Not sure what happened to August and September but I’m pretty sure I’ve been busy with work, the Garden and the allotment.

This has been my first growing year at the Sunbury allotment. The soil is poor but some things are adapting well.

The asparagus settled in well. I’ve dug in vast amounts of compost and WRM but it seems to enjoy the naturally free-draining soil (well, more than I do) This is Guelph Millennium.

The dahlias are putting on a good show but the yellowing leaves demonstrate how poor the soil is and how much work I need to put in with compost and manure.

This patch has provided vases of flowers; here’s some of my favourites

I planted 6 tubers of Pink Fir Apple potato in a bed and 4 others in sacks and the same with Charlotte. I had a poor crop from Charlotte in the bed and excellent from the sacks and curiously the other way round with the PFAs in the same bed – go figure. They have featured as dauphinoise, chunky chips and crushed mash. I find they are much better thoroughly rinsed to remove the starch.

The peonies really struggled to establish this year. The single Duchesse Nemours I lifted from the old plot did well as did the pot-grown Sarah Bernhardt but the new tubers have all struggled. I think they were all too small – another case of shrinkflation. I also think their original location was not ideal, so they’ve relocated to the bed by the shed. The soil seems better and it’s sheltered. Here we have 3 x Duchesse Nemours, in the middle is Sarah Bernhardt with space for the lifted tubers to go back next year. On the left is 2 x Edens perfume and 1 x Jules Elie

In the space vacated by the peonies I added 3 x Eucalyptus Blue Baby grown from seed. Apparently, they will take 10 years to get to 4m but I’m growing them for foliage so I’ll be snipping away. I’m considering adding autumn raspberries to the rest of the bed. The logic is the summer raspberries like it there…

I’ve turned the failed autumn raspberry bed into a cut flower bed. Not much happening yet. There’s nigella seeds sown and I’ve added seed grown centaureas, a echinacea purpurea and button head type hellenium. I plan to move the erynigium and echinops from the garden as well as a division of the shasta daisy that is very happy in the front garden.

I sowed nantes carrots in some large tubs and covered with mesh. It kept out the carrot fly but it proved to be a haven for moth caterpillars who munched the foliage to nothing. There are carrots but they are stumpy.

The polytunnel in the garden is a work in progress. I’m using some plastic storage crates as beds to grow herbs, spinach, lettuce and beetroot. I started the year with rocket and lettuce in pots in the tunnel, so moving onto these rectangular tubs should work and make better use of the space.

The cucumber Carmen is still producing, seeming to prefer cooler weather.

I cut back all the tomatoes last weekend. Blight had taken hold. I’ve never had blight in a tunnel and can only assume I need fewer plants for better ventilation. Once the Carmen has finished fruiting, I’ll give the tunnel a thorough clean and hope for better results next year. I did get four bottles of passata and some delicious plates of tomato salad, so not a complete loss.