Melons away

For many years I have been growing melons on the plot, some years more successful than others. Last year was particularly good, helped by a decent spell of sunshine at the right time. My usual method is to dig a planting hole, fill with manure and a handful of pelleted chicken manure, water, back fill with soil, water again to settle and mark with a cane. A few days later I transplant the variety Outdoor Wonder into these holes. Melons can rot if the stems get wet so I sink a cut off plastic bottle close to the roots to as a reservoir. I then cover with tunnels made from clear corrugated plastic sheets held in place by wire hoops. With a bottle and one melon at the end of each tunnel trained inwards, watering is easy. I use a diluted feed of liquid comfrey. The disadvantage with tunnels is that bees will not always find the flowers so to ensure fruit is set I hand pollinate. I often find that more of the male flowers seem to be produced than the female ones, sometimes it seems to be all male, so hand pollination needs to be done on a regular basis. Last year because we had a sunny spell I left the tunnels off all the time, but although there were enough melons produced, pollination was a bit hit and miss. So this year I will use the best of both worlds, supplement the work of the bees by hand pollination and put the covers in place when the fruit has set in order to aid ripening. I disregard the recommended method of training, I prefer to wait until I have about four fruits on a stem and then cut the stems two leaves after a fruit, thereby putting all the plants effort’s into swelling the melons.

The veteran verses the committee

There was a recent item on BBC’s the One Show (1) following up an article in the Telegraph (2). Both had all the necessary qualities, initial outrage, bags of sympathy and finally joy. A 92 year old WWII veteran was under threat of losing his allotment that he has worked for 20 years. The TV item, which rolled in a celebrity garden designer, didn’t give the full story or any input from the committee who had taken the decision; it also made mention that the allotments had been established after the war for returning soldiers, irrelevant in this case as the gentleman had only been there 20 years. The Telegraph gave the full background from both sides. The gentleman had been ill and last year had spent much of his time with activities related to the D Day celebrations. The committee aware of his illness has written to him expressing concern over the state of the plot and offered help, which he had refused. They decided to take his plot away, locals heard and an army of helpers restored the plot, as shown on TV, and the threat was lifted. Great bit of community action and everybody is pleased. However as the chair noted, the plot will be looked at during each months regular inspection and with a large waiting list everybody has to be treated the same. What happens if those kind helpers don’t come back? We had a similar situation with a 90 year old. We offered help, it was refused so without him knowing we mowed the paths and did the odd bit of weeding. I decided to let the matter quietly drop. He enjoyed his plot and worked it when he could. Although it sounds callous, I knew that eventually nature would make the final decision, which it did two years later. I have every sympathy for both the veteran and the committee. There is no easy way to deal with these cases.
(1) The One Show 21 April 2015
(2)  Cameron’s war hero faces being turfed off allotment. Telegraph 15 April 2015

The problem with birds

I am convinced that some birds have a programmable in-built satnav, with the destination being an allotment plot. Yes, it is that time of the year again. The annual battle of wills between a poor defenceless allotmenteer and a crafty, cunning, malicious, feathered flying fiend. I am talking about seed sowing. The poor, aforesaid, allotmenteer carefully and lovingly creates the perfect environment for seeds to grow and flourish. The soil is tilled and raked to a fine tilth, the drill is opened and watered, the seed is carefully spread along the drill and the soil is equally carefully raked back to cover the drill. The soil is patted down to make sure it is in contact with seeds and twigs, twine or netting is placed along the row as a line of defence against the aforementioned flying fiends. Meanwhile the members of the class Aves sit in the surrounding trees chirruping to each other and laughing at the allotmenteer’s pathetic attempts to keep them from their lunch. The allotmenteer leaves satisfied that they have done all that is humanly possible to give the seeds the best start in life. He or she trots home, assured that within a few weeks, germination will take place and very soon a bounteous harvest, probably the best ever, will happen.
Then along come the birds. I have seen pigeons bounce on top of netting to weigh it down so they can peck through the gaps. I have seen small birds hop in amongst twine and twigs to greedily eat all the seeds. There is no end to their cunning. I take this personally having recently lost a complete row of spinach seeds. Despite the deterrents I had installed, a row of little triangle marks approximating to beak shapes were present all along the row. I have re-sown but this time the row is under plastic sheets. Try and get them now!

