This is the raised bed where some of my carrots were grown, I m now using the bed to store some of my kerrs pinks. These potatoes will be used long after my other potatoes ,which are stored in a root cellar in hessian sacks.This method of storing potatoes is called ,a pit ,or a bing. The straw is used as an insulator,and also to allow air into and out of the bing.Come next April ,i ll be digging these up, hopefully they ll take me through to the first earlies.

Some of the onions and carrots all ready for winter storage.

To day i lifted my Kerr's Pinks, Arran Victories and Golden Wonders before winter , using begins.One thing i won t be doing next year ,is ,to use horse manure. The horse manure has brought a lot of weeds onto the ground and also a lot of snails. Next move is the airing and drying the potatoes for their winter storage.Out of approx 200 seed potatoes ,i manage to have 7 barrow fulls of keepers and 2 of rot and snail damage. I still have to lift my Sarpo Mira potatoes.

A brussel sprout plant in all its glory, probably too early in the season, but we re eating them now ,and they re lovely.The courgette flower is one of,if not the nicest flowers in the allotment..My broad beans are all finished now, so its into the freezer, and in with some young brussel sprout plants in their place.

This is garlic Germidour, a present from the 9 inch dibber.Cooked it up with roasted aubergine, peppers,feta,anchovies and parsley, thank you...

Fresh from the garden on a Saturday evening,a great accompaniment to roast shoulder of lamb........

soup dragon

Darren as proud as punch with his collection of soup veg.

This is the plot on the 26.06.11

My first carrots of 2011,and they carrot fly free:0), along with some Home Guards.

Asparagus

These are my first ever Asparagus ferns, and i m pretty proud of them. In total there are 7 showing from 18 crowns, so hopefully there ll be a few more starting to show within the next few weeks.

latest addition to the allotment.

With the excellent spring weather  the honey bee has had a great start to the year, and with it all this means that they have been showing signs of and swarming earlier this year than most,so after doing an artifical swarm to one of my hives i moved this small nucleus of bees over to  the the allotment, with all the strawberries beans and fruit trees to pollinate they'll be a welcome sight and really are a pleasure to watch while they are going about there daily business.

sweetcorn.

The growing season has really started to kick in and  its all go at the minute with trying to get everything sowed and planted out,i planted these honeydew sweetcorn seeds  three weeks ago under cover and hope to plant them outside around the end of this month,i have never tried to grow sweetcorn before but have the ground all well prepared and sitting ready for them ,i bought the seeds from Marshalls seeds website and out of all the sweetcorn they were selling these had by far the best reviews from people who had grown them in the past,that good i might add that they are now all sold out now. 

The deep beds in the foreground are for my carrots and parsnips,the others being used for runner beans,beetroot,rhubarb,onion sets and asparagus.

These are the nursery frames i ve made for bringing on some plants for mid spring planting.In the top on ,i am bringing on ,Lettuce,Spring onions and an early crop of nantes carrots.

In the second frame , i am bringing on Bedfordshire champion onions, Celeriac, Brussel Sprouts, Broccoli,Leeks , Courgettes and a few Squash. Its turned out to be a great addition to the allotment,as i've been eating fresh lettuce since late march. The white around some of the seedlings is,lime,its good for the brassicas.

These are my Gladiator Parsnips, planted in a mixture of ,unwashed sand ,quarry dust and compost.The bed is approximately 14 inches deep, so hopefully come the winter,i will be rewarded with great parsnips.

carrot fly protection.

After growing carrots last year and losing almost all of them to the dreaded carrot fly i  decided to build some net covered frames that can be lifted easily  on and off my beds when i am working around them,for the frames i used 1 1/2 by 1 1/2 inch wood and straight lengths of hazel which  i bent for the middle supports,i then placed enviromesh over the frame,which was then all held in place by 1 1/2 by 1/2 half inch wood,screwed down on top of the net which was sitting on top of the 1 1/2 by 1 1/2 inch wood, with the frame all made up and in place i then secured it down  by the use of a bungee cords at each end hooked onto screws into the bed itself.On the outside of the netting i placed two more bent hazels lenghts as handles for lifting on and off. They also serve as a roll bar to stop the netting getting damaged when the frame is lifted off the bed and sitting on the ground.

