Last year small pumpkins and patty pan courgettes were grown on the plot. Didn’t try this them this year. Firstly as the seeds failed, and second I wasn’t convinced about the small pumpkins and little gem squashes.
They all grew well, nestled amonst eight stalks of sweetcorn. The sweetcorn didn’t do so well. Grew tall, but the cobs weren’t that brilliant in the least.
So was I too quick to judge these squashes? I think I might try the space ship patty pan things again. Little gem didn’t quite have the flavour, and were beaten in the taste test by roasted sweet potatoes.
Will have to check the seed stasher and see what seeds i do have. The space ship shaped courgettes were certainly a good cropper. Except when you really don’t want to see another courgette.
All hallow’s eve has come and go. Yet Bruno the Ghost rider pumplkin is still loitering in the kitchen. Whilst squashes such as these do last for sometime, there will soon come a time where the pumpkin might have to meet it’s maker.
In the coming week, I shall try and soup the thing. Not that I am particularly looking forward to chopping it up. Takes a while, since the pumpkin is about 6lbs, with tough leathery skin. The seeds will be saved and hopefully donated to loving homes for the next generation of Bruno Babies.
As the wind chills, winter descends and advent becomes under way; the time spent on the allotment gets less and less. I might potter down then, and do the odd tidy. But with darkness after school, I spent the short amount of time I do use, on the weekends. That means the evenings after work comprise of box sets and reading books.Whilst I have a small library of books-it used to be bigger, but those books that i hadn’t read in five years were donated to a college-I know have an e-reader. This means mama h doesn’t complain about the space they take up, and I can have hundreds to choose forom.
Last night after counselling class last night, I finally got around to around to finishing off http://www.amazon.co.uk/Counselling-Toads-Psychological-Robert-Board-ebook/dp/B000FA622A/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1417629626&sr=1-1&keywords=counselling+for+toads I had started this last year, when the level 2 counselling class had spoken about Transactional Analysis. I was somewhat stumped about it, transactional analysis, at the time and was last night when the class covered it again. Serves me right,I should have perhaps read something about it. Anyway, last night, class finished early so I decided to try again, and went back to the beginning. I’m glad I did. I always find it difficult to resume from a stuck point. The book is a quick read, but then i do tend to quick read. Very simple, straight forward, and the mechanics of counselling, from a person centred approach were there. For instance, the contract setting and the theory were very familiar. I found that useful, a way of hanging my hat on something. It didn’t feel alien. Plus transactional analysis was explained really well. Having toad and the rest of the wind in the willows cast was really useful. Though I do dislike Ratty, and a lot.
But some books are just not that easy. I am stuck on ‘P for Peril’ by Sue Grafton. Half way, and perhaps it is just my brain not wanting to negotiate it. I like reading novels in a series. If Shardlake ever ends, I am likely to be heart broken. I started at ‘A for Alibi’ and would like to make it all the way through to the end. I am currently waiting for the e-reader to charge, and I am going to try and make it towards the end of the novel. Still have a couple of phillipa gregory’s ‘Cousin’s war’ series to go. I wasn’t particularly enamoured with that series, actually. Tudor court was much better in comparison. Failed miserably with ‘Wolf Hall/Bring up the bodies’. Not sure how that has won awards or become a huge theatre show.
Have yet to finish all Fleming’s Bond novels. Not too sure, if the non-canon books are going to make it onto my list of reads.
So much read on the e-reader, not a single gardening book though.
As the dark dank dreary days of autumn arrive; it is time to reflect.
This out going growing season has probably been the best I have ever experienced. From being a container experimenter to what is now my third year of alotmenteering. This was my second year on the plot, and it really has been a continuing learning experience.
Whilst the blog started off life as a repository and record of what I had experienced; it has become heartening to see who reads it and when. It is always lovely to see which corner of the globe is reading. Thought quite how anything compares is beyond me. One of my aims was of course to share, but to also record as mentioned above. A lot of what is sown and grown is very much a pseudo scientific experiment. I try to add detail, make observations and take lessons from what…
No one year is the same as the next year that follows when it comes to growing. But you always need something to carry your crop home. If you have loads of supermarket plastic bags, you need something to put those in. And pumpkins as you can see can be quite cumbersome. So naturally, having a trug is useful. I didn’t want just any old trug, I wanted a Hobbit trug. Off I went and saw to asking the lovely people at https://www.facebook.com/Loldeantimber?fref=ts
Having spotted @loldeantimber on the twitterverse, figured that they would have just the trug I wanted. I started out wanting a racing green one, or just plain green. To make it look prettier, wanted some flowers on it. I left it with @loldeantimber, and lo and behold, I got a fabulous handmade trug. Supporting British Business too! There were no air miles involved here. Though they might…
It’s the first of December, advent arrives in the hobbit house!
