Seed saving, Oct 2021

Every year I try to save seeds from certain vegetables, and some strains I have been saving for many years now.  I've been keeping the Lord Leicester peas going for ages, though this year we ended up eating most of them fresh!  I got a few dozen only, but I do have quite a lot from last year which should still be viable next spring.

Another one which I have been growing for several years is the green Kuri squash.  We cooked the biggest one from this harvest already (it met with a little bit of damage during harvest and couldn't be stored) and the husband put the seeds to dry for next year.  It came in at around 4 lb;  while it's a good size for us, none of the others are even half as much.  So to try and get the biggest squashes in the future, we saved the seeds from the biggest one harvested.

I grew two new to me varieties of French beans this year, and have saved seed from both of them;  one is a long podded purple type and the other is a flat podded green type.  Both tasty and fairly productive.  I'm moving away from runner beans--my usual green bean in the past--to French beans as they tend to set beans more reliably in dry summers.  That's not to say I won't grow runners again, but I didn't grow any this year.

Another new to me plant was the yellow crookneck squash, which was not as productive as I would have liked but such a tasty vegetable that I allowed one squash to mature fully for seed; the rest were eaten as young courgettes.  I still plan on trying to cook this lumpy yellow squash--we'll see what it tastes like when mature, but regardless, seeds will be saved.

Not seeds per se, but still continuation of the strains:  this year I saved and have replanted garlic cloves and leek bubils.

I have also acquired some seeds of a huge cabbage (and a few more leek bubils) from a fellow allotmenter, and have a very large Cinderella style pumpkin from the local farm stand, though we'll have to taste test it first (after we attempt to carve it later in the week--it's not a traditional Halloween pumpkin and might require a hatchet to get inside);  while I'd love to grow some big carriage-like pumpkins, I only want them if they taste great too.

State of the flock, October 2021

Our eight chickens have finally made the move back to the allotment after spending all summer at home;  I grew some excellent sweetcorn, squash and beans in their allotment yard while they were absent.  They are cleaning up the residue of these now, and will probably stay at the allotment all winter unless we have another enclosure order.  They are currently laying 1-3 eggs a day.

I'm hopeful we'll get the plot fully fenced sometime this winter--mainly because I want our ducks to go up and clean up the slugs.  So many slugs up there, just crying out for a duck to come slurp them up.  As of right now, our six ducks are free ranging at home, mowing the lawn and eating bugs and slugs here;  they're not on the veg patch just yet, but I'll try to move the fence to allow them access to it but not the patio--they poo too much for that.  I don't think any of the three females are laying right now, but as none of them lay in a dedicated nest I can't be certain.  I haven't found any eggs for several weeks anyway.

And Peep the duckling?  He is definitely a boy and his days are numbered, alongside one of the older drakes whom the son named Aggro (for good reason--that duck is a jerk).  We will have just the one drake by springtime, which is plenty.  I'm only waiting for it to be a bit cooler before I kill the two of them;  twice it's cooled down to around 12C during the week only for the weekends to climb back up to 19/20C.  I should have them done by November.

Almonds, 2021

For the past several years I've been trying to keep the almond tree within reach by both pruning and training the branches.  I lost control of that while pregnant with the daughter, and missed my chance again while she was a tiny baby.  I don't think I'll be keeping it small any more now that two years have gone by without intervention.  

And I think I like having this somewhat overly big tree now that I'm stuck with it.  Don't get me wrong, it's not truly a large tree;  it's on semi-dwarf rootstock and for instance won't ever get as big as our mature horse chestnut tree.  But it's taller than the garage it lives next to and is just about as wide;  and this year it's really gone to town on the almonds.  I've been collecting a basketful for the past several days and still haven't quite got all the lower down ones (the ones within my reach).  And the higher up ones?  So many!  The husband has promised to climb on the garage roof and I'll drag out the ladder too.

This tree is a Robijn variety which has more of that classic almond extract flavor found in cookies or marzipan;  they are nice to eat too, but are not what most people would expect and I prefer to use them in cooking rather than eating alone.  In the past, these nuts have been saved for making almond paste to put into our yearly Christmas stollen loaves;  I anticipate needing to find more recipes to use up the rest of them this year!  

I've also been looking up youtube videos on how to crack them more efficiently by hand;  it looks like a hammer and anvil--a flat stone on the floor/ground--is the way to go.  I've had a try and it seems slightly easier than the wire cutters I have used in the past (still pretty time consuming though).

