Succession sowing and planting

I did it:  at the allotment I cleared the last of the new potatoes and the snap pea vines.  The potatoes are in paper sacks in my cupboard and the vines are spread in the sun at the allotment to finish drying any pods for next year's seed.  If you recall, I'd planted the potatoes in no-dig fashion.  The result:  kind of small yield but not too bad.  Some plants were more productive than others but on average each plant grew about two meals worth, I would say.  Most I could just pull up carefully and sift through the mulch for potatoes (though a few needed to be dug up).  I would probably grow them this way again, at least with new potatoes.

The potato bed had been heavily sheet mulched in winter and renewed again in spring;  however it was still crisscrossed with couch grass runners, despite only a few blades of grass growing in with the potatoes.  I did my best to pull out what I could find as I prepared and sowed the bed with beet seed, but I already know it'll be covered in grass by the time the beets are sprouting.  I raked most of the mulch onto the tomato bed next to it.

The pea bed wasn't as bad with runners as the potato bed though I did have to pull out quite a lot of weeds in the unmulched bits where the vines had grown.  I sowed this smaller bed half turnips and half winter radishes.  Both beds have insect mesh on them;  the beets won't need it once they have grown a few leaves, but the turnips and radishes will, being susceptible to cabbage white butterflies as well as pigeons.

My small bed of daikon radishes (at home) is sprouting up under its little net curtain.  I've pricked out one last tray of kohlrabi--though they're not looking as robust as the ones I sowed in spring--and two trays of fennel.  Also potted on the spring cauliflowers;  these will hopefully transplant out in the kitchen garden after the cucumbers and zucchini are finished.  What's more, I sowed a pinch of pak choi into a pot which are just starting to come up.  These will have to transplant into the kitchen garden because they are known slug candy (though the slug population at home is starting to grow since my ducks aren't allowed on the veg beds just yet);  the kohlrabi and fennel may go up to the allotment when big enough to transplant.

Rain, and therefore more work

Rain!  The wider back garden, seen from the son's window, July 2025

The evening after writing the previous post, I watched a youtube video (but I can't find the link) about the hosepipe ban from a vlogger with an allotment who lives in my region (with the same water company);  people in the comments suggested visiting the water company's website to confirm than hosepipes can in fact be used in this region for watering food crops.  On the website, the company goes on to ask that a watering can be used if possible but that people won't be fined for using a hose for this purpose.  

I'd already rolled up my hose at the allotment and have been watering by hand this past week--I'm able and willing to do it at this point.  However, we've had a change in the weather:  it's been raining--and typically, it happened the day our school summer break started!  The last rain we had, about two and a half weeks ago, did top up my barrels but didn't much penetrate into the soil.  I planted out some autumn/winter cauliflowers at the allotment last week--clearing away the turnips to make room--and the topmost cm (or less) was damp but under that was pretty darn dry.  Thankfully, after a prolonged heavy rain on Saturday, the soil is moist and soft, perfect for seed sowing:  which I already did at home, moving seven random strawberry plants (and clearing lots of weeds) from the herb bed, and resowing with daikon radish.

Now I can get on with my succession planting at the allotment, which I've put off because of the heat;  I've carried on succession planting at at home as I'm able to water by hand several times a day if needed.  I'm ready to clear away the last of the new potato bed (been digging and eating these gradually) and the snap pea bed (left to dry for seed).  Perhaps I'll also pull out the rest of the kohlrabi and resow/replant their bed too.  

At the allotment I'll sow at least one more bed of beet seed, and one of winter radish (the large cooking type, not the little salad ones).  I also have some asparagus grown from seed;  I need to decide on a long term location for these.  At first I dismissed the allotment because of the ongoing couch grass infestation--but then I reconsidered:  is that really such an issue with asparagus?  Can I make a raised bed for them, perhaps?  Or can I maybe just keep sheet mulching around them as needed to keep the grass at bay?

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In other gardening news, I'm so swamped with vegetables right now it's almost overwhelming.  I reminded the husband about the summer it all became too much, though this time thank goodness it's not for the same reason (I don't think I could handle doing that again!);  this time it's the sheer volume of work I've been doing.  

I watched another youtube video (below) about self sufficiency in the veg garden, and this man, Huw Richards, estimated it took about four hours of work per week.  I would say that's roughly what I've been doing in the active months--mid spring to say mid autumn--but I would have to add that's not all the work that's required.  It takes me a minimum of half an hour every day for preparing, cooking, preserving, etc, in addition to the actual work of growing the food in the first place.  Sometimes I'm at it for two hours in a day, if I've got a lot ready all at once, for instance when I did the big kimchi marathon two weeks ago--or when I picked, pitted and froze all the Morello cherries from my little tree.  I like growing, I like to cook;  but really, the sheer volume of it is getting away from me again.

 

Rain please!

Our area (and many others) started a hosepipe ban on Friday;  we are not allowed to water with a hose until it's lifted--probably not till autumn at the earliest.  On Thursday evening, the husband took up one of our 220 L water barrels--it usually lives under the garage gutter--and put it at the top of the allotment where the pots of cherry tomatoes are, and filled it up with the hose from the water supply at the bottom.  He also gave the whole plot a good soak, for about an hour.  

Now I'm watering up there with watering cans twice a day.  The daughter and I have a good system where she stays at the tap at the bottom of the allotment, filling up one can while I water with the other.  Much quicker than me doing it alone.  I use the barrel at the top for just the pots near it which should last me maybe two weeks;  possibly the son and I can refill it with the watering cans when it's empty. 

