Hello, I'm Liam, and welcome to my August allotment tour. On these tours,
I usually share what I've been doing over the last few weeks. But this tour will be a little
different because I've been away. Instead, I'm going to share what I did to prepare the plot,
and more or less, it seems to have worked. I'll also share what I hope
to be doing over the next few weeks. So let's get started.
Highlights of this month's tour include the tomatoes growing inside the polytunnel. But
there are also a couple of chilli plants and some cucumber plants. The perpetual
spinach and chard is still growing strongly. The winter squash is beginning to mature. It's been
a bumper year for courgettes. French beans have been ready for harvest over the last few weeks.
The garlic growing in this bed here has been harvested, as have the new potatoes which
have been absolutely delicious. The maincrop potatoes are also ready. The onions are doing
well. The apples are swelling nicely now on the tree, and the elephant garlic is looking good.
I'm also really pleased with the dahlias that are decorating the plot.
What hasn't gone so well is the fruit cage, because somebody broke into it and
unfortunately broke some of the supports holding the canes up. They got in through the doorway,
but instead of carefully removing the net, they ripped it off from the top here.
And then once inside, they walked through the row of canes by breaking the wire that
was supporting them at the top, and stepping over.
Unfortunately, that's damaged the plants, and in doing so, they did remove a large amount of fruit.
But having said that, the food cage was a success. I did get large amounts of food of it myself,
and I learned a couple of things. The first is I think I'm going to use wire around the fruit cage,
probably some chicken wire, I think that will provide better protection,
it's less easy to rip. And the second thing is, I'm going to create walkways inside the food cage,
so that if somebody does get inside, they can walk around more easily and not break the supports that
are holding the plants up. That way, I may lose the fruit, but I won't lose the plants.
Starting the tour proper, with the polytunnel. Plants inside the polytunnel need to be watered
every day because of how hot it gets inside. It gets to about 50 degrees inside on hot days. To
water the plants when I went away, I have these water butts outside. I've got five water butts in
total. I've daisy chained them together and inside one of them I've got a water pump, that pumps up
water through this hose here, and then into a drip irrigation system that works on a timer.
The whole system is powered by this solar panel, that connects to a leisure
battery. The kind of battery that is used by caravans, and that is what powers the pump.
And the result has worked really well. When I came back, I was really pleased to
arrive back to lots of ripe tomatoes, both regular tomatoes and cherry tomato types.
I'm growing three main types this year. Sungold which are orange cherry tomatoes. A variety
called Chocolate Cherry. I'll just picked this one here to show. Again, that's another cherry type.
And then the standard size tomato which is called Premio. I’ll pick this one here to show.
That one's looking great.
I also have my cucumber plants. Now these cucumber plants are looking worse for wear.
You can tell by the yellowing of the leaves and they're also quite brittle to touch,
very dry to touch. These two plants are actually the cuttings that I took off
plants that I grew from seed. and by doing that it's extended the growing season.
This could be the last cucumber I take for the season. There we go, looks a good one.
And then next to the cucumber I have these two chilli plants. Well, actually two pots that
contain two chilli plants each. And these have these lovely green chillies growing on them,
they look ripe and ready for picking. The variety is called De Cayenne. I'm
really looking forward to trying them. I think they could be quite spicy this year
because it's been really hot and sunny. The sunny conditions should really bring out their heat.
When going away, what I tried to do for my winter squash and my courgettes, is to grow the plants as
large as possible before I go away, because I find the leaf mass covers the ground, and helps to stop
the hot sun drying it out. Before I go away, I also give the plants a really good watering
to make sure that the ground is nice and moist for them. It seems to have worked. The leaves
are a little less green and more brittle to touch than before I went away. But overall, I think the
plants are in pretty good nick. And the fruit is swelling nicely on them. I've got one over here.
Another one here. One at the back here, and and a couple back here too, one at the front,
and one at the back there. So I'm really pleased with that.
It's a similar story with the courgettes. There's some mold growing now on some of
the leaves. That's simply a sign of the plants ageing.
But there are some fruits still forming. I've got two down there,
and a few growing at the back here, including some flowers still forming. The extra step I did with
the courgettes before going away was to remove all the fruits that were forming on the plants.
I did that because over a couple of weeks the fruit would have grown into a really large size,
and it also encourages new flowers to form. That worked, because when I came back, the fruit that
had regrown on the plants, were ready to be harvested. A lovely surprise when coming back.