The big dig

The season has well and truely begun,with the planting of our potatoes.This years earlies are,Red duke of york and Home guard, second earlies are , British queens and maincrops are , Arran victory, Kerrs pinks, Golden wonder and Sarpo mira.

The long wait.

This year i ve decided to plant Asparagus, the crowns which i m planting are gijlim. I m looking forward to cutting a small amount of the first spears next year.

Composting horse manure.

Friday 28.01.11 ....Darren and myself took the afternoon and gathered up 3 trailer loads of horse manure,not easy work,especially when its quite fresh.The manure is going to be used for our potatoes in April,as a fertilizer for the seed potatoes.The manure has to be piled up ,and then covered,i inserted 4*1.5metre lenghts of BT plastic ducting,so that this would speed up the composting process,by introducing air into the heap.In the winter it can take between 3 to 6 months for the manure to break down to a pleasing compost.By covering the horse manure,it not only speeds the process,it generates alot of heat in the heap,and hence kills off, snail eggs,flies and their larve and any grass or weed seeds that have passed through the horses.

sunset on a number of blisters

Aquadulce Claudia beans

Darren s beans were planted early December 2010 in these earth pots.They ve been sitting outside since then,in the frost and snow.

Unearthing the past

Darren s Arran Victories from last year (planted approx early april 2010),still in great condition, no signs of frost damage.They re nice to see ,but can be a nuisance if left in the ground undetected. Popping up in the summer in the middle of your plot.

Rotovating and Dunging

G

To day the rotavator had its inaugural appearance in the allotment, as did the horse manure (thanks to my kind neighbour).

The 1 st signs of 2011

Darrens onion sets are starting to show signs of life after a week under glass in the allotment

Making the beds.

 So far i've completed four of my six planned raised beds,for the timber i used treated 6x1 1/2 screwed together and it worked out at £1.24 a meter from a local  hardware store.

The beds were made to the size of 3 foot wide by 8 foot long,with a 2  foot  space between each one for working around,making the beds

any longer or wider  would have become to much of a reach for planting and weeding.Getting  the beds level and in line was a bigger job than i thought as there was a slight run of on the land but well worth the effort as they are really starting to look the part even with  next to nothing planted in them yet.

After my final two beds are made and in place my next job is to work out and build some sort of net

frame that be easily lifted on and off the bed when i

am working on and around the them.

Darren.

Im the other half.

Im the other half of the Oldtown Allotments, Darren has done the informing so far, so hopefully i ll be on this a bit more frequently now. Yesterday, whilst Darren was building his raised beds,my wife and i took a walk down to the village,(annalong,co down)i counted 4 vegetable plots,varying in sizes. This is also part of what we are about. We want to start a community spirit,for growing,competition and trading of fresh produce.Also, everyone has their own ideas,techniques and sometime secrets with regards to the biggest,higher yields, planting,harvesting,preserving and storing of the years veg.I myself personally want to learn so much about this wonderful hobby and way of life,and i m very eager to hear of other peoples adventures in the allotment...........Robin

Late Autumn 2010....

 On an early Autumn morning of 2010 we gathered this sea weed from the shore in preparation for next years beds.....It was spread over the ground just before the winter so that the frost would help break it up and let it rot into the ground easier!

Only time will tell if our hard mornings work paid off.....

Hello to all and welcome to our blog...

First of all let me say thanks to you for giving us a little of your time.

Over the next few months....years...who knows! Robin and myself will be keeping you all posted on our allotment adventures! Both of us have been trying to grow vegetables for a few years now with little success, with pests and weeds being the real winners,so after alot of reading,web searching and listening we've decided to not let it get the better of us and really give it a go....
I hope folks that by following us on this we can all learn together on how to prepare the ground,plant,grow,maintain and finally harvest home grown vegetables fit for a king!