It has been a good week for biodiversity.  While cleaning and sorting onions into those for late winter storage, ones to use before December and the rest to use as soon as possible, I saw, through the corner of my eye, a rather dirty onion get up and walk off.  On inspection this unusual onion was a toad which had made a home in the cold frame where the onions are ripening. It crawled off into the herbaceous borders.

Then when lifting the mulching sheet as the last of the broad beans were cleared a slow worm slipped quietly from beneath the sheet into the adjacent strawberry bed. In fact there now appear to be slow worms under all my many mulching sheets - I have seen more slow worms this week than ever before

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At last allotment work is easing off and the plot is mostly up to date.  I have to say I am relieved – it has been a bit hectic harvesting and replanting at the same time.

With only six weeks or so of growing weather left, plants must not run short of nutrients.    However everything looks mighty lush and only some weak, newly planted or pigeon damaged plants need feeding. Brassicas checked by pigeons, have had a second dose of calcium nitrate to boost growth and keep the soil alkaline.  Where grow is not quite as it should be sulphate of ammonia has been applied, dissolved in water and placed at the base of affected plants with a watering can, to crops destined for autumn harvest; beans, beetroot, celery, courgettes and various salads and also in moderation to celeriac and leeks for winter harvest.  Ground cleared of summer crops and due to be resown or replanted has received a boost of dried poultry manure pellets

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People are even more reluctant than usual to ride in my car now carting home the alliums is in full swing.  Last year my garlic, onions and shallots were so disappointing that an emergency leek planting session had to be undertaken to have enough alliums for the winter.  Not so this year, although I have still planted an improbable number of leeks.

The spring planted onion sets and shallots have fallen over and dried off – they have come home now, to ripen in the coldframe, to make room for the last of the leeks. They were grown through white faced black polythene salvaged from the ‘Taste of Autumn’ Wisley event.  This kept down the weeds and reflected light back up into the foliage.  I have been a bit sceptical about this white polythene but I really think it has benefitted this sun-loving crop.  With no need to weed and hoe there is no need to space plants widely or in rows.  Therefore the onion crop was set out at a high density with about 10cm between plants.  The onions are on the small side of course but there are a very great many of them, all about 6 - 8cm in diameter which is fine for home use.  On the other hand the white kept the soil cooler delaying maturity by two weeks compared to black polythene, but I think the yield is better under white.

There was virtually no bolting suggesting I could have planted a fortnight earlier for a bigger crop.

In the coldframe they join the over-wintered crop, which being planted much more widely are very much bigger, although the crop per square metre is smaller than for the closely planted spring onions.  ‘Setton’ and ‘Sturon’ were the main spring planted onions and cropped very well as usual and were joined by newcomer ‘Stur BC20’ which seems just as good although it is hard to say if it is better.  A new red onion ‘Red Supreme’ seemed to have the edge on good old ‘Red Baron’.  A white onion ‘Snowball’ also did well, but is so pungent as to be almost unusable.  Perhaps it will come at you less fiercely after storage.

Official onion trials suggest some good newcomers for 2009: ‘Reddawn’ and ‘Red Emperor’ are reported to be very promising and two sets with good disease resistance may be available to gardeners soon.  By some fluke of dry weather in June onion downy mildew was less damaging this year but is a scourge against which the gardener has no defence.

As ever ‘Senshyu Semi-Globe Yellow’ and ‘Radar’ were reliable over-winter and the red ‘Electric’ is completely reliable unlike older over-wintered reds.

A wide range of shallot cultivars were grown from onion-sized ‘Red Sun’ and ‘Hative de Niort’ to funny little ones whose label I have yet to uncover from beneath the black landscape fabric mulch through which all the over-wintered onions, shallots and garlic were grown.  Some of these shallots were set out in spring to replace onions that failed over winter and have filled in the gaps productively.

To harvest the onions and shallots the sheet is lifted and those bulbs that don’t come way with the sheet are gathered up.  I was pleased with myself for planting beans, courgettes and pumpkins into the maturing onion crop to get an early start but of course I cannot now lift the sheet and each onion has to be laboriously inched out without disturbing the following crop.

Garlic has all been gathered with ‘Early Wight’ and ‘Solent Wight’ making a heavy crop despite the severe rust disease and ‘Moldavian Wight’ being very much smaller, but supposedly tastier. I am not sure about that.

