Allotment Virgins... The story of Plot 13...

ShootForTheMoon

Does anyone have any good resources, books, magazines or links for a bit of reading over the winter in preparation for our first plants going in?? And planning the layout of the plot??

In an ideal world, we'd like to grow the following:

Green & Yellow Courgettes
Sweetcorn
Peas
Asparagus
Broccoli
Carrots
Parsnips

Beetroot
Spring Onions
Pak Choi
Rocket
Lettuce

Strawberries
Maybe another soft fruit?


Comments and suggestions welcome as always!!

Emma_whitnash

Wow, this is great. I too have taken on an allotment recently (2 months ago), half a plot I'm sharing with a friend. No pictures unfortunately, we were so keen to get going forgot to take any!!

Anyhow it was very overgrown when taken on, had not been tended for about 2 years so a little messy. Still once work started it wasn't that bad. We now have 4 rectangle beds (6ft by 4 I think) and soon to have a large square one (8ft I think). Fruit bushes have been planted (3 redcurrant bushes inherited from the plot!). Strawberry plants put in, 2 compost bins ready and waiting to be filled. We've put any grass/weeds cleared into our green bins for now as there was a lot of bindweed.

We got free manure from a lady who owns a field nearby (thanks to my friend) so that was great and get free bark chips at the site. My OH is donating some motorbike tyres so we can make 'pots' lol - he was only going to chuck them!

I never thought I'd get an allotment as work and have 2 young children plus a large garden of my own. However the opportunity arose and I must say, is all very exciting! So we're busy planning nest year's vegetables (sweet corn, leeks and toms so far).

I've ordered garlic, shallots and onions to go in and have planted winter spinach - yum). Also got some chard seeds for free from the site and they've already grown!

We've bought large bags of compost from the council (probably from my own bin!) For the princely sum of a £1 per 40L bag.

I'll look forward to your news!

ALIBOBSY

ShootForTheMoon wrote: »

Does anyone have any good resources, books, magazines or links for a bit of reading over the winter in preparation for our first plants going in?? And planning the layout of the plot??

In an ideal world, we'd like to grow the following:

Green & Yellow Courgettes
Sweetcorn
Peas
Asparagus
Broccoli
Carrots
Parsnips

Beetroot
Spring Onions
Pak Choi
Rocket
Lettuce

Strawberries
Maybe another soft fruit?


Comments and suggestions welcome as always!!

I have to admit to liking the river cottage handbooks and have funnily enough been rereading the grow your own one just recently. However there are many websites and loads of advice and videos online and on forums like this. TBH sometimes it s a case of giving things a go and see what works for you and your ground/area.


Regarding the above list my comments from our experience would be:-

Green & Yellow Courgettes-courgettes are pretty easy once past the early stages and give a lot for the space, I found it better to grow on for longer in pots under cover before planting out and remember to add plenty of compost/manure to the ground before planting and liquid feed once the flowers start. Some say yellow courgettes are tasteless, but never tried them. Did grow the round ball shaped ones this year and they seemed to fill out and grow even faster than the green ones-for throwing in soups and sauces you got more filling for your courgette if you see what I mean and they were fab stuffed and baked.

Sweetcorn-hard to germinate, takes up a lot of space, but tastes fab if you get some cobs. Gave up in the garden, but if I had more space like you would defo give it a go. Grow squashes underneath to keep the weeds own and double up on harvests or google "3 sisters" to maximise the growing space.

Peas-need ALOT of plants to get a pot full of peas, but they are so delicious fresh from the pod, the kids tend to eat them in the garden like sweets so I still end up buying frozen later in the year. But sugar snap/mange tout are brilliant, more bang for your buck and keep on pumping out pods for ages. Pea sprouts and tops are fab in salads.

Asparagus-not much success here as I tried to start cheap, think you need to go for good quality roots and do all the proper prep, plus needs space.

