Harvest bits and bobs

A place to chat about anything you like, including non-gardening related subjects. Just keep it clean, please!

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PLUMPUDDING
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I've plenty of tomatoes ripening but they are a bit slower than usual. Still it is good to be able to keep up with them rather than having too many all at once.

Two nice surprises this week - lots of really good sized florence fennel bulbs and several cauliflowers ready.
vegpatchmum
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I have tomatoes ripening both in the greenhouse and outside but only just. I've removed the lower leaves on all my greenhouse plants, as well as any leaves showing signs of damage and I've removed the lower leaves on one set of my outside tomatoes as well because they were looking a little battered.

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Elaine
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Our two sowings of beetroot haven't done very well on our plot. The first lot had patchy germination, whereas the second lot failed to germinate at all. I'd pre-soaked the seeds and watered the row prior to sowing, which usually works a treat and produces so many beets I end up with a cupboardful of jars of pickled beetroot plus lots extra to give away and donate to our allotment produce stall at the local RSPCA motorbike show. I'm assuming it was due to the heatwave as I couldn't get down to the allotment every day to water up.
Potatoes Pentland Javelin and Charlotte have been marvellous...good yields, no slug damage or other nasties. We tried Red Duke of York this year but we're not keen on them.
Soft fruits Black and red currants, red and green gooseberries have produced pounds of fruit (lots of jam making sessions!) and strawberries which were slow to start went daft overnight. I've made more jam from these than ever before. The Joan Jay raspberries are just starting to produce...I've been eating those! yum!
Brassicas have been a bit hit and miss but enough caulies to freeze.
Runner beans and courgettes are going daft as per usual...neighbours are beginning to hide when they see me coming home. :lol:
Our toms and cucumbers in the greenhouses are being slow to ripen too (I was late getting them planted out) but I've been harvesting them this past week....just removed some lower leaves on the tomato plants.
Onions and shallots have done well, though the onions aren't as big as they have been other years..no problem, as I prefer smaller ones.
All in all, I'm quite happy with it all after last years disasters due to the wet weather.
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30'row of Charlotte dug last night, some decent sized ones, but not quite baking size.
Cosse Violette CFB prolific, as are Burpless cucumbers.
Cylindrical beetroot are doing well, two large jars filled with three pans worth and more to do. Nice to slice at up to 10" long.

Next potato to dig is either Nicola or Mayan Gold, the latter I am unsure when it should be dug, any advice welcome. :?
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Stephen
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Heavy crops of red, black and white currants.
Good crop of broad beans (gone now).
Heavy crop of Czar plums (the other tree yet to ripen but much lighter of fruit)
Raspberries coming on now, looking good.
Freezers already full!
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Motherwoman
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I'm so envious of plum crops ripening, two years with no set at all down here. Lots of currants and gooseberries though and struggling to find freezer room now. Got first apples nearly ripe too; an unknown tree that's very old with a big hollow section at the base of the trunk. Not Beauty of Bath so haven't a clue what it is but it always crops well even in a bad apple set year last last year.

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Stephen
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Yes, I'm very lucky but I got help from Brogdale. In my little handkerchief of a garden there is just room for two trees, fanned agaist walls. My request was for trees which would polinate each other (obviously), one primarily a cooker the other a desert, different colours and to ripen at different times. I thought this might be a tall order but Czar and Coe's Golden Drop ticked all the boxes. The Czar is a much heavier cropper and I would like more of the desert but I am very pleased with their advice and they are great trees.

I overlooked the gooseberries, I had lots of those too.
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Motherwoman
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I seem to have lots of anonymous fruit, inherited in the garden and from un-named sources. For instance a golden plum that usually fruits like crazy and is known as Ted's cutting! There's also an ancient cooker, not a Bramley, which provides most of my cooking apples.

Where you are short on room Stephen do you grow your gooseberries and currants as bushes or as cordons? I'm thinking of trying gooseberries as cordons on the allotment.

Pulled up the last of the peas yesterday and trimmed excess foliage off the tomatoes, no sign of blight yet thank goodness and they are just starting to ripen. Runner beans are doing well, Enorma Elite is performing better than Lady Di whcih I have to say is a bit skinny on growth and beans.

