Here come the warm shoots

Lettuce begin...

First sowing in the greenhouse, whilst listening to the wind, the creak of the greenhouse panes stretching in the sun and a programme about popes and the Lombard League - I didn't know they played football!

All Year Round Cauliflower
Primo summer cabbage
Red Rookie autumn cabbage
Olympia broccoli
Zen Calabrase
Giant Prague Celeriac
Musselburgh Leeks

Lettuces:
Lollo Rosso
Romaine
All Year Round
Little Gem
Red Salad Bowl
Mizuna

Anti-clockwise

Finally after last weeks wet weather and frosts, the weather held for a few days, enough for the wet to subside, the wind to dry out the clods and the earth to be vaguely workable - spent the afternoon, planting the last of the garlic, the onions and shallots, and prepping for the new term whilst listening to the Old Firm slug out the CIS final...

Whilst much revolves around the seasonal cycle, there are varying degees of investment required:

Long-term - Rebuilt the compost heap after last fortnight's slow overnight burn from emptying out the BBQ ashes (oops!) which had melted the compost bin. And prepared the carrot bins having finally collected them from David. The bins should hopefully lift them above the 18" required that put them out of the carrots fly's reach, and produce my first proper carrot crop... Check the hosepipe rim safety feature!

Medium-term - Most crops are spent in the year, and some take years to establish themselves, such as the boy's apple trees - however last week I unearthed one of the great inbetweeners - horseradish, which takes a couple of seasons to establish itself and then crops regularly - whilst I had forgotten all about it, it has been busy sending down long tapers, which brought tears to the eyes back in the kitchen, making a great accompaniment to a roast beef at the in laws last sunday.

Short-term - And whilst at the in laws, I was presented with one of the first wind-up radios (Thank you Denis!) which can only be described as a relic from another era. An investment of 2 mins winding gets you full capacity of 30mins listening. In this age of smartphones, a 12" box which, you wind up and um you can get FM radio on, seems rudimentary. But for far off places with limited access to mainline power and the outside world it provides a lifeline...
Such as rangers v celtic scoreline! They'll be dancin on the streets of Govan/Gabon tonight! You do get the distinct impression that the killajoules produced winding it are directly converted as you watch the cranking shaft rotate slowly anticlockwise...

Best go - there's three images in this post - I better get cranking!

Scarecrow

A special morning for Patrick! - him and some pals from nursery walked up the hill and spent the morning working out rhubarb poking through the shuck, eating biscuits and making a scarecrow for taking back to the nursery veg patch - a great way to start the growing season!

Full circle

Aye, this time last year I was lamenting for freelance mondays down the allotment to get on with the planting - this year, I'm available!

Thanks to everyone for coming down yesterday to clear and tidy for our special visitors on Tuesday. Managed to rebuild the fence with Jimmy, removing a section so that the greenhouse gets full light (and warmth)/ Sharon designed and build a fantastic cold frame/Armida sanded and taped the edges of ten boards/ Maggie spruced and tidied whilst Alayne and Colski kept the bairns waving and entertained.

One hour from each adds up to one person's full day so lots achieved - thanks! Plus I don't think I could drink a crate of Tennants by myself!

Had our annual fire of briars and spent wood with all the ash (potash-heavy) going right back into the spud bed. What goes around, comes around....

The eye is the first circle; the horizon which it forms is the second; and throughout nature this primary picture is repeated without end...

from Circles, by Ralph Waldo Emerson

Call for action!

With v. important guests confirmed for next tuesday morning, a call goes out for sunday afternoon assistance. Obviously can't say too much about the identity of the visitors, but here's a picture of the "Royal Princess" coming into berth at Oban from the shed...

So, much to be done: pictures to be straightened and dusted, scrap wood to be gathered, outlying boundry to be secured, fire to be lit, T to be drunk...

PS Solent Wight Garlic planted today...

