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Now that duties at Chelsea are over, the allotment can get some attention. My favourite part of allotment gardening is raising new plants each year. Every sunny place in the back garden near a tap or water butt is covered in young plants and tray by tray these are scooped up and conveyed to the plot...
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Recent dry, sunny weather allowed the slugs and the first wave of weeds to be tackled. Subsequent rain restored soil moisture leading to ideal seed bed conditions. The downside was that weeds germinated in hundreds, but just in time the weather turned dry and vigorous raking again polished then off....
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Getting crops in the ground and growing is the critical task now. To do well crops need plenty of leaf in June/July when the sun and temperatures are highest, days are long, and in this dry district they need roots deep in the soil extracting moisture. Unless established in April they are in a poor position...
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Right! This is getting silly! I know each year in the garden is different – but I just wish they were different in a good way. Two years ago we were over-run with tomatoes, peppers, courgettes and aubergines and the freezer was swollen with ratatouille. Last year was the ‘blight year’ and tomatoes and...
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Planting-out is nearly done with celery, celeriac and tomatoes going out last night. This followed planting of summer and early autumn cabbages, cauliflowers and calabrese as an intercrop in between where the winter cabbages, sprouting broccoli and kales will be planted at the end of the month. The cool...
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My itchy fingers from last Friday were well and truly scratched over the weekend - I had a good catch up at home and at the allotment. My main bug bear was the number of tomatoes, peppers, courgettes, cucumbers and squashes that needed to be potted up into their final growing pots. So, armed with a trusty...
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