We just popped down for a couple of hours weeding to get on top of it, especially the mares-tail. While we were there we had a couple of visitors..............
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We've had a few days of decent weather so everywhere should be dry. We have a couple of little helpers with us today. I've fixed some old trellising from our back garden (that we've had replaced) onto the back of the seating area for the grape to grow through and for added privacy and quiet. The potatoes need mounding up.......... The artichokes seem to be at home in the bottom "arrid" bed, look to be the best ever. We hadn't been down the allotment for a fortnight so we thought we should have a good long day down there, especially as we were currently in the middle of an exceptionally dry spell. So far April has only produced 10% of it's normal rainfall. As it turned out we were down there for around six hours and for three of those we had a couple of little helpers! As Simon was with us we took advantage of a recent delivery of chippings. A major job was weeding the fruit cage, planting the blackberry cuttings from the upper fruit cage, and then laying some chippings. The wild-flower bed is looking good and with the majority of the comfrey removed from it there's more room for flowers etc. Note how many clematis buds there are on the clematis that was only planted last year. We found time to sow a whole bed of onions and net it over. All in all a productive day and we managed to weed about 90% of the beds, although it's definitely easier when we're in the middle of a prolonged dry spell. Bank Holiday Monday and the weather was OK, not brilliant, but OK. We went down prepared to do a full day but at lunchtime we got distracted.............. The mange-tout and the beans are looking OK. Potatoes in the top bed are doing fine but can't decide whether to "mound-up" any more. Artichokes are in flower. The Goji Berry appears to have some mildew. Don't know why so gave it a good watering as it's very dry down by the cemetery wall. We didn't do any celery last year; instead we concentrated on celeriac - but that was a bit of a failure. This year we're going back to celery, but the bed is a bit bumpy and full of weeds. Cleared all the weeds from the celery bed. Flattened out the big lumps and dug five channels for the celery to be planted in. We have about fifty plants so that equates to ten plants per channel. We were just about to stop for lunch when Mercy, Jessica and Sophie arrived to help. Here's Mercy ready to plant a sweetcorn. In fact, everybody gave a helping hand with the sweetcorn. Here we have the sweetcorn in and ready to be watered. And here's the sweetcorn planted and netted. Started putting in the courgettes as well. And here they are, done. Had quite a bit to do today but we had some visitors who were only to eager to help. Becky came down with Sophie and Jess who picked some tomatoes (and unlike Mercy resisted taking a bite out of each one) and also picked a few blueberries and blackberries. We also had Stacey come down to help and she cut the beans down and cleared the bean-sticks and then picked a few of the remaining blackberries. We also cut back some of the stuff that was dying back, particularly around the seating area and we tidied up some of the beds such as the rhubarb. Sophie and Jessica picked a few tomatoes...... ..............and also a few blackberries. The rhubarb looked a bit of a mess so we cleared the dead leaves and tidied the bed. Just some of the produce we picked. Stacey cut the beans down and tidied the sticks. Another pleasant day weather wise so today we had two little helpers on site. There's been an old cast iron bath abandoned nearby for about two years so today we requisitioned it for the blueberries in the top fruit cage. How on earth it got down here in the first place as it weighed a ton. BEFORE:- AFTER:- The other main thing we did was the support post hole in the same fruit cage had almost dried out so as more rain was forecast for tonight we took the opportunity to put a concrete support in and make the cage upright again. BEFORE:- AFTER:- Well, finally a reasonable amount of rain. Had about eighteen hours of rain over Thursday/Friday. Not torrential but steady; enough to mean that we didn't have to water today. It did mean we had a lot of Mares-Tail to deal with though. We also had some visitors......... Also had a visit from the worlds largest moth. No idea of the species but it was nearly the size of the palm of your hand. And it all meant we were able to pick some more produce including some potatoes, of which the quality was superb but alas the quantity not nearly so. To finish some general photos showing how some of the produce is faring - mostly really well. We even have a decent amount of carrots now. Warmest day of the year so far and as it's been dry for over a week conditions were near perfect for working down the allotment. Planted a bed of onions but mostly did "structural" type work. Fixed a wooden framed netting cover given to us a couple of years ago. It's quite flimsy and was showing definite signs of wear. Mended the small fruit cage door as the hinges were falling off. Screwed some wooden netting supports to one of the bottom beds and secured two large pallets to the far side of the plot to serve as "fencing" as the adjoining plot still shows no sign of occupation. Also put chippings down on some of the more bare parts of the plot.......and for the second consecutive weekend we had visitors. Screwed a thermometer next to the shed to check how warm it really gets in that sheltered part of the allotment down by the cemetery wall. It reached 27*C today which is pretty good going for early April - the air temperature back at home in the shade was 21*C so it's significantly warmer on our sheltered plot. A beautiful Spring Day today so we had three little visitors........ Two of whom insisted on helping................ Today we finished the bean trench and planted a bed of seed potatoes as well as clearing a couple of beds in readiness for planting. Moved some of the compost about a bit, finished creosoting the shed, and had a Subway Sunday lunch! First lunch down the plot of the new season. The new eating/picnic area passed it's first big test with everybody here.........
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