Happy pickings

 As the nights turn cooler it's time to protect crops at the allotment, so we're now closing the greenhouse doors and windows, and popped a cold frame over the late lettuce - anything to lengthen the cropping season!
This afternoon though was warm enough to potter about in short sleeves - a great day to have just lazed in a garden chair but things needed to be picked.



 A lot of plants are reaching the end of cropping - tomatoes, runner beans, the 'bean' beans - borlotti, cannellini, red kidney - peppers, chillies, courgettes, sweet corn ..... all summer crops that won't survive a frost, so I'm picking them all as fast as I can!

 The sweetcorn has been slow to ripen but has at last! I've also picked some of the cobs as small 'baby corn' for stir fries - these had no chance of developing into larger cobs, and picking them might help the others grow and ripen.

Peppers seem to be the best we've ever grown - we've actually got a surplus right now. Although in a greenhouse, the tomatoes have a touch of blight so I'm now picking green ones before they're affected

cauliflowers have been disappointing though - this one looks good, but is barely bigger than a tennis ball 

 some of the lettuce from the cold frame - I'm pulling odd leaves rather than waiting for a whole 'head'

 courgettes keep coming, though a little slower now - and the weird curled up thing is a cucumber!

Out allotment is at the edge of the plots, next to a hawthorn hedge now turning to suitably autumnal colours, glowing in the afternoon sun.

A Quiet Sunday - perhaps...

After a gap of more than a week, we spent yesterday 'morning' at the allotment - and came home about 4 o'clock laden down with runner beans, tomatoes, courgettes, borlotto/cannellini/kidney beans, apples, pears, rhubarb, raspberries, blackberries, half a dozen plums, peppers, chillies, tiny cabbages and cauliflowers, potatoes, broccoli, radishes, blackberries, raspberries......

 Now I just have to work out some menus for the week to eat it all up!

Picking, picking, picking

 every trip down to the allotment sees something more being harvested. All the onions and garlic are now lifted, and strung up to dry.



Every visit there are more runner beans to pick!

The courgettes are growing faster than we can use them, and now the cucumbers are beginning to crop.





And the tomatoes - again, far too many to use so some are already ending up in the freezer.

For now though, potatoes are only being lifted as needed

Picked earlier this week

It's the time of year when every allotment trip sees us coming home laden down with lots and lots of veg.....
courgettes, white radish, cucumber (first of the season)

 huge box of onions as we decided to lift them all

 runner beans, peas and spinach

 french beans and broccoli

 a smallish cabbage,lifted before it burst







and a mix of blackberries and late raspberries



I forgot though to photograph the tomatoes which have moved rapidly from being a rarity to having too many!

First of the month - August

 the day - and the month - started off sunny, so we briefly went to the allotment and came back with a box of goodies - potatoes, rhubarb, a few raspberries, blackcurrants, gooseberries and even blackberries,

 tomatoes (probably the first of a glut)



french and runner beans

 a handful of peas

 courgettes (definitely well into a glut of these)








Back home for lunch - and the rain came down soaking everything and making the flowers look most bedraggled

 It may only be the first day of August but with blackberries ripening and Michaelmas daisies flowering Autumn seems only just round the corner

Busy Saturday

 Back from the allotment loaded down with all sorts of goodies - two carrier bags of peas, another of broad beans,






two courgettes,

a good handful of cherries





and a few raspberries.

Meanwhile, at home, the first chilli has set

Picked this week - 9th November 2014

Here we are, well into November, and still picking raspberries and tomatoes - even a courgette and some tiny chillies!

Some more seasonal produce too - small cabbage, a reasonably-sized head of broccoli at last, spinach and beetroot.

Carrots being given away at the allotment again, with a couple of late 'summer' turnips and blue winter radish