Here's to an excellent almond harvest;  long may it continue.

Food totals, September 2021

Vegetables

 

2 oz salad greens (lettuce, mizuna, chard)

51.5 oz French beans

22.5 oz squash

103.5 oz chard

66.5 oz zucchini

22.5 oz radicchio

21.5 oz kohl rabi

4.5 oz lettuce

6.5 oz beets

10.5 oz carrots

2 oz kale

Total: 313.5 oz, or 19 lb 9.5 oz

Note:  I weigh all my vegetables after preparation:  peeling, trimming, etc.  Does not include:

12.5 oz sweetcorn (untrimmed)

Fruit

 

74 oz plums

16 oz figs

2.5 oz yellow raspberries

 

Total: 92.5 oz, or 5 lb 12.5 oz

 

Also harvested but not weighed: 

 

2 Laxton Fortune apples

19 Sparta apples

Eggs

 

63 eggs from 8 hens and 3 ducks

Sheet mulching again

Up at the allotment I've been sheet mulching as much as possible, despite having gone over the whole plot at least once already (and several beds more than once).  The weeds are vicious, especially the grass.  Sheet mulching in spring/summer basically gives my own transplants enough time to get a footing before the grass comes roaring back by autumn:  now.  While both beds seem just as weedy as each other here at the end of the season, as far as harvesting actual food there was a big difference; I was able to grow big plants and harvest food from sheet mulched beds this year, whereas plants in beds without the treatment were simply no match for the weeds.  

However, sheet mulching in autumn and winter will knock back the weeds and grass for longer--possibly until next autumn, depending on how deep I'm able to make it.  I guess spring/summer mulch might last longer if I were able to make it really deep too, but I don't have a lot of cardboard to hand--I'm bringing home small to medium sized boxes from work which will cover about 1x3 m per week (single layer).  It's not thick rigid cardboard unfortunately and each box needs to be overlapped by about 15 cm;  it's enough to exclude light and smother soft vegetation but breaks down fairly quickly.  I will try to pile the stable bedding on as high as possible, but that's the extent of it:  a thin-ish, piecemeal cardboard layer topped by straw and horse manure.

I will say though, the soil is much improved since I started back in 2018;  it's full of worms and holds moisture really well.  I've not needed to water anything at all except the newest transplants and containers this year.  And the horsetails haven't really appeared at all--they covered the place last year.  It's still just teeming with grass!

Into autumn, 2021

I feel like we've been lucky with a fairly warm and sunny September so far, which has extended the harvest of zucchinis and French beans, among others.  The squashes have produced one or two new fruits this month too, though they may not have time to ripen fully;  they're good whether ripe or immature so I'm not too concerned.

The sweetcorn has all been harvested now, along with all the artichokes, apples, figs and plums.  We still have a few meals of carrots, lettuce, raddicchio, beets; and many more meals of chard!  The chard's really big this year.

Today I planted out the spring cabbages at the allotment;  there are already Brussels sprouts, winter cabbage and purple sprouting broccoli there, transplanted out in summer.  All of these have had some caterpillar damage and none are particularly big.  I hope the spring cabbages fare a little better--at least caterpillar season is just about over till next summer, by which time these should be already harvested.

Mainly I've been trying to get some autumn sunshine while it lasts, whether at home or at the allotment, and enjoying the harvest as it comes in.  Again, I didn't grow enough to meet our storage needs over winter/spring, but we have a little and should have fresh veg anyway (chard of course).

Food totals, Aug 2021

Vegetables

 

75.5 oz green and yellow zucchinis

39 oz green tomatoes

1 oz golden tomatoes

113.5 oz chard

9.5 oz kohl rabi

34.5 oz French beans (purple)

20 oz cabbage

11 oz carrots

2 oz oyster mushrooms

22.5 oz artichoke hearts

4.5 cauliflower

5 oz squash (immature)

3.5 oz kale

37 oz potatoes 

Total:  378.5 oz, or 23 lb 10.5 oz

 

Note:  I weigh all my vegetables after preparation:  peeling, trimming, etc.  Does not included:

 

18.5 oz sweetcorn (untrimmed)

 

Fruits

 

37 oz plums

57.5 oz figs

13.5 oz raspberries

4 oz Sparta apples

 

Total:  112 oz, or 7 lb

Eggs

76 eggs from 8 hens and 3 ducks