Front Bit

Another interloper, this is Dave beginning to sort the bottom of the front garden, so several years ago:

The wall nearly finished but before the summerhouse was erected.

Front Garden: Old Fuschia

Dave having cleared the bottom front garden, 

now preparing to build the new wall:

Successional Plantings

As you can see from these pictures, the lettuces and radishes are looking good enough to dig up and eat.  So it's time to plant some more of them to eat in a few weeks when these are finished.

Oldway Mansion - part of Paignton's Heritage

Oldway Mansion is a large house and gardens in Paignton, Devon, England. It was built as a private residence for Isaac Merritt Singer (1811–1875), and rebuilt by his third son Paris Singer in the style of the Palace of Versailles.

Part of the Oldway Gardens

Site with info: http://www.paigntondevon.co.uk/oldway.htm

Our Back Garden

Hostas:

Mike Robertson Rose:

Fuschias:

David's Dragon:

Euphorbia:

Drought

5 July 2011
I've been up to the allotment again today - watering in the vain hope that it'll encourage some rain to fall.

No camera so can't take a photo but it was lovely picking: peas, beetroot, lettuce, courgettes, radishes and raspberries.  Also picked some broccoli and greens at home, have left some of the broccoli to go to seed to encourage the bees.

The beetroot looked so yummy that I immediately pressure-cooked them and ate one and it was wonderful and sooo sweet!

Looking forward to some more stuff very soon, it's very rewarding after all the weeks of hard work.

6.7.11: It worked, it's been raining on and off all day, much to David's disgust as he wanted to bowl and so has got rather wet!

8.7.11: Picked first runner beans.

For more information about our allotments - see Link:  http://www.phgas.org/

22.7.11

Picked beetroot, spinach, radishes, peas, broad beans (some) runner beans, a carrot, lettuces, courgettes - and lots of weeds:

Various lettuces, marigolds, a courgette, some broad beans, tomatoes, potatoes

Potatoes, courgettes with sweet corn growing amongst them, then runner beans

Beetroot

28.7.11
It's too dry again, hasn't rained for a long time and the water butts are getting empty.  But - 'mustn't grumble' it's so lovely for all the people who are down here on their holidays.

3.8.11
Still hardly any rain, the ground and the plants are seriously suffering.  How can it say in the paper that we had a very wet July?

Parsnips Hint

Hint: when you sow your parsnips remember that they take ages to grow, so plant a row of radishes in the same row as radishes come up quickly and so you'll know where to hoe around the seedlings.  Then, when the radishes have been removed, you'll be able to see where the parsnips are.  I've just done this and it seems to work - BUT - eat the radishes quickly or they'll become hard and too strong and not even any good to 'put in the soup'. However they make good compost!

2 September 2011: Well I planted radishes and parsnips together and it definitely worked!  However, next year I'm going to plant fewer radishes as they were rather too successful and became hard and too strong-tasting quicker than we could eat them.  

There's only one down side to this brilliant idea: we don't much like radishes.

So, this week I've steamed them along with other vegetables and they don't taste strong at all.  Then as they were quite pleasant, I've now tried them in stir fries (nice and crunchy and not the usual bitter taste) and then today put them in the soup.  Again, they were wonderful and gave a lovely colour to the soup.

19th July: Picked lots of vegetables up at the allotment this afternoon: runner beans, broad beans, peas, spinach, potatoes, radishes, lettuce, courgettes (including one double, see above).

View of the allotments from our house

Three pictures taken on 23 July 2011

Allotment Photos

Having an allotment is hard work . . . and then one day the rewarding part comes when we come home laden with goodies - this week it's been carrots, beetroot, courgettes, radishes, lettuce, peas, broad beans, potatoes, runner beans, the end of the broccoli and beginning of the tomatoes.
Some of these have been plentiful, others rather sparse, but they've still made an excellent stir fry and lots of home-made soup.

 When the digging had just started, Spring last year.

After much hard work the half plot nearly cleared, the shed's up:

then: lots of seeds in and everything beginning to sprout:

That was all last year and we had quite a good crop.


Now this year: Yesterday's haul from the allotment - all this plus potatoes, onions and spinach.

So it's now worth all the hard work, dirt and worry.