We managed a couple of visits to the allotment last week and each time manged to clear and dig a bed.
Our first target was the bed which held the remains of the sweet peas and some of our annual flowers. The sweet pea frame was dismantled and the debris cleared.
The bed was then dug and recovered with weed control fabric and wood chippings.
This completed the digging on one side of the Plot.
The next target was the annual bed on the other side of the plot. With no frame to take apart this bed was cleared quickly but the digging was heavier going and we decided to leave the bed open to the winter.
We are now at the stage where all the beds have been dug over. It's some time since we actually achieved this happy state of affairs.
Even when covered in weed control fabric, some weeds manage to seed into the bits of soil that end up on top of the fabric when planting and so I cleared any that had managed to grow on the strawberry bed. The plants didn't perform well last year and so are probably destined for the chop. We intend to buy new stock but we tend to leave older plants in place - just in case - until new plants are established elsewhere.
At this time of year fungus often appears in various places on the allotment. The wood chip mulch around out autumn sown annuals has an impressive cluster of what I am advised by Mark, the fungi guru from Mark's Veg Plot, could be Tubaria furfuracea - Scurfy Twiglet. Not a very attractive name is it? Unfortunately it isn't edible, although to be honest I'd be far too timid to eat any fungi that I food growing in the wild.
Martyn, cleared the old tomato plants from the plot greenhouse and generally tidied up in there. He even managed to harvest a few remaining tomatoes. Freshly picked tomatoes in November is a first for us.
We picked a few vegetables to replenish our cache at home. I've been waiting for parsnip harvesting time as I have a recipe for Cheese Veggie Cornish Pasties that I want to try. I know that officially they shouldn't be called Cornish Pasties but I'm not selling them so should be allowed to get away with calling them that.
The seeds under the grow light are doing well. We have coriander, salad leaves and spring onions. I'm not sure how these will work out but anything they produce will be considered to be a bonus.
With no flowers to gather from the plot, we had to content ourselves with our two orchids to provide us with colour indoors.
That was until we visited a garden centre last week. After pushing our way through all their festive paraphernalia we actually found some plants and came home with these.
Just call me Ebenezer if you will but isn't that better than all that tinsel and glitter?
If you are interested we have posted a few videos taken of last week's plot activity on our vlog here.
Our complete monthly harvests are listed here.
This week I am linking to harvest Monday hosted on
Dave's blog Our Happy Acres