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Peas and beans are the mainstay of my midsummer allotment crops; Pea ‘Ambassador’ grown for shelling produces two pods per node on tall leafy plants that put up a good fight against weeds.  The pods this year area little short – it is always much better to have 10 peas in a pod than 6, as shelling is so much easier.  ‘Balmoral’  has longer pods and lots of them but on shorter plants that compete less well with weeds. However, the edible podded snap pea ‘Cascadia’ is the most productive pea, which again grows tall and leafy, is delicious and I could grow only one pea this would be it.

Peas are not very high yielding.  Official yield figures for peas are about 400g every square metre and broad beans are much the same, while dwarf French beans yield nearly double at about 750g and I would guess that edible-podded peas approach dwarf French beans (no official figures are available).  Climbing French beans probably crop a little more heavily but nowhere near as much as the 2000g produced by a good crop of runner beans.

Like the pea season,  the broad bean season is on its last legs.  The main crop of ‘Witkiem Manita’ sown in March is nearly finished, the follow on crop of small seeded ‘Scorpio’ has been gathered and the final sowing of ‘Witkiem Manita’ has set a good crop and is just going over mature.   Scorpio has very tasty small beans, but I still think the bigger, more vigorous, ‘Witkiem Manita’ gives the best results overall.  If my eyes don’t deceive me this is the bean used for the August supermarket crops of broad beans and I hope to get similarly good results at this difficult season.  Old books recommend ‘The Sutton’ for this period but I was deeply unimpressed by its late performance last year, although it gave fair results from an over-wintered crop.

The  French beans raised indoors in April have been gathered.  The direct sown beans from early May are almost over and the May sown is in flower now, while the June sown crop are 20cm tall but have yet to flower. As dwarf French beans are much the same in my view I just bought one big bag of 'Scuba' with some purple 'Royalty' for pretty.

 To follow them July-sown yellow and purple climbing French beans are climbing their wigwams and to follow these late sown runner beans have reached the top of their canes

Both peas and broad beans are being cleared away now with time for a second crop before winter.  It is well to have plenty of plants on hand to follow on, and my stock of cell trays has been re-sown with courgettes, cucumbers, beetroot, calabrese, cauliflowers, herbs, kohl rabi, oriental greens, and salads ready to go out into the newly cleared ground.

In the meantime courgette, French bean and runner bean seeds have been dibbled with a length of 25mm dowel through the holes in the landscape fabric through which broad beans have been grown.  It is amazing how well seeds germinate under this treatment as long as they have some slug control applied at the same time.  Without cultivation the soil has lost no moisture and the soil compacted by the dibber and the subsequent consolidation of the soil over the seeds by a clenched, gloved fist leads to rapid germination and growth, while the landscape fabric keeps the ground weedfree.  If all goes well, and remains deer-free, these will be cropped in October.  A covering of fleece boosts temperatures by a couple of degrees and excludes deer, which happily appear insufficiently enterprising to push aside the fleece.

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The fleeting spell of hot weather after Tatton Park Flower Show made all the difference to my allotment..

For weeks careful watering and feeding to ‘push’ tender crops has been needed to make sure they develop enough roots and leaves to take advantage of summer when it arrives

Sweet potatoes under their low polythene tunnel have gone from weedy plants covering a tea tray’s worth of ground to cover over a square metre.  In fact they are in danger of over-heating so the tunnel was pulled back and water applied to the landscape fabric mulch through which they are being grown.  They got a really good soak and this might do them for the year; until mid August anyway.  Abundant water can lead to lots of leaf and rather watery tubers, so they are being grown hard for smaller, but tastier tubers.

Tomatoes have gone from thin and willowy to thick, dark green plants with large trusses of fruit.  Sweet corn from pallid and wispy to dark green and luxuriant.  Climbing french beans have arrived at the top of their canes putting on a spurt of growth.  Dwarf French beans are in full crop.  Cucumbers have burst out of their fleece tunnel.  Peppers have formed a heavy burden of fruit in their fleece tunnel.  Unfortunately courgettes the size of my little finger when I left were only fit for the compost pit.

My numerous pumpkins and squashes have grown from plants you could almost fit under a bucket to sprawling monsters making their move on the nearby soft fruit

As usual in high summer one other, much less welcome plant has shown its appreciation of the hot weather; Galinsoga AKA gallant soldier or kew weed. This extremely virulent South American weed loves heat, is not at all put off by dry soils and whole regiments of it have sprung up, especially in the root and brassica crops.  It had to go, but at least the weather was fine for a crawling though dusty crops pulling this stubborn weed out one by one.

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