Caught in the act!!!

The strawberries have now produced 41 plants, and another dozen are still in pots around the growbags waiting to be cut away.
I noticed that some of the plants had become a little ragged looking and then noticed several of these on the leaves!!!

Well this i planted thinking it was a courgette but clearly its one of the pumpkins, which made me look at the four pumpkin plants i planted in a row, and yes - not pumpkins but courgettes!!! Makes me wonder about the other squashes i have in, what are they going to be ???!!!
Above is the rows of chard and salads, and the area cleared of the blighted tom's. I have sown there some winter lettuce and oriental salad leaves. Below are the sweetcorn which are still a little short but seem to be producing tassles, and with a bit more sun hopefully will put on some more growth. In amongst the sweetcorn 'should' be 2 butternut squash! In the background are the runner beans which have started producing some nice beans.
The onions are all now up and in the shed drying, the area has been raked and sown with an autumn/winter green manure.

All photo's were taken about a week ago. This is the tray of some of the strawberry plants that i have managed to propergate so far, i added another tray today and have another potential 20 in the pots around the growbags.
Here are the chilli plants, the first is the jalapeño and the second is the Fresno plant which has alot more fruits on it, some trying to turn red also.
The tomatoes in the greenhouse, which are looking okay after surviving a few days without watering when we were away, we are getting a few fruits every day but my 2 year old boy is straight in there daily to pick them before i even have a chance to get them!!
This was the tomatoes at the plot the other day which had gone a bit wild and outgrown the canes and tying in i had done, but i went to the plot this evening and they had all sucumb to blight and i needed to remove the whole lot unfortuantly. The blight has started on the potatoes also so i started removing the halms of the main crop row, and completed digging up the second earlies.

I think this is a great photo, perhaps because it looks so uniformly 'like an allotment' that you might see in a book or down your site! (pity the rest of the plot is not the same!!) You can see the chard onthe left followed by the french beans, pumpkins, pak choi, little gem lettuce, beetroot and then some rasberry canes on the right side.
The runner beans and peas, which i have now completed the wire netting support for, and they (the peas) are coming up great. We have had a good crop this year again but i still need to do more next year i think, the kids love picking podding and eating them. Once the netting is up they are pretty trouble free to be honest.
The runner bean flowers and the first picking!.

The patchy parsnip germination on the left has now had a further sowing, but i need to still sow another row soon.
The sweetcorn block, with now only 2 butternut squash in the patch, but hopefully the later sowings i have in pots will augment this.
The beetroots, carrots and spinach beet. I sowed some more carrots in the gap at the top where they failed before.
The onions, shallots, peas and runner beans. At the front is the latest sowing of pea's which have come up very well! Must get the supports in for them ASAP.

Funny weather

at the moment but the plot loves it, humid, sunny but also good downpours helping things along.

In the last week since the last post i had a good day down the plot and planted out the trays of seedlings. I have now 2 rows of pak choi which pleased one of my Philippine friends, 1 1/2 rows of little gem lettuce and another row of beetroot. The lettuce has really come on in the last couple of days, the 'webbs wonderful' is looking great. With the help of my son i sowed another tray of 'lollo rosso' lettuce, and another of mixed red and green lettuce. We also sowed another tray of basil as the current crop is going over, i've rather wasted it really but never mind.

When i was at the plot the other day i also weeded well, the peas have germinated pretty thickly and should provide a good late crop, the current crop are starting to be picked now! Its great to see our kids devouring peas straight from the pod's. I also put in the tray of leeks and have a good row there now, fingers crossed they survive.

The runner beans all seem to be slowly climbing the poles now and starting to put on the pretty pink flowers too, the broad beans are podding up nicely, i'll give most of those away though, and in the centre the sweetcorn are looking well. In the middle of the sweetcorn i put three butternuts, although as i previously said one plant was looking dodgy, and has since perished, the other two are okay as far as i can tell. I have however bought and sown another 4 butternut seeds as a backup plan.

Which is what i have also done with the courgette's, the two that survived in the plot are okay but slow growing so far, so i have bought and sown another three plants which look quite promising at the moment, i'll defiantly put these in the ground soon too.

Another pleasant surprise is on the path edge into my plot some raspberry canes have been growing, coming under the path from my neighbour plot!! They have suddenly starting producing some lovely fruit which the kids have loved picking! i must look at transplanting the canes into my fruit row that was started this year.

Finally, in the greenhouse and garden, the tomatoes looking good, the cucumbers look poorly still, even the new one i bought to replace the last dead one, and the chillis have whitefly. The strawberrys in growbags are producing the odd fruit, but also plenty of runners which i am starting to try to propagate into pots of compost as i need to start a strawberry bed at the plot next year. This is been my latest 'reading up' topic as the kids love them and i need to start a proper 'production line'!!!

First potatoes!!!! Its pretty much 12 weeks since planted so took he plunge and dug some up. these first earlies are 'red duke of york', few small ones so i reckon another week or so and some good sizes should be coming through.

The previous post had photo's of my tomatoes, cucumbers hopefully going to climb up a trellis, a row of french beans with celery behind alongside the overgrown radishes, runner beans, and my massive radishes which i have tasted and affirmed my 'not-so-sure' opinion of them to be honest.

Lots of weeding done, just planted my sweetcorn, 3 butternuts put in but looking pathetic. Four pumpkins planted amongst plenty of manure, and i just removed the radishes to allow the lettuce to get some light and room to grow. I also sowed the last of peas in a thick row.

Sunflowers in and poppy sowing