Saturday 24th March 2012 - weather: hot and sunny

I know readers, I am a week late with my lottie update, but better late than never huh?

The usual routine. BBQ supplies, kids with i-pods, flasks, seeds, spuds and the rest of the allotment paraphanalia.

I didn't think it would be a long visit to start as daughter number one wasn't in the mood for a day playing in the dirt, but I soon talked her round and of course, once the fire was alight, she was happy.

First job of the day, get the last of the spuds in. I have a row of Pink Fur Apple, Kestrel, International Kidney and Anya. I then have a row half planted with Int. Kids and half with Anya. I still have a few seed spuds left and they may get poked in somewhere, but I do have one of the potato growing sacks at home in the shed, so I might bung them in that in the garden.

Next in, broad bean plantlets. They are about 6 inches tall, good, stocky plants, so they went in, but the peas that are romping away, just infront of the fruit cage, shed end of plot number one. From here I trundled over to plot number 2 and planted 15 little gem lettuce plantlets and 12 lollo rosso plantlets. These have gone down the middle of the runned bean canes as they will be gone long before the beans are high enough to be a problem.

Now, I know it is only the end of March, and I also know now that a cold snap may well strike the middle of the first week of April, but I did plonk in a few runner beans and a row of dwarf French beans. The Frenchies have the cold frame over them, so they might be okay if they do poke their noses through....I don't hold out quite so much hope for the runners, but if they aren't too keen and stay underground for a bit longer, they might pull through. I also sowed some more peas, carrots, beetroot, spinach and turnips, and I station sowed some sunflowers and finally I planted some red onion sets that a customer had given me.

Hubby cut all of the paths for me and finished rotovating plot number 2 so our end of the site is looking really neat. We have some very keen newcomers and after a stroll around the site, it looks like only 2 plots are currently being neglected by their owners. Fingers crossed that all changes before the weeds start spreading their seeds everywhere.

The last job of they day for me was weeding the fruit cage in amongst the rasberry canes. I have membrane down amongst the bushes so they are fine. Then hubby dumped my rotted compost in the cage and I raked that around the canes to give them a good feed to help with yet another bumber crop of raspberries. Meanwhile, he was humping barrows full of steamy manure over onto plot number 2 and heaping it up in preperation for Operation Squash planting which will happen at the end of April, start of May.

A good five hours spent on the plot and it really is looking good. Next visit will see me planting sweetpea, lettuce and swede plantlets as well as sowing loads more seeds.