Monday, 3 November 2008

Okay

so this update has been even longer in coming, but certainly less time than waiting for summer this year!
I felt its was time to show some photos and explain whats been happening. Summery of this year - another rained out season. No sun means little grows and only the late autumn sun meant we finally had some corgettes, but it was not enough for the other squashes to prosper, all failed.
Most other things were dissapointing also, sweetcorn grew no higher than my knee, carrots very poor and small, climbing french beans rubbish - all these things i presume are down to the poor weather and probably the poor nutritional quality of my soil which i am now addressing.
The above photo is the end of the plot mostly dug over apart from the parsnips which actually seem to have done well, judging by the first pull. The strip in the middle is the failed carrots with weeds in between awaiting removal, and the top right corner is some green manure i've sown, mustard seed.
The plank in the middle is actually alongside a strip of horse manure spread over the surface.The covered part in the middle is still yet to be completely cleared mainly due to time, with the clocks going back its now impossible to get anything done in the evening, but i suppose that another winter under cover cannot do any harm and i'll target that area with green manure in the spring.
I started a bean trench where the peas were this year and will extend it when i remove the spinach beet, another of the few successes this year.
The top part has also been seeded with mustard, and i am going to remove the water butt and other stuff from the wall edge to put down some covering to stop the weeds coming under the wall, generally couch grass and mares tail. I need to plan where to put the water buts and build a compost bin at some time, as well as considering where to put the permanent fruit beds (raspberry and blackberry) that i want to plant next year.



2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Glad to see that you are making plans for next year, despite what you consider poor results for this year. I doubt if your results are very different from those of other people, judging by what I hear from friends who grow vegetables who all consider it has been a bad year.

Perhaps I could send you a few loads of manure for Christmas, not sure the postman will agree though I am sure your two "little helpers" would enjoy assisting you spreading it around!

Happy Digging
Arno

arn said...

thanks, and yes i see plenty of other plots which are in a similar state this year, which sort of relieves me in a way!