To your marks.....

I feel a huge sofa and Guinness shaped void in my life now the Olympics is over. Despite the Scots' early attempt at sabotage it was a total triumph for Britain from start to finish, although getting shite acts Elbow, Emeli Sande and Muse into the closing ceremony spoiled things a bit at the end. Attention now turns to who stands on the podium at our summer and autumn shows! ( I really do shoehorn this shit in sometimes!).


Despite my recent attempts to get tickets at a higher grade of showing I just love the small village or town shows and will always try and enter as many as I can. Anyone who shows and who thinks these aren't worth entering needs his genitals feeding through a mangle and gobbled off at the other side by an Azerbaijani shotputter. I'd been bitten by the bug in the mid-90's after watching Medwyn pulling some parsnips on an episode of Gardener's World and resolved to have a go at the method myself having first witnessed a few sets at the sadly now long defunct Loughborough Show. I well remember pulling my first set of long carrots and parsnips from a couple of hastily prepared drums the next Autumn and proudly (and nervously) taking them to a local village show set in a marquee. The smell inside a hot marquee is a magical one as far as i'm concerned and it was made all the more enjoyable that particular day as I came back to find red tickets against my parsnips and globe beet.

I have hundreds of photos from my early shows which I love looking back on, and it's now plain to me that my early efforts weren't that great compared to what I've been producing recently, mainly thanks to the advice I get from fellow NVS members. However, over the years I've seen plenty of exhibits that were more than worthy of being shown at a much higher level and there is often a healthy level of competition, and you can always learn something new. On Saturday I visited Burbage Show and it was plain to see that the terrible weather has significantly affected exhibits in terms of quality and the quantity tabled. As I had a very irritable Oscar with me I was unable to take any photos, but congratulations to all those growers who managed to get something benched in this most trying of seasons. All being well I will try and enter next season as it's a quality show with most of the top Leicestershire growers competing. The Show has a website;

http://www.burbagegardeningclub.org.uk/

Because Malvern is hosting this year's National Championships the Midland Branch of the NVS moved their Branch Championships as part of last week's Shrewsbury Flower Show, and I'm as pleased as punch that blog follower Marcus Powell had some excellent success including winning the 3x2 class with his entry below, all the more impressive when you consider the likes of John Branham and Andrew Jones were competing.

Just about everybody I've spoken to says that their celery is without question their best looking crop this season which is totally unsurprising as celery is a bog plant in the wild. My celery is starting to bulk up now and I've been persuaded to put a 20" collar on at this late stage as we have some 6 weeks until Malvern, although I may leave a few on 18" collars for Harrogate which is two weeks earlier. Growing each plant in a large bottomless pot sunk into the ground really allows me to concentrate water to the plant's roots and I'm giving them all a good daily drenching. I learned last season that it's nigh-on impossible to overwater celery. I really proud with this row of healthy looking sticks, all standing to attention. The plastic coated twist ties mean I can undo the collars for maintenance purposes very quickly indeed.

The 'Prince' french beans have grown nicely since plating into 12" pots. I will take these into the greenhouse after returning from our holiday in 3 weeks time. It's one less thing for the mother-in-law to have to worry about watering while we're away.

A few days ago I started to get concerned about my parsnips, as the foliage was looking a little yellow and a mildewy type fungus was affecting the stalks. A spray with Maxicrop greened them up again and a new fungicide called Signum appears to have conquered the mildew. I also had a few stump carrots suffering blight (alternaria) and I've used Signum on these too.

Over on allotment diary Dan's pumpkin 'Simon' is 2 feet long and topping 30 pounds, and a fine, handsome beast he is. As Dan says it is half the length of his namesake but only 10% of his weight. Wanker. (Too near the truth for comfort though!)

Getting back to the Olympics my beloved Leesa won an Olympic themed cake compy at her place of work and was presented with a 'gold' certificate in recognition of her achievement. (If only the killjoys hadn't stepped in and spoiled our fun at Malvern!).