MW
Redfox
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Lots of runner beans, courgettes and carrots. had a few cabbages, tomatoes are now ripening well, had a few cucumbers and peppers are all doing well and starting to ripen :D . Potatoes so far have been poor, hopefully next lot will be better.
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Ricard with an H
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I just lifted two big fat slugs feeding on one of my tomatoes, that was a surprise. I just didn't expect slugs to negotiate the sides of a big clay pot then up the sides of a plastic root-trainer.

I'm learning, second-rate tomatoes anyway. :(

Another six square metre X eight inch raised bed has been added to the kitchen Garden and this time I bought ten sheets of ex-mesh to keep Mr Mole out from this and other beds. Thanks to whoever it was who recommended that, now I have a lot of soil to move back-and-forth.

Carrots are good this year so it wasn't the stones last year that buggered them and a good crop has given me lot's more confidence.

A reasonable garlic crop, both hard and soft neck together with onions, red and white have also given me more confidence though I still need to loosen my soil a little more.

I just bought 27 50 kilos bags of New Horizon green compost/soil conditioner, it looks and feels exactly like that horrible Durstons stuff but it was cheaper. NH say it's made from green material but it still has a few bits of wood in it.

Oh-well, I did a test area early in the spring and it did loosen the soil up nicely with the planting responding so thing are looking good for next year if my back doesn't give up first.
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Motherwoman
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At the start of the season I didn't notice any slugs on the allotment but I 'got rid' of quite a few yesterday. They love tomatoes and are hanging around under the courgette leaves. The snails climb up the bean sticks so they get a flying lesson onto the unkempt plot next door.... unless I'm feeling particularly mean :x

MW
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Ricard with an H
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I've had very few slugs this year and though I have been particularly regular with the little blue slug pellets around most of my planting I never thought of protecting the tomatoes.

I've had it with tomatoes though, all that work and I get better from the Co-op who have four different choices and soon to be knocking them out BOGOF.

A crop I haven't mentioned is the Chinese aster, they look a bit wild compared to the uniformity and beauty of chrysanthemums but a cut-bunch lasts over a week. I have two square metres of close planting and about six different colours.variations. Flowers are expensive and they make my plot look happy. Oh-yes, and the French marigold that were such a problem to get started are a riot and huge. I even have them growing in the driveway.

Comfrey liqueur ? :D = Aqua vitae.

And next season I won't mess about trying to raise seedlings in less than ten degrees, don't pack them to close, don't over-water and maybe sow direct under fleece more-often.
How are you supposed to start and maintain a healthy lifestyle if it completely removes a wine lover’s reason to live?
Richard.
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Motherwoman
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See, experience of what suits you and your conditions is kicking in all ready Richard!
I tend to be a late sower of things (sometimes unintentional!) and mostly they catch up. I watch some people on the allotments go through 2 or 3 sets of runner beans before they get some survivors.

Flowers are not something I've gone in for on the plot but now my family for feeding is getting smaller perhaps I'll give them a go.

MW
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Ricard with an H
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Motherwoman wrote:I tend to be a late sower of things
MW


Some local advise was to plant very closely to keep the weeds down so I planted very closely and possibly had some stunted growth in the middle. When I cleared most of the planting out after cropping I prepared the beds for late salad stuff, the empty beds are now a mass of self-seeded or seed-bank weed growth but i'll have to wait until they are big enough to pull out to identify them.

A pal was looking at one the beds and asked what I had sown, weeds. a mass of weeds are now growing because they have space.

I imagine close planting is a trade-off though I have very few weeds amongst my carrot bed but masses where the soil is open to light where I pulled the onion and garlic out.

I thought there was something wrong with some of my garlic because the top growth was stiff like garden cane and the bulbs small. Hard-neck ?

I'm learning. :D

Nice straight carrots this year, sow direct and don't faff with trying to bring them on early then transplant. In fact i'll use seed tape next year.

I'm seed-tape-man.
How are you supposed to start and maintain a healthy lifestyle if it completely removes a wine lover’s reason to live?
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retropants
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Hi Richard, yes, you are right - hard neck!

with these, as soon as the curly flower stem appears, you should cut it off (and eat if you wish) and then the plant concentrates it's energy on growing the bulb rather than the flower stem :) the flower stem is called rocambole and when young is crisp and tender and lends itself to stir fries with it's mild garlic flavour.
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