Reweed Allotment Blog

A few pictures of my 3 Bhut Jolokia Plants and my large Fatalli plant.

I removed the side branches of all the plants early on in growth to encourage upward growth but the last few weeks of nice weather really made the plants branch out.

It’s drilled into your brain from a young age that “they make you see in the dark”. However if they were that good for you they wouldn’t be such a pain in the arse to grow.

Soil Preparation

Carrots need deep, stone free soil which is fertile yet well drained.

When preparing my carrot patch I dug the soil to depth of about a foot and about 2 feet wide. I then sieved the soil back into the trench. Thus removing all stones… It took ages.

If a carrot hits a stone when growing it will fork and deform, the only upside of this is sometimes a carrot looks like it has a penis.

Sowing Seeds

Sow seeds directly in the soil as the weather starts to warm up.

I like to make small trenchs with my finger or a generic garden tool about half an inch deep, sprinkle the fine carrot seeds along the length of the trench about half an inch deep.

Plant Care

As the seedlings grow, thin them out so they are 2 inches apart for large carrots, or don’t thin them out for smaller baby carrots. Try your hardest not to bruise or disturb the carrot leaves as that attracts the nightmare carrot fly. bbbzzzzz.

Keep the bed weed free.

Harvesting

Lift the carrots gently with a fork either as small sweet baby carrots, or leave to mature to larger carrots.

Soil Preparation

Leeks require a rich well drained area of soil. You can dig in plenty of well rotted compost with plenty of moisture content.

They can be placed in full sun or partial shade, but hate to be water logged.

Note: I found when I had my leeks in a gloomy dark corner of the allotment they bolted to seed and were inedible.

Sowing Seeds

You can start seeds either in trays or directly in the ground (once the danger of frost has passed).

Sow seeds about half an inch deep, with an inch between seeds. Seedlings should emerge in about 2 weeks if you planted directly in the ground, maybe sooner if you sowed them in trays and kept them warm/indoors.

Thin seedlings out to roughly 4 inch apart.

Transplanting

When leeks are about 6 inches tall, make holes 4 or 5 inches deep and about 8 inches apart, you can use a fancy garden tool or your fingers. Place one leek seedling into each hole.

Do not fill the hole with soil, instead fill the hole with water. This will give the roots space to spread out and will backfill the hole a little for you, gradually filling completely over the course of a few weeks.

Plant Care

Leeks are very hardy plants, once in the ground you could leave them alone and they would very likely survive and continue to grow for many months before going to seed.

You can however blanch your leeks.

Increase the white portion of each leek by carefully earthing up soil around the bottom of the stem gradually over summer.

Some people use old toilet rolls or brown packing paper, this both blanches the stem and stops gritty soil getting into inside the leeks.

Harvesting

You can harvest the leeks when young or leave them to mature. Simple use a fork to gently lift leeks leaving the rest to carry on growing.

Last year my garlic and onions got rust so bad not one of them reached a size greater than a golf ball. This Included elephant garlic and a large onion variety. Since then i’ve changed plots, moved to position in full sun with no damp spots…

Well it’s back… pulled all my garlic today, rust had destroyed them. Golf balls.. no no, marbles.

Garlic the size of marbles.

Disappointed.

So if rust isn’t initially caused by damp and bad light, what is it caused by? And how can i f’in stop it.