At last the year begins and that b***** awful BBC allotment programme

The potatoes are chitting in egg boxes, the propagator is full and warming away in the greenhouse and the beds have been dug. Well actually, the beds have been ready since December. I have laid some plastic sheets to warm the soil in order to get some early carrots sown. Come next week and the final plot will have been let at Bullbeggars, but two half plots still require tenants at Littlewicks. For the first time since I became Chairman, we have a shortage of people on the waiting list. I blame the BBC programme the Great Allotment Challenge. I think is has done more to damage allotments than any Council could ever do. The opening lines of Bohemian Rhapsody go ” is this the real life, is this just fantasy?” It could have been written with this programme in mind. No it is not real life on a plot, yes it is fantasy. Grow the perfect veg, pickle it and while your at it run up a flower bouquet! Get real. Allotment life is all about hard work, on your own or with help, not a team behind the scenes. It is about putting up with failure and growing wonky carrots. Yes some grow flowers and yes some make jams and pickles. Where’s the rain, where’s the mud, where’s the disappointment. More to the point where is the friendly banter and comradeship that I and others meet everyday on the plot. Certainly there is no sense of outright fierce competition. One person joining our waiting list, having seen the programme, asked me if we (the Committee) had to oversee every thing she grew and would we reject it if it wasn’t perfect! An extreme view yes, but a perception brought about by an ill thought out attempt to jump on the bandwagon of success of the Great British Bake-off. Rant over..

No updates for a while

Sorry there has been no updates for a while. I have been under the NHS regime for the better part of this year. Consequently my plot has been ticking over with the very considerable aid of a good friend and neighbour. In return I am passing on my knowledge to enable her to run her own plot. I hope to get back to regular postings in the New Year when the aforementioned so-called health service finally does something! Knew I should have taken out private insurance years ago when I was healthy enough to get covered!
Meanwhile, I can report that Horsell Bullbeggars site was runner up again for the second year running in Woking’s allotment competition. Bullbeggars opened for the Yellow Book and in conjunction with the two other gardens in our group, raised over £770. I can’t stop producing cucumbers and I harvested 30 melons from 5 plants all grown in the open with no covering! And I am sick to the back teeth of French Beans and courgettes! On balance a good year.

Spuds n mud

We have a couple of fun competitions on the sites: for children and adults to grow the tallest sunflowers and the biggest pumpkins. We supply the seeds so everyone grows the same variety and certificates and small prizes are awarded to the winners. Recently I spent a couple of hours judging the sunflower competition. Now, this is not easy as the weight of the head often causes sunflowers to droop. So with the aid of a rule, some string and a step ladder I measured each entry from the point where the back of the head met the stem right down to the ground, hence the step ladder. This year the tallest overall, at 2.9m, was grown at Littlewicks by Sam aged 5. I had asked that each entry be clearly labelled, Sam’s said “with adult help”! The winning adult entry was at Bullbeggars among a fiercely fought family group, each with their own entry, with dad Ian P winning at 2.82m.
Give the newly promoted Assistant (wife) a fork, point her in the direction of a potato bed and what do you get? Well in our case it was a slightly disappointing yield of maincrop Sarpo Mira. We had dug about half the bed between us when the rain called a halt to our endeavours and the yield was, relative to previous years, about a third less. The tops of the potato plants are still green and have not yet flopped; usually I would delay my harvest until the tops had gone brown which would indicate that growth is finished. However, due to future commitments, we decided to take the plunge and dig early. Now with any other veg you can easily tell when it is ready, and how much is there. Even a carrot or parsnip you can knock some of the soil away from the shoulders and see if it looks a decent size. But potatoes are awkward. You can’t see what is under the ground and once you put the fork in and dig it up you can’t put it back! The low yield is probably due to the lack of rainfall this summer; rain would have significantly increased the yield. I only water my potatoes after planting the tubers and during a recent session of the Centre Aisle Tea Gang (membership loose, anyone can join), no-one present admitted to watering their spuds during the season, all preferring to let nature do the work. So yes, it is my own fault and I should not complain! Now we are getting more showers I am confident that the remainder of the crop will be better and the newly promoted Assistant (wife, formerly known as apprentice) will once again enjoy the pleasure of digging spuds in the rain.