Dad retrieves the tree and accoutrements from the shed. I get chastised for having stuffed things into the shed, so he couldn’t find the stuff so easily. He then spends time constructing the six foot synthetic spruce that we have had ten years this year. It’s predecessor has disappeared into Christmas tree heaven. If it was still around, it would be same age as me. And that ‘faerie’ is actually the same age as me, a nice round thirty years old.
All the colour coded limbs are attached, slowly and with precision. Having all been bundled together with metal ties last year. Then the family tradition occurs, with pops putting the lights on. And trying not to get dizzy, as we form a chain. One threads the lights out the box, the next person goes clockwise, the third anti clockwise. Lights are then switched on, and the decorations added. We have amassed so many, but we are now down the select few baubles. The red one’s remain, from years and years. Crocheted snow flakes, pine cones, tie bows. Lots of assorted ones. But only the one faerie.
Then comes the tinsel, and never on tree. That’s for decking the halls. Or krishna and Shiva as you see. The tree itself is sat next to the home mandir.
Britian at it’s multicultural best! The season for peace, goodwill, and sharing.
The last batch, I promise. For the festive season I have steeped raspberries, cranberries and cherries in light rum. Added to them was cinnamon, star anaise, cloves and black cardomon and white sugar. Shall now leave for a while.
Hawwww, I have very cold feet. Really should have worn two pairs of socks in the red wellington boots.
The last of the currants and gooseberries have arrived. I pootled down to the plot with versaille currants and invicta gooseberry plants. All of which are bareroot and in need of plugging in. When I first arrived the whole of the plot was entirely white with the frost. I have seen it snowed upon, but never so chalky white and somewhat sparkly. There was something quite eerie about it. Despite only one pair of socks I was layered up with thermals, hoody and heavy coat.
Walking down to the plot and trying not to slip over in the mud, there were roses on other plots.All looking a bit cold and frost kissed. Same was on mine, william shakespeare 2000 and lovers meeeting roses looked rather sweet in being iced over. In the last two days, we have had some rather harsh frosts.
Opened up the plant box and tried not to cut my fingers off. I am slowly running out of space to plug things into. Will have to consider carefully where exactly I plant to sink potatoes. There were three plants of Versailles currants and three of invicta gooseberry. Giving me a a very varied selection of both on the plot. I already have two redcurrant plants from poundland, but in the two years that I have had them, they have never fruited. Lots of bare rooted fruit has been plugged in now, I am still hoping to plug in some yellow autumnal raspberries that I will share with my aunty. There is a vague idea where these will go. Most likely by the autumn bliss raspberries so they are all together. At the moment though, it all looks like a field of twigs haphazardly plugged into the clay.
It has now been two year since the horticultural hobbit blog was born. You can see the introduction and about here https://horticulturalhobbit.com/about/ The blog is two years old, and I have been on the plot now for approximately three years. We are now going into the fourth year of plot growing. The blog has come a long long way since it first came on line.
I have been sowing seeds for just under five years, nearly as long as I have been a qualified teacher. I actually stared sowing during a May bank Holiday weekend in 2009. I actually remember sowing thirty cayenne chilli seeds and minibel tomatoes. They are somewhere in the recesses of the archives actually. Prior to that, I hadn’t really given gardening or growing your own much thought. At that time, I was feeling stressed and worried. I was coming to the end of the inital teaching training period and had not gainful employment for that Autumn. So sowing seeds seemed a good a distraction as any really.
At that point, I was container gardener. I hogged one side of Dad’s garden, and built up one by one, a line of pots from Poundland. We had three running bean plants, some lettuce in a green scrappy grow bag. I remember picking those running beans. And slightly wonky, question mark shaped dwarf french beans. Cheap compost too, as I wasn’t exactly flush. Then came a week tomato greenhouse, to cover a rather dismal aubergine. I had graduated to aubergine by then,by way of experiment. I had a lot to learn, onions and cabbages were sown and plugged in when they ought perhaos not be.
