Plot July 2005, The summer of the long harvest

The allottment has provided a constant supply of fruit, vegetables, herbs and flowers and this seems likely to increase year after year.
After the destruction last year caused by pigeons to my brassicas, I am using more nets and fleece. Extra tomatoes were planted outdoors as were very weak tomatillo plants raised in clumps from seed harvested last year in the potting shed. They recovered and made sturdy plants but never got as tall as last year. The tomatoes later got blight just as they set fruit. I uprooted and burnt them immediately. Tomatoes raised in the potting shed escaped blight but should have been pinched out a bit more severely.
The picture shows two varietys of broad bean, the taller one is spring planted and the one in the background was over-wintered, both produced huge amounts of beans for several months.
The melons have largely taken care of themselves in the cold fame, which has a newly constucted top of corrugated plastic. I waited for a bright day to hand pollinate the flowers but nature had already taken care of that. I started with eight plants grown from last years seed and only one plant remains. That single plant has taken over the whole of the frame and made attempts to escape. The fruit is later than last year but continues to swell.
The pumpkins developed yellow leaves early on, possibly due to the acidity of the soil heap they are growing in which is last years compost but I pushed drain pipes into it and filled them with chalk. I watered through the pipes until the plants were established.
The white rose bush I grow for Melissa has black spot which was never successfully treated, but the bush produced flowers for cutting. I am very happy with the dahlias, which recovered after being burnt by frost earlier in the year.

You`re thinking of getting an alottment? You say you are, "Up for a bit of quiet digging on a Sunday afternoon?" You`ve had a look around the site, innocently treading onion rot disease from plot to plot and helping yourselves to a generous handful of someones freshly sprayed raspberries ripening in the afternoon sun? Now you think you will stroll down my neatly edged and clipped grass paths and your cheery greeting will be returned as if this allotment is a public footpath. I don`t think so, Get off my lawn you b*gg*r.

A Duel of Delight and Desperation