Sweet Corn

I have said it before and make no apologies for doing so again. It is the best time of the year – sweet corn harvesting time. But how can you tell when it is ready? The first indication is that the silky tassels at the top of the cob go brown, however to check that they are fully ripe, you have to peel back some of the covering leaves (the husk) and press a thumbnail into one of the kernels. If the juice that comes out is milky then the cobs are ready to pick. To do so, grasp the cob, twist and pull downwards. If the juice is clear then try again another day.
Now all vegetables are best eaten fresh, but none more so than sweet corn, hence an American saying “walk slowly to pick it, run back to the kitchen to cook it” It rapidly loses its sweetness of flavour after a few days even if left in a fridge and there is a marked difference in taste between a cob picked and cooked within a few hours and one that is a day old. The outer leaves, silks and stalk are removed and freshly harvested cobs are best boiled in unsalted water for no longer than about 10 minutes. If you can be bothered, you can remove the cooked kernels from the cob, but honestly, what looks better on a plate than a bright yellow cob dripping with butter? It is equally as tasty steamed or grilled whole.
One thing I have never tried but have heard is good, is to leave the cobs to dry on the plant, remove the kernels and cook them in oil where they will double in size to become corn nuts.
The tassels at the top of the plants are actually the male flowers and the silks the female. This is why it is grown in blocks rather than rows to give the best chance of pollination. I have also read that it is good to eat sweet corn with any type of bean. Apparently both of these vegetables are each deficient in an essential amino acid; however what is missing from one is abundant in the other, so eating both gives a balanced meal.
By the way, whatever the size of the cob, there will always be an even number of rows of kernels. That is something to do with it being a monocot seedling. For those of you who cannot remember school biology lessons (should have stayed awake at the back, instead of only being interested in the sex ed lessons), a monocot is a plant that has only one seed leaf, as opposed to say a runner bean seed that produces two fleshy seed leaves. Why being a monocot gives an even number of kernels I have no idea, I too must have been asleep for that lesson!

Waiting time

This week another two people were added to the waiting list for a plot at Horsell. We now have 35 on the combined list for both sites, Littlewicks and Bullbeggars, and try to satisfy a preference where possible. Within that figure are some who have specified that they do not want a plot for several years when they expect their circumstances to change, perhaps due to retirement. Why put your name down so far in advance? Well, over the past ten years the demand for plots has grown, resulting in ever increasing waiting times nationwide, and this has been widely reported in the media. Prior to last year’s opening of Littlewicks, I had over 70 on our list.
However, it may be that things have started to change. Several times a year representatives from the ten allotment sites in Woking get together with officials of the Council. One of the things we regularly discuss is the number of vacancies and the length of our waiting lists. At this weeks meeting four others besides Horsell had a waiting list. This meant that, for the first time in many years, you probably wouldn’t have to wait very long to get a plot at one of the other five. At previous meetings we had commented that perhaps the bubble, if not burst, was at least springing a leak. Usually we expect to receive emails and phone calls asking for a plot at the beginning of the New Year (probably a resolution) and to peak at Easter if there is a good spring. At Horsell this year has been very different and there were no peaks at the expected times, only a slow drizzle. However, we already had a waiting list in double figures. Other sites reported a complete fall off in enquiries. Now a report has been published in association with the National Allotment Society that shows waiting lists have dropped by 15% across England in the past two years. The report surveyed all 323 English principal authorities and found approximately 78,800 people on waiting lists. That works out as 52 per 100 plots as against the last survey in 2011 of 57 per 100 plots. Further, in the past two years 51 Councils (Woking included) created a total of 2,000 new plots across 65 new sites.
Now the new plots alone cannot account for the drop. The article accompanying the report speculated that maybe recent poor summers had put people off, or that as more sites are under self-management (as are ourselves and most in Woking), the committees take a more robust attitude in evicting those who do not tend their plots, making for a faster turnover. Personally, I think it may also be that, with the changes in the economy, many people have seen their working hours change and realise they will not have the time needed to manage a plot. Something that unfortunately caused four couples on our sites to give up mid-way through the year.