Dunbar Rovers

Good day at the Bridgend Allotments potato day yesterday - Got Pentland Javelins (1st earlies), my new favourite Dunbar Rovers (sounds like Melchester's lowly 1st round fodder, cup opponents)(second earlies), Isle of Jura (early main crop) and Pink Fir Apple (late main) - 15p a tuber, which is about half price from most seed catalogues! Unfortunately, thought there as no Maris Peer, and a creamy fish chowder cooked over a summer fire on a west coast island beach just isn't the same without a firm Maris Peer or two peeking out... so ordered up 2.5kg last night from Marshalls seeds, along with

"Onion Stuttgarter Stanfield (100 sets) - it has a sweet, smooth and very mild taste, delicious for salads and cooking. Shallot Topper (25 bulbs) - our top selling shallot. Vigorous with stronger foliage and a 30% bigger crop. The bulbs store for an exceptionally long time. Garlic Solent Wight (2 bulbs) - a superb softneck Garlic, producing large, top quality bulbs. Bulbs will store for months."

Popped down to the allotment today, on last day of half term, with Sandy and Dan to sow the first of three trenches of the Sutton broad beans... Stealing a month on last year's sowing (25 March) Wanted to get the beans in before the forecast snow this week, so lets see what happens! Growing 2011 is ON!!

Fertile ground

For those who really want to get the nose in amongst the onions as it were (or who know their onions, to iron out my mixed metaphor!), check out this sowing guide! For those who don't, here's a postcard from Stromness:

plotstretcher

Sunday night, february, music, (M.Ward album withdrawn from record library and yours for 60p) red wine, last years seed packets... Sharpen the pencil, clean the rubber, its plot plan time! Crop rotation is a much conflicting area. Everyone disagrees on the plant types (legumes, roots, alliums, etc) the amount of years to rotate and even the order... science, no... Guesswork just gets more founded over time (i.e experience) Still who wants to grow four equal amounts of ech crop... As with everything, plan a little, but only so you can chamge tack! Due to canny Sept purchasing in pounstretcher all seeds got: just need spuds, onions and garlic!

rubarb, rhubarb

Having had a weeks worth of flu, a mowzie to the allotment on a fresh saturday afternoon was more about the consititutional rather than business... Just as well as the ground is soaking with the water table a few inches below the surface. Treading anywhere when this wet compacts the soil, reducing the air in the soil so instead spent an hour tidying the beds from the edges. The remnent of the red cabbage, beetroot and celeriac, all lifted and composted.

Whilst the winter weather has taken its toll on the beds, inside the new (donated through the fence from the golf course) plastic composter there's been plenty of action, due to the thermal qualities helping the bacteria to turn over. For the first time in six years of growing i can say i have actually made compost (being sure that it was something else six moths ago). Previously i have never remembered if that layer of black crumbly soil was there when i started the pile in between the palettes three years ago!

So the rhubarb crowns got their annual smothering...

International Year of the Youth 1985

Happy SOS day!

Wikileeks

Long established protocol dictates that all gardening articles need a topical punning title, whether in old media like newspapers or new media like blogs. Some things don't change!

January and the new year is of course the time to review last year and look forward and make new plans. As the years pass and allotmenteers get older, we refine our favourite varieties, and perhaps become set in our ways. Regular readers will know that I set myself a challenge each year to grow something new, to keep me learning and staying young! And after two years of trying celeriac, i'm admitting that maybe the damp east edinburrgh climate just doesn't haar-ve the warmth required to bulk up the tubers. Pulled the roots last week and they've not even grown to the size of a golf ball!

Not so with the leeks. For five years i've grown the same variety: MUsselburgh, and finally i've cracked the secret of a good leek - the seeds need to be planted ina container with a good four inches of sandy loam rather than in modules as the roots need loads of room to establish strong seedlings. Although some former denizens of the royal burgh remain oblivious, these leeks as the name suggests, seem ideally suited to the local climate, and last weekends haul was a good start to the year, quickly made into leek and tattie soup. This year, i'm looking to build such local loyalties: Ailsa Craig onions, Pentland Javelin spuds, Musselburgh leeks: traditional scottish allotment fare. You can keep your Pixie's, your Red Rookies and your Picasso's this year I'm looking back to go forward!

