It actually stopped raining

Last week saw an improvement in the weather. We actually had some rain free days where the temperature rose to a pleasant level. We managed to carry out quite a few jobs both in the garden and on the allotment. What's even better is that we seem to be edging out of the hungry gap.

In the garden we planted up several tubs which of course necessitated a visit to the garden centre to 'fill in gaps'. 

With blackbirds moving in on the ripening cherries it was also time to turn the cherry tree into the ghost of summers' past. Sleeves of fleece were secured to the branches with clothes pegs. It doesn't look very pretty but, if we are to have a chance of tasting a cherry, it is definitely necessary.

Next to our allotment shed we have a tayberry and the first thing that I noticed on our first visit of the week to the plot was that it was swarming with ladybird larvae. Unfortunately, these are larvae of the Harlequin ladybird and not our native species. The larvae of the Harlequins are more spiky. Anyway at least they are still aphid munching machines.

We erected supports for another defence against pilfering blackbirds. Although our blueberries are not yet ripening we wanted to be ready to cover the blueberry bed with netting as soon as there are any signs of the berries turning from green.

 The first lot of brassicas are now coming into production.

The heads of calabrese - Aquiles were forming thick and fast and needed harvesting before they blew. The one below went into a turkey and broccoli risotto which was based on this recipe. The plants quickly went into side shoot production so many of our meals next week will have  a broccoli bias.

I mentioned in my last post that, Martyn managed to dig over the old strawberry bed and that we had hoped to plant it this year. A couple of warm, dry, sunny days put paid to that idea as the lumps of soil have turned into rocks which we have no chance of breaking down. Plan B has now been enforced and the bed has been covered with weed control fabric topped off with a wood chippings mulch. At the end of the year the fabric will be removed to let the winter weather work on the hardened soil. The mulch will be left to be incorporated into the soil.

We continued to plant up the winter brassica bed adding broccoli - Rudolf, Cauliflower - Clapton and cabbage Kalibro to the Crispus Brussels sprouts and Kilaton cabbage that were planted last week.

Our second sowing of Onward and Sugarsnap peas have been provided with supports. The first batch of peas are just starting to flower/

Annual flowers that had been growing on in trays in the garden have been planted out to fill gaps both in the garden and on the plot. I've planted zinnias, ageratum, statice and gomphrena

We harvested our first lot of overwintered onions. These were, Radar. The bulb sizes are variable but most are a useful size. The gap created by their removal has been planted with young lettuce plants.

We harvested our autumn planted, hard neck, Casablanca garlic from the same bed.  Having had little success in the past, we'd given up on garlic but last year we decided to have another go at it and this year we have had success. Most of the bulbs are a good size and have formed cloves but one or two have grown more like shallots. Has anyone any idea of why this is?

 Last week's total harvest was a bit more varied than of late.

18 June

We're not expecting many redcurrants this year as we haven't managed to get around to netting them. The blackbirds are already having a field day so we have decided to share. No doubt, the lion's share will go to them.

20 June

As well as calabrese we have cabbages ready for picking.

23 June

We emptied the final potato crate on Sunday and the two tubers planted in the crate produced a good crop. We can only hope that our open ground planted potatoes don't let the side down. Once the potatoes had been removed the compost was refreshed with some fertiliser and I sowed some beetroot seeds.

23 June

Considering that our strawberry plants are in their first year they are producing a good crop of delicious berries. At the moment the variety Sweetheart is producing the majority of berries. The two largest punnets above contain the Sweetheart harvest.

You may notice that three broad bean pods made it into last week's harvest. The pods need to swell a little more before they produce a serious picking but we couldn't resist trying one or two in Sunday's vegetable stir fry.

Our complete monthly harvests are listed here.

This week I am linking to harvest Monday hosted on 

Dave's blog Our Happy Acres

By the way, Walton's are running a competition to win a shed which you may be interested in entering - if so it can be found here.

Thanks to those who responded to my invitation to make a comment. I appreciate you taking the trouble to say hello. I know I get lots of visitors who never comment and I'd love to know who you are - unlike the annoying spammers who can't seem to grasp that their comments go straight into my spam folder and never see the light of day.

You don't have to have your own blog in order to join in conversations. It may seem that everyone who comments knows one another but bloggers always welcome new commenters, after all that is how we all started.

Copyright: Original post from Our Plot at Green Lane Allotments http://glallotments.blogspot.co.uk/ author S Garrett