme The Ornamental Kitchen garden.

My plot is all about experimental growing, maxium productivity and year round abundance.  As with all of the other plots I did a lot of work to control the weeds, but it’s a high maintenance plot.  I’m always planting, harvesting, experimenting and generally having a great time.

Collectively the plots deliver an amazing abundance of fruit and veg all year round.  Debbie, Jennie and I are effectively self sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit for much of the year.  During winter we have enough surplus to feed a few more of our friends and during the rest of the year we feed up to 22 people.

This video provides an overview:

I do an update of the allotments, roughly one a week, you can find the tours here:

Our approach to allotment life is to: grow as much as we possibly can, to be self-sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit in season, to give away our huge surplus to friends and family, and to have as much fun as possible.  For more on self sufficiency check out these videos:

Debbie and I spend about 4 hours a day, 4 days a week on the plots (on average) and we keep nudging that down as we eliminate non-productive work: like grass cutting, weeding and watering as much as practical. We are both newbie gardeners, only starting the allotments in 2016.

I’m a bit obsessive about the nutrient density of the veg that we grow and making the plots easy to work because it’s through this allotment lifestyle and food that I’ve overcome a debilitating auto-immune disease.

I’m always aware though that it might not last so I make sure that I don’t work too hard, eat as much organic fruit and veg I can and design the plots so that I can still work them if I flare up again.

We are self-sufficient in veg and seasonal fruit so if I want to eat something, I have to grow it. Sometimes I take this seriously, because I really want great food to eat every day, sometimes it’s just a bit of fun, or an experiment to test out an idea that I will take seriously next year.

Last year early potatoes were in the ‘just for fun’ category, but it worked well, so this year I’ve taken it seriously and I’m trying to have new potatoes all year round. It’s mid April and – one month earlier than last year – I harvested my first batch. if all goes to plan we will be harvesting continuously now every week.

In the video I go through the few simple steps that I took, it’s not a lot of work and it’s well worth it. As you will see in the video I could have harvested a few weeks earlier and next year my objective will be to harvest my first batch sometime in March!

If you are new to my allotment videos you might find a bit of context useful. We live in the north west of England, in Lytham St Annes, which I believe is the equivalent of USA Zone 8.

We have three allotments in my family, mine (Steve), my wife’s (Debbie) and my middle daughter’s (Jennie). We also have a small kitchen garden at home. They are all managed in an integrated fashion, so don’t expect to see the usual mix of veg on each plot. I do most of the planning and seed starting. We each have our own plots, but we all help each other out.

Jennie’s plot has been designed as a traditional allotment, but we put a lot of focus on minimising the work we do there.  It’s basically a plant and forget it plot, full of garlic, leeks, onions, potatoes, brassicas, squash, beans and fruit trees. It’s heavily mulched to reduce weeds and easy to water.

Debbie’s plot is mostly full of perennials, it’s a garden plot.  Again we did a lot of work to keep the weeds down and Debbie’s approach is inspired by the TV programme The Ornamental Kitchen garden.

My plot is all about experimental growing, maxium productivity and year round abundance.  As with all of the other plots I did a lot of work to control the weeds, but it’s a high maintenance plot.  I’m always planting, harvesting, experimenting and generally having a great time.

Collectively the plots deliver an amazing abundance of fruit and veg all year round.  Debbie, Jennie and I are effectively self sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit for much of the year.  During winter we have enough surplus to feed a few more of our friends and during the rest of the year we feed up to 22 people.

This video provides an overview:

I do an update of the allotments, roughly one a week, you can find the tours here:

Our approach to allotment life is to: grow as much as we possibly can, to be self-sufficient in veg all year round and in fruit in season, to give away our huge surplus to friends and family, and to have as much fun as possible.  For more on self sufficiency check out these videos:

Debbie and I spend about 4 hours a day, 4 days a week on the plots (on average) and we keep nudging that down as we eliminate non-productive work: like grass cutting, weeding and watering as much as practical. We are both newbie gardeners, only starting the allotments in 2016.

I’m a bit obsessive about the nutrient density of the veg that we grow and making the plots easy to work because it’s through this allotment lifestyle and food that I’ve overcome a debilitating auto-immune disease.

I’m always aware though that it might not last so I make sure that I don’t work too hard, eat as much organic fruit and veg I can and design the plots so that I can still work them if I flare up again.