Broccoli-not sure if you mean calabrese (supermarket style brocooli) or purple sprouting. The first grows over summer and is pretty easy the second grow almost all year to harvest the next spring. Both fill beds for long periods and cabbage whites are a pain in the backside. I do like broccoli rabe or rapinni which grows in just 60 days and provides lots of little broccoli sprouts to stir fry in summer, great with slices of courgette and garlic mmmmm. If the do go over and start to flower the flowers are nice in salads an the hoverflies and bees love them. Plus you can eat the leaves like cabbage-chickens love these.

Carrots-varieties for all situations an all year around pretty much. I never thin out as such, simply sow thinly at the start then pick and use the small carrots as you go. Each time you pick along the row the rest get bigger, as they are organic I simply wash and use the whole thing-tops as well.

Parsnips-Always have trouble with slugs eating these as they sprout so in tubs this year and so far big and bushy. Take a long time to grow.

Beetroot-great to stick in as quicker crops between the longer growers, keep sowing an enjoy the tops small in salads, bigger in cooking.

Spring Onions-easy peasy, fast, fill gaps, no hassle.

Pak Choi-Mine seem to bolt in summer, but have some, amongst other oriental leaves, going great guns in the unheated greenhouse now.

Rocket-bolts quickly in summer, but easy to grow so just keep sowing in sucession

Lettuce-apart from the fact slugs love it, especially the seedlings pretty easy, grows in shallow amounts of soil and saves a fortune over summer. Pick and come again is my fav, but I do grow some to heart up especially little gems. If the outside leaves are a bit bashed around or thick they can be cooked like spinach/cabbage.

Strawberries-kids love these and they are pretty easy, ev1 should have a strawberry bed. I also like alpine SB which pump out what seems like hundreds of tiny tasty baby SB-these freeze well to go in breakfast muffins and similar later on.

Maybe another soft fruit?-Blackcurrants, redcurrants and gooseberries are great for cooking/preserving and grow pretty easily and you could consider apple/plum or similar for longer term rewards.

Other than these I wouldn't be without a selection of beans, runner beans and broad beans are much nicer than shop bought as you can pick them young and fresh plus French beans are good as well.

Enjoy it!

Ali x

ShootForTheMoon

Wow... Thanks for the amazingly detailed reply Alibobsy!!

Thats a fantastic help! Glad that I'm not a million miles off in terms of what we're looking to grow... As we are both big kids anyway your suggestions are very appealing!!
I think the idea is really going to be about going for improved flavour and generally growing what we will get the most use of!

The rocket is coming along nicely and we have been eating a lot of it recently.
Also made a pea and mint soup (albeit with frozen peas at the moment - this time next year I hope to have our own!)

I love River Cottage and his philosophy is completely how I feel about food - will see if there's any books in the library to read up over the winter... I hadn't thought of that!!

So excited to have got there with the ground work - just keeping on top of it through the winter now so that planting can begin in spring!!!

warehouse

Congratulations! I got my own allotment in February this year, you have a great head start on the growing season.

Personally I'd dig a load of manure in ASAP, my own 2 ton delivery of rotted cow manure is coming this Friday. Dig it in over the next month. Should be ready to go by planting time.

What I've learned this year:

Strawberry's get eaten by birds, get nets up. I went for marshmallow strawberries which were superb, even in year 1. Got them off ebay.

Planting all my peas, lettuces and turnips at the same time meant I got a bumper crop of them at the same time. Stagger planting.

Grass grows fast, get a cheap lawn mower to keep on site if possible.

Weeds! Weeding is a huge job, 1 to 2 hours a week, every week from spring onwards.

Get a polytunnel or greenhouse for tomatoes, peppers and anything else that prefers heat.

Pumpkins and cucumbers were a HUGE success.

Have a flower bed, the plots where I am that grow flowers in some areas look really good. Sunflowers too.

Consider a fruit tree.

A compost bin is absolutely essential.

Potatoes seem to grow really well in any conditions.

Don't over water.

Otherwise, have fun.

ALIBOBSY

Herbs are good investments, little input and lots out. I am currently still drying various herbs and moving pots under cover for a few more weeks of use. Plus many herbs over winter either under cover or even just outside as they are.

