Sunday 9 August 2009

Harvesting

I have been away on holiday for the major part of July and left Mattias to get on with the allotment on his own. Every now and then a text message would appear on my mobile saying everything was growing really big. I did not really understand how big things could grow in just a few weeks... we now have an abundance of vegetables including some really big courgettes (which are probably to big to be called courgettes and should be referred to as squash or something else).

Then there were the cucumbers which must be the biggest I have ever seen. The long green variation and also a smaller round variation (crystal apple I believe). Funniest thing is that one of the cucumbers had decided to grow straight into the piece of string that is holding the plant up with the result of a very weird looking cucumber. See the picture here...


We are in for a bumber crop of tomatoes, the first ones I harvested today are very sweet and juicy. The 100s & 1000s tomato plant has literally produces 100s & 1000s of tiny little tomatoes that are the size of big blueberries. We have planted so many variations of tomatoes that it is difficult to remember what is what... but one thing is for sure, they are all doing really well.

Other things doing really well included the just under metre high swiss chard... yes, it is growing out of proportion. The purple sprouting broccoli with it first couple of broccoli spears appearing already, the berlotti beans which I harvested some of today and the artichokes are all impressive. I was told that we could not expect any artichokes in the first season having grown them from seed in only 6 months, two of the plants is now producing lovely little artichokes.

One of the sunflowers we planted seems to have taken on monster proportions. Its stem is the size of a human arm in diametre (perhaps we should call it tree trunk) and it is reaching more than 2m above the ground. If it was not for it being so heavy and leaning worse than the leaning tower of Pisa, I would guess that it is even 2.5 m tall... I wonder how big the actual flower will be when it is in blossom...?!

Sad news on the raspberries as the autumn variety have failed to establish themselves on our allotment, however the summer variety is growing really well and are producing some very large sweet and juicy berries.


The Halloween pumpkins we planted to turn into lanterns at the end of October are also growing to enourmous proportions. If they are already larger than a football, then how big will they be by October?
Having now brought home what looks like a bumper crop, it hardly shows on the allotment as there is so much more to harvest over the coming weeks. We will probably enjoy a mostly vegetarian diet over the weeks to come.








3 comments:

  1. And what a lovely vegetarian diet it will be! Enjoy the fruits, or should I say 'vegetables of your love and labour'.

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  2. Great harvest. Isn't it great when you get to eat the fruits (or veg) of your labour?

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  3. It sure is great enjoying the veg of our labour! :)

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