Deep low pressures causing havoc

Since the last blog we have been hit by two deep low pressures causing havoc on our allotments. Gusty winds in excess of 60 mph have done a lot of damage on our site exposed to the South and South West. This is normally good for ripening fruit and growing bumper crops as we get the sun all day but this type of scenario is bad for us and according to the forecasters happens once in 50 years. Hmmm.
Molluscs are having a bumper feast as their numbers seem to have trebled to the norm and the wind damage is heartbreaking.

We take pride in being able to donate from now on until the end of the season, fruit, herbs and fresh vegetables to give a 'live' feel to the wonderful National Trust's Victorian kitchen in Lanhydrock house but this year it's not going to be so easy with everything well behind and damaged. The young lady who features on our website pages is a National Trust employee who collects whatever we have spare every 10 days or so and I have put a small pic here of our veg in situ.

It's midsummer's day in just over a week now and the evenings will start drawing in again. We have been robbed of the Summer this year, feel very sad especially for the tenants who work so hard to make their plots neat, tidy and productive.
On the plus side, our water barrels collecting rainwater off the shed roofs are full to overflowing!

Improvement must be round the corner, our site is too big to move there though.

Extreme weather problems

Although having had an allotment since 11 years old, I don't recall having such a poor, slow difficult start to the growing season. Seeds failed due to a very dry March, plants raised at home in the greenhouse/cold frame once transplanted were very slow to respond mainly due to cold nights (even a damaging frost Mid May, unusual here) and all in all a frustrating time on the plot. I worry about our 'newbies' who having been told how wonderful it is to grow your own on our very fertile site see their initial efforts not perform as they should. The tip that they would REALLY enjoy a picnic on their plot just isn't happening unless they take hot water bottles and weatherproofs. Even our seasoned allotmenteers are complaining about the weather wrecking the crops and are resowing and replanting new stock hoping they will behave properly this time.
Walking around the site yesterday, I was pleased to see that the recent rain had at last started to move seedlings of flowers and veg but I was apprehensive of the weather forecast for the next day which gave that Devon and Cornwall was going to bear the brunt of a deep low pressure storm which was 'unusual' for this time of year. Sure enough I woke to the sound of heavy rain and gusty Southerly winds which at the time of writing have become worse in the strength of wind. Good job my wife's hanging baskets are residing in the kitchen having been brought inside.
I am not looking forward to seeing the aftermath when I return to our allotment site as it was just starting to recover and now from looking at the damage to my own garden o/s the window, know that bean rows, Sweet Williams, Lupins,
Cosmos will all have suffered.

We are a tough lot and will rectify everything, with a smile of course.

On the positive side, we don't grow maincrop potatoes here due to constant mid season blight problems but yesterday we were visited by a chap who donated 50kg of maincrop Sarpo Mira for us to try. According to JBA potatoes, this are the best blight resistant tubers available so we will give them a try.
    

Important feature of our family friendly allotment site

We are lucky in that this allotment site is very popular with younger, family members who between them have 39 children and grandchildren. The emphasis is on teaching and learning BUT it is important to mix education of the journey in the way vegetables and fruit arrive at our dinner tables....... with play.
With this in mind, a dedicated children's area has been set aside which is well used, especially school holiday time and weekends. All toys are plastic and inspected weekly for damage, splits or dangerous edges when the large area's grass, (seed sown by the children,) is cut.

A wendy house is the base and 'lookout'. Old tyres with scores for kicking the ball through them are liked even if the balls do manage to go over the 8ft deer fence next to them. A sizeable piece of astro turf gives the children a chance to picnic on dry land and a very special picnic table made by workers at 'Resorce' recycling group means mum and dad can sit for a while next to the area and have lunch with Junior happily playing.

  We try to keep adding to the toys but is not always easy as money does not run to buying new all the time so it was a real bonus when Cathy came back from her brother with a whole car boot full of scooters, ride on toys, toy lawnmowers and a kitchen, mini wheelbarrow, etc, too much to list, if you read this David, a big thanks from our younger members.
Future plans this summer include a tent and a sandpit and we may organise a time capsule burying which should intrigue.
The 3 pictures show the area before the children sowed the grass seed in the first year, another at distance showing the whole area and another taken today displaying the new additions.

This area is regarded as an important feature of our site and I don't know of any other allotment site with this extra, email me if I'm wrong please, address on contact page.
 
I have been told several times that the children beg mum and dad to go to the allotments to see what's new which is a change from refusing because 'it's boring up there'.   

Time for the visiting of Flower shows!

Notice the hand prints on the fence?

Interesting working area

Well hot foot from the Malvern Spring Flower show and bursting with new ideas and plans for the plot!  The weather could have been better but the sun did shine in the afternoon.  But nothing could dampen the enthusiasm of the school children that had designed and produced their show gardens.   It was amazing what they did and they were so keen to tell us all about it too. I really liked 'George's Marvellous Garden' by Burlish Park Primary from Stourport-0n-Severn, naturally based on the Roald Dahl book of George's Marevellous Medicine.

Loved the funky orange chicken!

There was a very interesting talk about allotment tips from Terry Walton, of Gardening News fame, he has an allotment in Wales and good to hear that even the professionals have the same problems as I do.  

It was illuminating to hear his comments about the productiveness of courgettes!   As no doubt all of us that grow the said veg have been swamped with the little green/yellow darlings and not known what to do with them - well all recipies are gratefully recieved and will be put on our cookery page.  A prize for the one that uses most courgettes in one go!   I have managed this year to stop the under-gardener from growing more than 3 plants but only by letting him grow tomatoes this year.  