Being a geek, i needed a book to help me, and I found one. Dipped in and out of it, it is Alan Titchmarsh’s kitchen garden book. I still have it, and do refer to it from time to time. When summer ended, the autumn came and I felt rather sad that nothing would grow over the winter. I kept going, and the in the following spring, found out about the local allotments. Quite literally a stones throw away. I may have inadvertently ‘bribed’ the allotment secretary. I had too many onions and not enough space in Dad’s garden. Putting my name down, I paced up and down for five months. November came, and I had a plot. Half of one at that stage. Two weeks were required to clear it all. Luckily, the half plot had been sprayed with weedkiller so once everything was dried and dead it just need pulling up and away.
This feels a very long long time ago. During the time that has passed, I have learned a great deal. What turned out to be a small scale experimental study, has grown dramatically. I had not realised just how much I would learn, and how the experiment would develop.
When it came to starting the blog, I didn’t intend to just keep a record. I wanted to share, and I was and am, proud of what I grow. Especially, if it is edible. In sharing, if I had something that wasn’t working, or didn’t happen. The chances are, someone else was likely to have a similar issue. Plus why struggle, there is no shame in asking for help. I have found fellow allotmenteers, readers across the world, incredibly helpful. Always willing to share.
You do get the odd one or two who might tut and be harbingers of doom, but for the most part, people are really supportive. Sharing, is always good. Whilst I am not exactly writing a Psychological study,and this isn’t exactly a ground breaking bit of research. Oh there is a pun in there some where. I do like to share things, be it successful or not, In the vain hope that someone somewhere might get something from it. No matter how inane it might. I still treat it all as an experiment. I’m not sure how this would all work as a research project. Would there have to be an ethics proposal? I do have to exterminate pests. There are pitfalls and positives. How boring would it be, if we had all the answers, and I didn’t learn anything. In science, we get proof of something, and other things fail miserably.
I also blog as I enjoy what I do on the veggie plot. There are some instances, where I don’t enjoy it. I mean, pulling up weeds, I hate that with a passion. Especially when it is raining, and the ground is sodden. I also believe in what i do. That might sound like a sales pitch, it really isn’t. Some folks probably would’t grow a single seed as it doesn’t interest them. As mentioned previously, I wouldn’t have. I just didn’t.
It never ceases to surprise me where the blog gets read. Perhaps I mis-underestimated the reach of the world wide web. That or there are lots of spam bots, I don’t know.
Ventured down to the plot today. It’s been damp and miserable all week, and with work I haven’t been able to get down to the plot. I wanted to double check the chillies, and was heartened to find that they are still there. All very bushy and green, I don’t have the heart to euthanise them. So much for entering the dorset naga challenge, I have not harvested one chilli from any of them. Seems cruel to let them continue, when there doesn’t seem to be any fruit forthcoming. They all look healthy, burgeoning with blooms. But still nothing. All very disappointing. Even now, we are half way through November. How long further will these things go? I doubt very much that I will get a chilli this Christmas! Not sure now, as to what chillies i will sow next year. Might go back to basic cayenne and see what happens.
At the centre of the plot is William Shakespeare 2000. A beautiful red rose, that when in full bloom, smells of lemons. That too is still going. In fact, I counted eleven blooming roses across the plot. Even the week before last,I had eleven roses that I harvested to fashion a bouquet from. I don’t recall roses being in bloom at this point in the year before. And there are quite a few bushes on the plot. I tinkered with the climbing roses, golden showers and i think the other one is called danse de Feu. These just needed tying in to the metal arch. Which reminded me to prune there roses on the plot. A task made somewhat easier, in having been deadheading blooms over the summer as I went along. The more established posh roses, such as christian dior, Lover’s meeting, silver jubilee, pascali, peace rose, harry wheatcroft, have grown upwards quite a bit. Less so with the width of these. The less established lost label roses are a mixed bag. Still quite small, a handful are quite tall, and still very leaf. No idea what they are, hence the name A lot pink ones, an odd orange one.Was looking at where I might squeeze in another couple of roses bushes. Given how we have Shakespeare all ready, Anne Boleyn might be one to window shop.
The autumn bliss raspberry will also need to be pruned. I’m not entirely sure what to do with those.
horticultural 'obbit 