I did exactly the same with the French beans. Before I went away, I picked as much beans as
possible to encourage more flowers and beans to form on the plants. Now, because french beans
grow vertically, the ground is more exposed to the heat. And what that means is that the ground
is more likely to dry out, but I gave the plants really a good watering before I went away, and
also when I came back. Given how hot it's been, I am surprised with how well the plants are doing.
On many of the plants the leaves are still a good colour. A few are showing signs of dying
back. But there are lots of French beans still forming over here. So, with luck,
I'm hoping to harvest French beans through August, and perhaps into September too.
I've really enjoyed the new potatoes I've grown this year. The variety was
called Pentland Javelin. Quite a light coloured, almost white coloured potato.
To eat, I've really enjoyed boiling them, and then covering them with a little olive oil.
Absolutely delicious. New potatoes don’t store particularly well. So alongside the new potatoes,
I've also grown maincrop potatoes. The variety I've chosen to grow this year is called Piccaso,
and last year the potatoes I grew had a really delicious flavour. I have a
couple of beds of them. I hope to dig up the potatoes through August. If it's too hot,
I’ll leave it till September, and then I'll box them up and store them in the
shed. That way I hope the potatoes will last till Christmas, and perhaps January and February too.
One of the first jobs I did when I came back was to dig up my garlic. Because there's been
so little rain, the bulbs had actually dried while still in the ground, so they’re ready
for storage now. It's really satisfying to take home a wheelbarrow full of garlic.
Now with my onions, I don't usually water them that much. But before I went away, I gave the
bed a really good dousing of water a couple of times in one week. And that seems to have done
the trick. Some of the bulbs are really good size. This bulb here is about the size of a tennis ball,
as is the one alongside it. But a few of the bulbs are a little smaller. These two here are more golf
ball size. Nevertheless, considering how dry it's been. I think I'm lucky to have a harvest at all.
I also gave the elephant garlic a good watering before I went away. The other thing I had to do
was that the elephant garlic started to grow scapes, which are the stems that lead to the
flowers. There's typically one scape per plant, and all that's needed is to pick off the scape,
and that way all the energy goes into developing the bulb and not into the flower. These plants
are starting to yellow. So, maybe towards the end of August, they'll be ready for harvesting.
The apple tree may look mature, but it's actually only a couple of years old. And because the tree
is relatively young, over the last month I’ve given the tree a really good dousing of water
about once a fortnight. Now, I don't know how deep the roots go and whether that watering was
strictly necessary. But looking at the leaves and the apples, it certainly hasn't done any harm.
And the developing fruit is looking really great.
Not all the apples are perfect. This one's got something on it.
And another here that looks to have been eaten by something.
But at this stage, overall the majority of apples are looking in good condition.
Over the last few months I've been really enjoying harvesting the perpetual spinach and
chard. My strategy for keeping the plants going when I went away, was to allow the bed to become
almost overgrown with lots of big leaves. And that effectively provided almost 100% shelter to the
ground. And then I gave the plant a really good watering, and I think that has done the trick.
The plants certainly survived the period when I was away. But the first job I did when I came back
was to remove all the old leaves to allow plenty of space for the new leaves to form. Now the old
leaves wouldn't have been good to eat, they were discoloured, and also really sort of dry and hard
to the touch. I'm sure if I had to cooked them they'd have been really chewy. But in the centre
of the plants new leaves form. And by removing the outer leaves, it allows all the energy to
go into forming the new leaves. And I hope to be harvesting those over the next few weeks.
To finish with, one of my favourite things down here on the plot are the dahlias I’m growing,
not only do they decorate the plot, but they also make excellent cut flowers. I can bring them home,
put them into vases, and enjoy them at home. There are five dahlia varieties,
these large orange stems which were the first variety that I grew.
They also have these gorgeous red orange buds. I really love these flowers.
And last year I added these two varieties. Another cactus type, a very light coloured peach variety.
The heads are relatively smaller, a little smaller than the size of the palm of my hand.
And also this white cactus type. Really lovely blooms,
but again relatively small compared to the orange dahlias that I have.
And then new for this year, I've added these two dahlia varieties.
This absolutely stunning purple and white dahlia,
and it's producing lots and lots of flowers. The plant is absolutely covered with them. And then
in contrast, next to it I have this yellow cactus dahlia variety, and these are the biggest headed
dahlia that I’m growing. The flowers when fully open are almost the size of the whole of my hand.
Now there are a lot less flowers compared to the purple ones, probably not surprising because of
the size of the flower heads. But I have two open at the moment. And there seems to be more
on the way, and perhaps next year when the plant is more mature, there'll be even more.
And that's it. I hope you enjoyed the tour. If you did, please let me know
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