June is one of my favourite months of the gardening year. It’s a time when you are rewarded for all your hard work; clearing from winter, sowing, potting on, attentively watering seedlings and taking frost action. Me referring to bounty probably tells you this post is about our allotment. It’s starting to feel like a functioning plot and having an actual harvest has temporarily dimmed the focus on the weeds.
Our strawberry patch has been booming! In just 3 weeks we’ve picked a whopping 3.5kg of fruit. I’m recording the weights of everything we harvest on a spreadsheet so at the end of the year we can total up how much we’ve grown – and its value in supermarket prices. A bit nerdy of me.
I had kale seeds left over – not many but enough for a small crop. After our caterpillar woes last year we decided to net them. But the netting we have isn’t very big so we are harvesting the leaves before they get too big for the net (around 12cm). They’re really tender so I’m going to pick them this way from now on.
The potatoes are starting to flower, yippeeee! I read that if you leave them for an extra couple of weeks after they flower you get bigger potatoes. So that’s what we’re going to do. We’re keeping our fingers crossed they stay blight free.
Red currants from the communal fruit trees at the allotment have been made into mixed berry jam along with strawberries and some foraged fruit from last year.
Sadly our garlic in the back garden has rust 🙁 I’ve cut off a lot of the affected leaves to try and stop it spreading and I’m hoping the bulbs will still reach a good size. All the lower leaves are starting to turn brown now so they only need to hold on for a couple more weeks.
I dug up the worst affected plants and thankfully the bulbs seem fine.
Garlic scapes have been popping up. Before the rust situation, we were cutting them off and putting them on the bbq. Very tasty! If you’ve got no idea what a scape is, it’s a shoot/bud that grows up out of the garlic – you trim it off so that the plant puts its energy into growing the bulb instead.
Scott’s family bought me two blueberry bushes for my birthday. We planted them out in the fruit patch at the allotment and they are chock full of fruit.
Red runner beans flowers are the brightest vegetable growing. I’m hoping we get a mountain of beans so we can live off runner beany herb linguine like we did last year. Garlicy, lemony, cheesy pasta filled with freshly picked beans – Summer meals don’t get much better than that.
Cornflowers are my favourite wild flower. I squirrelled away lots of saved seeds from the front garden last year so I sowed those along with the cornflower seeds I received as a leaving gift from my last job. The heat this week has coaxed the first flowers open.
It seems to be a good year for strawberries – which is always fabulous news! Your plot’s looking good, it’s nice to get some rewards for all the hard work isn’t it? And I love the nerdy-ness 🙂 #hdygg
Rewards make all the hard work (weeding) worthwhile. I think all the sun has made the strawberries sweeter – we’ve grown them in previous years but they seem extra delicious this year. I can’t get enough of them!
wow!!! that’s fantastic. i’m so envious of all your strawberries. and my inlaws in west virginia pick those red currants for jam as well. so yummy!
Thanks Claudia. The red currants were really fiddly to pick. Wanted a few more but lost patience after a while 🙂
Your allotment looks very productive. I’m so with you over the nerdy spreadsheet. Used to do it for the eggs and it was an eye-opener. Never thought of eating the garlic flowers.Squirrel that one away. #hdygg
Thanks Cheryl 🙂 I only learnt about eating the scapes because I saw someone on Instagram had added them to a stir fry. I wish they would all pop up at the same time though, you tend to get a one or two here and there…
A veritable bounty Gemma! Our strawbs have slowed right down sadly, they were doing so well and now they seem deflated.
It doesn’t seem like long since you got the allotment, it’s really encouraging at how much can grow in such a relatively short space of time – you obviously love the allotment.
Cheesy beany pasta? *dribbles* – every time Garner – every time!
Thanks for joining in again sweet (no longer burnt I hope) cheeks x
Thanks! I saw a photo after it was dug over in April and was amazed at how quickly everything has grown since then. Nature is working hard for our tummies 🙂
Oh Gemma, glorious photos. Such a lovely time of year, all of hard work put into the plot is paying off and giving foodie rewards, it is just fantastic!
Thank you Emma. It’s a good time of year – everything is growing so fast at the moment. Lots of promise of delicious things to come. Hope your patch is booming!
Just wonderful how much you’re growing. I really need to put some netting over a strawberry patch behind our rosemary bush as it seems all the little birdies are visiting it before us!
I think we were reading each others posts at the same time tonight Kriss – your comment came in just as I posted mine on yours 🙂 Someones net at the allotment had a blackbird inside last week – bet it had a field day in there!
What a reward for all your hard work. We’ve had bits and pieces from the garden to eat but it is mainly the strawberries at the moment.
It’s amazing how much you’ve grown in such a short time. I remember how brilliant it felt to be harvesting crops in our first allotment year, it really spurs you on doesn’t it?
Like you we’re hanging on a little longer for the first potatoes, I think I might cave today though so we can have some for dinner. That bean recipe has been firmly bookmarked… and I’m loving your spreadsheet neediness 🙂
Yeah for home grown fruit and veg – it makes all the hard work worthwhile. I have thought about recording exactly what I harvest but know I would never do it – I do however know that if the freezers and stores are full, I did OK!
I never realised you had an allotment too – always thought you grew everything in your garden instead!
It’s a fabulous time of year, isn’t it. Your plot looks great! We’ve had a bumper harvest of strawberries too, and all the other berries are not far behind. Have also started harvesting shallots and and peas and the broad beans are just coming on-line now too.
the allotment looks amazing and so many home grown products, I hope the potatoes continue to grow after flowering