Love my bay tree which has survived minus 15 degrees in that really cold winter a few years ago. Lost one of my mints-pineapple in the cold, but garden mint, peppermint and spearmint all came back in the spring.

I think you mentioned oregano. I got a little cutting about 5 or 6 years ago, think it was in a £2 pack of various herbs from aldi or lidl and it is still going strong. Like the mints it grows easily in pots and you can split the plant and it bushes up really quickly into another plant. The flowers are lovely and the bees love it. The chickens love it and it supposedly boosts their immunity. It seems to be industructable and grows like crazy I love it. It also drys easily and the more you pick it, the more it grows-fab plant.

Also like garlic as again its easy to grow and we love garlic here. I save any smaller cloves for the following year ad haven't bought new garlic since the first lot about 3 years ago.

You will have more space than us so some stuff we might not bother with, you could consider. I only grow a few salad potatos in pots/half a bed as we haven't the space to keep a maincrop in the ground and as we have a great local farm shop where we can get locally produced bags of spuds for great prices so don't need to bother.

Once you start growing you can consider more unusual crops like different colour veg-white or purple carrots etc.
Next year on the list we fancy cucamelons and amaryth.

November/December are great months to get researching and plan out what you fancy growing. I have found both Aldi and especially Lidl do great, cheap seeds as well as the various discount/pound stores. Plus a number of good online suppliers, so it needn't cost a fortune and seeds keep for years in most cases and you start to learn about seed saving as you go. E.G I have left about 5 or 6 runner bean pods on the plants this last few weeks. They are fattening up and I will dry them for net years crop. Some people actually grow whole crops of beans and just leave them on the plants for the whole season and just dry and pick at the end of the year-some to use to plant, some to have over winter as dried beans.

LOL you can tell I love growing my own and am missing being outside- I am ill with a chest infection.

Enjoy it its very addicting.

Ali x

ALIBOBSY

Regarding weeding I have found little and offen works best in the garden, I would say probably 10-15 mins a day 3-4 days a week. But I can nip into the garden and quickly hoe one or two beds in a short time.

Mulches are great and some plants keep the weeds down so much that there is little weeding required-squashes pretty much block anything out. Mind you I don't obsess about have perfectly clean beds as weeds help to turn the soil and bring up nutrients. I try to look on them as free compost supplies and chicken food-they love dandelions, and in the end the chickens "add" to the compost/soil feeding.

Ali

Cally_Smart

As for reading material,I love Nigel Slater(his autobiography Toast is fantastic!)He is an inspiration to me. He writes various columns in the gardening magazines I follow like the RHS magazine The Garden as well as his tome on Vegetables etc. He tries unusual vegetables which are hard to find in the shops & interesting to grow some are the heritage types. Plus,of course, he does some wonderful things with them on his tv shows! We (name dropping here!)even exchanged 'tweets' once about Medlar trees of which we both have !

Tashatutuw

My Parents have an allotment which I like to help out on (mainly around cropping times) - they found local Big Plant Hire/Tool Hire companies sell off old scaffold planks for £2 per board (our local price so may vary) which they have used to create bedding supports, a large compost area (with the use of old palets - also usually either free or dirt cheap!!) and various other things in their allotment.

I have a large field and medium 'orchard' at home which have been drastically underused in the 3yrs since DH and I bought the property. We have chickens, ducks and geese in our orchard (but only a few fruit trees), fruit trees on our garden?? and our poor lonely goat (his mate died a few months ago) in the field. Plans for Spring are to get a small herd of pigs to fatten, more fruit trees for the orchard and to seperate pigs and goat from some of the field as I want to use some of our land to grow veg and fruit so will follow closely on this thread to pick up some useful tips.

Oh, looking at organic growing ShootForTheMoon - my Parents use egg shells around their plants, crushed up a they will keep away the slugs without use of nasty chemicals.

ShootForTheMoon

Time for a bit of an update!!

We're having an absolute ball... Loving learning and growing and have had some fab results! We're inundated with salads, radish, spring onions etc... The best bit?? STRAWBERRIES!

Thanks for all the help and advice guys!!

Shoot x