Competition results

Competition-wise it has been a pretty good fortnight for both of the Horsell allotment sites. Out of the ten sites in the Woking Council competition Bullbeggars was runner-up as best site and Littlewicks achieved a very commendable 5th place. That is all the more remarkable considering the site has only been open for a year and about 90% of its tenants had little or no previous growing experience. One of the Bullbeggars plots was runner-up in the novices category. Also remarkable in that they had only had a plot for two months and had had to put a lot of work into it! In addition, some of our other entries in the various categories were only a few marks from third place, so all in all a pretty good result.
John M’s photo immortalising Derek (he of the biscuits) and other members of the Centre Aisle Tea Gang (no prior application needed to join), was awarded 2nd place by the judges in the Horsell Village Show. He also won with the largest marrow. One of our members, Liz P, scooped most of the trophies in the veg growing section and was also awarded the RHS Banksian Medal. This is a prestigious RHS award and in the Horsell Village Show is given to the person who accumulates most points from the 21 categories in the Vegetable and Fruit division and the 19 categories in the Flowers division.
A few weeks ago I mentioned that people on both sites were reporting bumper crops of soft fruit. Two of the Bullbeggars plotholders have comprehensively proved that with recent examples. Simon R has two blackcurrant bushes; on two separate trips he took home a bucketful of currants each time. Ray and Heather S accumulated 74lb of gooseberries from 3 moderate size bushes, plus 47lb of strawberries from a 33 -plant strawberry bed. These are by no means isolated incidents and it is certainly going down as one of the best ever years for fruit yields. As Simon R said, whereas last year it was a case of ‘who wants to carve the last strawberry’, this year he has had more than enough to eat and still have plenty to make jam.
It is not just fruit. Beans, courgettes, beetroot, cucumber, carrots (in the latter case, it seems everybody’s but mine) are all cropping their little hearts out. Must be something to do with the weather!

A judging we (they) will go

Over two days last week all the allotment sites in Woking were judged on behalf of the Council. The two RHS accredited judges choose the best site and also have the unenviable job of selecting the winners in four individual categories; best plot, best newcomer in their first year, best plot tended by a lady and best plot tended by an over 70 year old. Each site puts forward up to three candidates in each category. It is a mammoth undertaking by the judges. To give some indication of the task, they spent just over two hours walking around the Bullbeggars site and a further one and a half hours at Littlewicks (it is smaller in case you are wondering). They not only have to evaluate each of the entries but also gain an impression of the site as a whole. It is not a task that I would wish to undertake and I doff my trowel to them for their endeavours. No, I am not creeping. By the time this goes to press they will already have informed Woking Council of the winners!
Just a few hours after this the Horsell C of E after-school allotment club arrived on site. It is a shame that the two visits did not coincide; the judges would have seen the children dig up their potatoes and painstakingly divide over 300 spuds equally amongst themselves. Yes, they counted them and apart from the odd comment of “I dug that big one can I have it”, all went home satisfied with their haul. Word has filtered back to me that the parents were suitably impressed with the taste!
One week on and it was the turn of the school’s year three children (all 90) to visit my plot and see how and what I grow. Thankfully this was done in three shifts! I began by showing them cards with different seeds attached. The idea is for them to guess what veg it is and also to demonstrate that the size of seed is immaterial to the size of the harvested veg. It is easy for them to believe, and in most cases identify, a courgette seed or a pea but it is a different matter when they are confronted with the smallest seed on the card and be told it is a cabbage. It is also an eye opener when I show how one pea or bean produces a plant and then open a pod to display the numbers inside.
The tea gang, featuring Derek of the biscuits, have been immortalised in full digital glory by John M and entered in the photography section of the Horsell Village Show on 27 July. Surely a winning entry?