And the challenge:well this year it time to reclaim that much maligned veg, the cauliflower. Hell, it would achievement enough to grow sometime that shape, but i'm sure fresh cauliflower would be deliciously crisp! And the variety?, you're asking: North Forelander sounds suitably intrepid to me!

Good luck to all in your gardening exploits for 2011- be brave!!

Merry Christmas!

Another year, the snow lying thick on the ground... Hiding all but the pigeon stripped kale shoots... The chutney's being distributed... Goodwill to all man, and animalkind! Seasonal greetings to my readers all over the world and may nature be kind to you all in 2011! Johnny

To Yorkshire

Allotments in Saltaire, Yorkshire

Love in the Laundrette

Two of a kind, we have so much in common
I thought, as I cycled past her on the Common

Our bags were stuffed with soiled belongings
Was she lonely too? Filled with untold longings?

I could write a tune, a poem or a play for her
Knowing that soon I would make a play for her

Although our eyes had met only moments ago
Once inside, I decided to give it a go

Cried: 'Let's put our clothes into the same wash!'
The look of horror told me that it wouldn't wash

'Let's save time and money. Share our washing powder.'
But she turned her back and snapped, 'Take a powder.'

She needed her own machine. To run her own cycle.
So I unloaded, and lonely, rode home on my cycle.

Roger McGough

Not currently doing much work!

Cobbles

It may be autumn and the leaves dropping off the fruit bushes, but the raspberries keep coming. My favourite fruit! They don't come all at once but rather a good bucket a week from early september to now...

Otherwise turning the compost; transporting the nitrogen heavy, lemon smelling fruit and veg scraps from home through the streets of restalrig, risking earning myself a nickname of stinky johnny from the kids by the vennel, to mix with the crops.. Six months from now!!

Have to dash: the blog has now gone live... And colski's here at the gate to share a brew and celebrate thedons cuffing the hibbees by 4 goals to 1! Might even get him to guest blog! Another first for the warm shoots!

Godzilla!

Digging the main crop spuds... Good size (due to the chemicals?! More like Godzilla size!). Best left for a couple of hours in the cold portobello air to harden the skins before storing for the winter

Hugettes

Sandy, Hissy the boa Constrictor and me popped down on a sunny sunday to catch up on the courgettes progress.

After last year's haul of plum and courgette chutney thanks to my brother's Simon plums from East Belfast flat, from which he has moved from (albeit four streets up the road) and therefore no longer access to , I was left wondering a) what was I to do with more bloody courgettes and b) what's maggie going to have on her cheese sarnies for the next three months. However luckily just as the courgettes have turned into hugettes over the past fortnight, Kim and Tania's new house has a plum tree square in the back garden. To be boiled collectively next weekend...

I planted out the last of the lettuce a fortnight ago. Meanwhile the beetroots were cropped first on Sun 22 May, after a couple of rows failing to germinate early in the year. The first french beans were collected today and the kale planted out a fortnight ago after the first earlies are looking decidedly ravaged by caterpillars. Lots of blackberries, and the first inklings of the autumn raspberries!.. Hissy couldn't contain himself.

garlic harvested

No, its not one of my paintings, it is in fact the autumn planted garlic pulled tonight and left to dry in the shed - took a handful of fresh green bulbs for garlic soup. Meanwhile the Olympia broccoli has grown to gauarantuan propotions - seems awful early to me? However (NB for next year) they were planted on 7 March, and were probably ready to start picking in July, providing enough for two months - a second sowing at the end of April/early may would be worthwhile as it produces through to Nov.

Homecooked productions - Beyond Rhubarb and Custard!

Good thing about allotmenteering is sharing the produce round when the glut comes. Having received the rhubarb, good pals Matt and Kate spent a long time at their kitchen table, chopping and trying things out before coming up with the following - Rhubarb and Strawberry Crumble!

Check out their new animation, produced in much the same way, for further seasonal, homecooked delight!