Last years's crop got blight but this year he's trying a blight resistant variety 'Fantasio', bought last year on our trip to the Suttons Nursery and an old variety called 'Auntie Madge' from the Heritage Seed Library.   http://www.gardenorganic.org.uk/hsl/variety.

Good to see Hilda planted up on the plot and looking fantastic in her bunting.  Hope to be up the plot at the weekend, weather depending of course, still have lots to do.   Replace the carrot seeds that never made an appearance and check to see if the parsnip seeds have decided to show, mind you it has not been the best weather to sow seeds in-situ so think I will sow in modules this time.  Oh and may even go and watch the 'Olympic Torch ' as it passes through Bodmin, invited them to go via our allotments but they didn't think it was a good idea!

Looking out the window at the moment the sun is shining and the birds singing!   Who would have thought only yesterday the weather could be so foul!   In desperation I planted my sweet peas and Hurst Greenshaft peas, I remember them being a good doer last year, as they were bursting out of their pots.   If I get chance I’ll go up and check tomorrow how many survived the onslaught of wind and rain.   I know we now have a dingy (Hilda) on our site but if it floods up then we are in deep trouble!  Besides I feel ‘Hilda’ is past her sailing days and is best suited to housing the multitude of flowers that Ruth has planned for her. 

 My greenhouse can take no more plants/seeds, you can only just get through the door and definitely no space to swing a cat – mind you Reggie, my cat, would not take kindly to it either.   I’m sure he was a gardener in a past life as he spends lots of his time guarding the plants but my ungenerous under gardener would say  finding himself the warmest spot for sunbathing!   I’ve decided to grow several varieties of French beans this year, Purple Queen, Blue Lake, Magpie, Hutterite Soup and Black Canterbury and they are all growing on well but ........like a lot of people I've spoken to the runner beans are a dismal failure so far. 

Painted Lady has always been a dependable crop but this year only 10% germination in the first sowing.   Probably down to the cold, wet weather and the ground just hasn’t had time to warm up. Still like all optimistic allotmenteers I have done a second batch and eagerly await their germination and if they fail then we’ll just have to hope the 10% that did germinate give me a bumper crop.   Not expecting my Celeriac to germinate well I sowed loads and sod’s law all of them have come through!   Problem is I have an inability to throw plants away and am always stuck as to where to put them, my freezer is still housing several pounds of broad beans from last year.  So if you see some demented old lady on the side of the road at Lanhydrock trying to give away celeriac plants it's likely to be me!

 Got a good crop of lettuces as well  and a surfeit here is no problem as Jack & Paddy, my guinea pigs,  would walk over hot coals to get a tasty lettuce!  The only thing they like better is cucumber, the outdoor variety Marketmore did very well last year.  I tried a heritage variety but it was far too bitter for my liking so sticking to Marketmore again this year.

  

Good weather this evening so all being well hitting the plot tomorrow so will let you know how it goes.

Photos of all 3 community gardens

What a difference a few days work makes as I'm pleased to say the 3rd garden is well under way with Hilda's deck having an undercoat of weed suppressant and a topping of recycled Cornish compost ready for planting up when the night frosts and the chilly Northerly wind plaguing us lately finish, usually the beginning of May in this part of the country.

The rest of this new project has moved on to the stage we are almost ready for some imaginative planting of the new beds  thanks to some hard work by the 'site steward' Billy, assisted by me, in a chilly wind that was blowing all week. I have put a photo below of how it looked today. I've also added photos of the other two gardens mentioned in my last blog on Monday last.

I had the pleasure of growing some Swiss Chard Bright Lights for the Bodmin schools to grow on in a competition under the 'Bodmin in Bloom' banner so when delivering them I had the chance to invite anyone interested to come and look at our site, particularly to view our gardens, as 4 of the schools had wildlife attracting gardens themselves and maybe can give us some tips and all took me up on the offer so we will be pressing on with this new garden a.s.a.p.

Formal Garden above and Wildlife attracting area on the left.

Hilda sails in

Ever since the birth of this allotment site, we wanted to make this project different from anything else seen in Cornwall, part of that ethos was to create community gardens near the entrance for the many visitors we get to enjoy.    The plans for these have changed a few times along the way but we are now starting to create the 3rd and last garden with the first two starting to look mature now being their second year. A wildlife attracting area with a very mature fallen Beech tree forming the back and a pond at present teeming with tadpoles is very popular, all the plants donated by the tenants will attract the bees and butterflies and the tiny formal garden directly outside the main shed has 4 matching beds with a flower urn in the middle looks good now the spring flowers are out.

We were looking for a bit of inspiration for this 3rd one, it's quite an area and needs to look right so imagine our pleasure in obtaining an old 15 ft dinghy complete with sails and rudder to use as a focal point. It had to be fetched from Exeter but should have known we could rely on Billy, the tenant who bought and donated the boat, to go up and fetch it late one evening. I kept him company and we eventually arrived at the allotment site around 11.30pm with the boat still in tow. Pitch black, no light anywhere so it had to stay in the car park overnight but as soon as dawn broke we were back easing her in thro the narrow gap in the Cornish hedge and into the gate to place in her last resting berth. She was tilted slightly towards the South West for maximum light and the deck will be planted up once the night frosts have passed. She has been given a new coat of green paint as the mixture of yellow and blue flaking off didn't look good. Gardens will now be created around and along from Hilda as she is now known and was the spark we needed to get our creative juices going. Hilda was the name of Billy's dearly loved mother-in-law who has recently passed away and we thought it was a fitting name, so many have known a Hilda in their lives with fondness, even my wife's mother was a Hilda too. A Hilda is an anagram of Dahlia so perhaps we will use this popular flower to form the base of our gardens around her.