 Allotment Finances
We’ve harvested a total of £1730 of fruit and veg this year
We’ve spent a total of £458 this year, mostly one time investments

What we’ve harvested and eaten
We harvested a total of £228 worth of veg this week, excluding everything from the store. This is a lot higher than last week, in fact we had our biggest ever harvest day on Tuesday, but not our biggest week because we didn’t have any of the bulk harvests we enjoy in summer/autumn.  We had 39 meals with ingredients from the allotment.

We picked: calabrese, broccolini, purple sprouting broccoli, sprouts, sprout tops, romanesco leaves, calabrese leaves, red cabbage leaves, radish, radish leaves, lots of types of kale, cabbage, true spinach, perpetual spinach, mizuna, giant red mustard, chard, kalettes, spring onions, celery, salad rocket, sorrel, claytonia, lambs lettuce, leeks, pea shoots, lots of bean tops and loads of lettuce. We also raided the store for: carrots, potatoes, onions, shallots, garlic, red beetroot, golden beetroot and dried apples.

How many people are we feeding?

We are stable for now at eight families (Us, Elena, Jennie, Tony, Diane, Anne, Chris, Christine) about 20 people and we will probably stay at this level for a few weeks now, sharing any extra surplus with fellow allotmenteers.

What we’ve bought this week
Nothing

Videos published
I published three short videos:

Growing early beans, peas and carrots – just for fun

Growing early tomatoes – just for fun

First Harvest of the Early Potatoes

What I’ve sown

What I’ve planted

I’ve harvested the last of the Lambs Lettuce and planted true lettuces and radish in it’s place.  I’ve also harvested the last of the chicory and planted six more kale plants and radish in place of that.

I’ve potted on

1. Bedford Sprouts
2. Marathon Calabrese
3. Dazzling Blue kale
4. Carvelo Nero kale
5. Red Russian kale

First harvests of the year

1. New potatoes, we harvested the first three seed potatoes
2. Asparagus

What we running out of

We have run out of dried pears and winter squash

Last harvests of the year

Lambs Lettuce

What’s left in store

Potatoes – 2/3 medium sized bags
Garlic – a few bulbs
Carrots – 1.5 big boxes
Onions – 2/3 large box
Shallots – 1/2 large box
Beets – 2.5 big boxes
Dried Apples – 1 big cool bag

Water Reserves and Rainfall

Allotment reserves (Steve) : 2400 litres, down by 200 litres
Allotment reserves (Jennie): 450 litres
Allotment reserves (Debbie): 400 litres
Home reserves : 750 litres

It’s been dry for a couple of weeks now, with no rain forecast for the next ten days, but fortunately although it’s sunny, it’s also cold so the ground has not totally dried out, but I need to water the beds as every one of them is full of veg.  I’m also bringing 80 litres a day from home to keep the water butts full.  As soon as it warms up (next week) we will start getting through water at a depressing rate!

What have we processed for preserving

Nothing

Highlights

Incredibly we had our biggest ever harvest this week.  Harvesting more in April than August is quite a vindication of my new strategy to maximise harvests in spring rather than winter.  This basically means we picked more veg in a week in April than a month in Winter and it’s much higher quality, picked in much nicer conditions.  We still grow enough in winter to make sure we have plenty to eat, but a smaller surplus.

I made a big effort this year to make sure that we have new potatoes as early as possible and as late as possible.  Blight scuppered my ‘late as possible’ plan, but the early as possible plan has worked out very well and we should have an abundance of new potatoes for the next few months.

Thanks to longer days we are now able to harvest in the evenings, which is cooler and we can also enjoy a day out.

Lowlights

I’m in a race against time now!  The winter brassicas are coming to and end much faster than usual and the over-wintered (as small plants) and spring sown varieties are on a go slow because of the nightly frosts.  I think we will have continuity of supply, but I’m pleased we grow a surplus usually because I think we will have just enough for us.

Some of the winter brassicas now have cabbage aphid, so we will have to pull them up early, to try and avoid them spreading to this year’s plants.

The allotment water has not been switched on and we have no idea when it will be switched on as the committee hasn’t even discussed it yet.  We are used to it being switched on in early April, so the lack of information on this makes it very difficult to plan.

Lack of rain and tap water makes planting out all of the new seedlings something of a lottery.

Frosts every night this week means lots of messing around with fleece.