I also have planters at the bottom with more tomatoes and a few carrots;  in the ground I'm watering:  plum tomatoes twice a day;  leeks, pickling cucumbers, zucchini and squash once a day.  In-ground plants I'm not watering every day:  corn, beets, kohlrabi, purple sprouting broccoli, Brussels sprouts.  Not watering at all:  potatoes (digging some up every few days), snap peas (letting the remainder mature for seed), raspberries, artichokes, rhubarb, currants, gooseberries (all of these are finished for the year except a few artichokes).

At home watering isn't such an issue:  I'm there a lot more than I'm at the allotment!  I move the washing machine pipe to a different veg bed every day, I'm saving and reusing several liters of washing and cooking water every day, and I still have three water barrels fairly full of rain from a week and a half ago.  Twice a day I have to water my six pots of tomatoes, two pots of peppers and peach tree (in a large planter);  plus there are still some trays of seedlings on my patio table along with most of my houseplants on their summer holiday (my two remaining houseplants in my bathroom need shade--I collect their water in a bucket as my shower warms up).   Oh, and as my two ducks require fresh water daily, I reuse their two mucky tubs every morning too, when the son has replaces them with clean.

My allotment soil is full of organic matter to absorb water and well mulched to prevent it evaporating--my kitchen garden soil is too.  The plants I started early in the season such as beets, kohlrabi, etc, have been surviving fairly well on the sporadic rain because my soil isn't quite parched yet.  The cool-loving snap peas gave up flowering because of the heat but are still green and alive despite me not watering them at all;  actually I'm considering pulling them up to resow the bed with another batch of beets, but I would have to water these regularly until it rains again.  While I want lots more beets, I'm not sure I can keep them alive.  

Though I'm not yet desperate for it, I really really want some more rain--I can't believe I can actually write that:  this is usually a very soggy island!

Cabbages, lettuces, leeks and flowers

Last week was a kimchi week, with about 10 cabbages all ready at once;  the variety is Dutchman (an F1) which I bought last year in the £1 sale, and I grew them at both the allotment and home.  They are a lovely, quick growing sweetheart type--most of them no more than 3# in weight (a few smaller, one actually much bigger).  I've made somewhere in the vicinity of 10 L of kimchi.  I'm not out of cabbage yet, and I'm also not quite out of big jars--but I've got no room in the fridge and the kitchen counter is also pretty full.  I eat kimchi pretty much every day with my eggs and bacon at breakfast, and sometimes with lunch or dinner too;  I'm not worried about having too much as it will keep for several months or longer--but I may need to rethink my food storage space.

I've now picked most of the lettuces and cabbages (to the left), June 2025

Actually I was going to sow even more cabbage seed last week in the hopes of a second harvest but it turns out I don't have any more.  I have four small Savoy seedlings which I've planted them in the gaps in the bed above where the lettuces and cabbages have gone;  however one has seemingly expired from the heat/dry and the other three don't look very promising either--it was old seed and not many sprouted.  I will turn instead to pak choi, which I definitely have seed for;  however, it too doesn't like hot dry conditions so I will probably wait at least another week to sow (it did finally rain again on Sunday but we're forecast another heatwave this week).

I finally got to the end of the first batch of butterhead lettuces, but have planted out another batch, seen below with leeks.  It's actually kind of amazing how fast it has grown;  I protected it with those wire trays at first but the lettuces outgrew them and the birds started pecking the leaves poking out;  I've now put up some bird netting and canes and it is looking a lot less tattered.  There is still some curly oakleaf lettuce about--and I've just pricked out the newest batch of these into a tray, for hopefully planting out at the end of the month.

These Lyon leeks have grown since this picture, as have the lettuces (under the wire, front left), June 2025

When I planted out the leeks, their tray had some unexpected calendula in it so I just planted them all out together.  This bed borders my patio and also has some wallflowers at the front of it, to flower next spring;  I grew a few other flowers from seed this spring, including:  zinnia and French marigold, lupin, echinacea, verbena, aquilegia and perennial sweet pea.  Most of these have already been planted out in the wider garden but I wanted the wallflowers close to the house so we could still enjoy them from the kitchen (when it's too miserable to go out);  the rest of my new flowers bloom in later spring/summer.

The Vegetable Challenge has begun

The makings of a salad, June 2025

Official start date:  21 June, 2025.  Official end date:  21 January 2026.  

Rules:

• No vegetables to be bought during the Challenge--with the exception of onions.  
• "Salad" fruits such as cucumber/tomatoes/etc, are allowed but highly discouraged and will be noted.  No restriction on non-salad fruits (apples, bananas, etc).  
• Vegetables obtained for free, i.e., gifts/trades/foraged/etc are allowed, so long as no money is exchanged.  Vegetables bought before the start of the Challenge are allowed.

Greyhound cabbage nearly ready (butterhead lettuce past ready!), June 2025

My last Challenge unofficially lasted seven months, but only officially reached the six month mark;  I am setting it for seven months again--hoping to extend it longer actually--but will leave seven months as the goal.  I feel this should be achievable--and I hope eight months or even the full 12 will be too.  I will do my best to keep on growing and preserving up to and beyond the official end date.

Packing it in: cucumber at the very back, then courgette, cabbage and lettuce;  spring onion at the bottom left, June 2025

I think I could have started this Challenge a lot earlier this year actually--we've been eating garden/allotment veg almost exclusively, barring some seasonal produce bought crazy cheap (£0.09 per kilo?!) at Christmas and Easter, which we mainly either froze or fermented for later use.  I'm now freezing and fermenting my own seasonal produce too.  Let's go!