As a reward I've decided to buy her a new dress.

Sunday visit to church

I love my veg, but I refuse to be tied down to it. Recently I've been itching to get out walking so despite the 27 degree temperatures I took Leesa out for a leisurely 10 mile hike yesterday. She'd heard me enthusing about the 'Roaches' in Staffordshire and decided she'd like to come and see what all the fuss was about, so I left the veg to fend for itself in the heat, packed the rucksack, donned a ridiculous pair of shorts, laced up the boots and off we went. Leesa likes to walk light.....

...so guess which turnip had to lug the heavy rucksack as usual?

First stop was a 200' long chasm 50' deep in the wooded hillside called 'Lud's Church'. It was much cooler down here and as you can see from the ferns and mosses clinging to the side, sunlight doesn't penetrate much.

I made a new friend along the way!

After some gentle uphill plodding we reached the top at approx. 1660 feet. A young lady kindly took our photo. Always offer to return the favour.....then run off like billyo with their camera!

At the end of the day a deserved pint of Abbot's Ale....

....and half a shandy!

Back on the plot things didn't suffer too much in the heat but I am having to give the onions quite a lot of water to keep them ticking along. I should shade them or lug them outside but to be honest I just can't be bothered, and they seem to be doing very well despite the heat. There's a class in the NVS National Championships for onions over 1kg but smaller than 1.5kg (3.3lbs)so I will try and get a set of 5 for that for a giggle, although they're easily the best i've ever had at this stage of the season and we still haven't reached the longest day yet so who knows what size they'll end up.

I did manage to get the leeks collared on Saturday. This year i'm using these plastic coated twist wires that you cut to your desired length (Dave Thornton gave me a huge bundle of it) and they make the task of collaring and uncollaring the plants on a regular basis much easier than fiddling about with bits of string as i've done previously.

I got all the shallots 'dished', that is the soil removed from around the clump so that each bulb can swell out without any chance of stones or hard lumps halting their progress. I'm still watering them at the moment but will stop this in the next few days with a view to starting to get them ripened off by mid-June. They're all roughly 33mm diameter in the main at the moment. As soon as these are lifted I'll sow some globe beet in their place which should be about right for Malvern or Westminster.

As well as 15 bags of Kestrel (just popping through) I got 10 bags of Amour set out. I was going to do 20 of each but I may well leave it at that now.

My celery plants have continued to grow well and I'll be planting them out over the coming Jubilee weekend. I am having to make sure the pots are thoroughly wet at all times and having the plants in these blue trays means I can pour an inch or more of water to achieve this, celery being bog plants in the wild that don't much care for wilting sunshine.

The long carrots in pipes in the greenhouse are another crop that are suffering in the heatwave, and I think I may have to abandon this idea as an alternative way of growing long roots in future. A few that were growing away ok have just been cooked to a crisp! Getting enough water to them is proving to be problematic, and I think i'm probably only wetting the top few inches but I'm also worried about flooding them. Back to the drawing board.

However, mad mexicans seem to be enjoying this sunshine......

....and the herbs also love it, being mainly of Mediterranean origin. Funnily enough I thought I heard the ghostly voice of Robin Gibb emanating from my herb bed earlier but when I went to investigate it was just the chive talking.

Back to reality!

We had a wonderful break in Tenerife, our first holiday in 26 years without kids! I can highly recommend it! It was however a huge culture shock when you've been used to Greek islands for many years. The Spaniards actually finish building things! Pavements didn't suddenly end in a huge pothole. Everything was neat and tidy. The roads put ours to shame. However, Spanish cooking isn't a patch on Greek cuisine although we ate well enough. I'd never had paella before....and I won't in future. What a disappointment that was! And the Spanish cannot cook fish to save their lives. But we'll definitely be going again.

It was a real culture shock flying into a very windy Manchester Airport last Sunday evening. Not only did I very nearly shit my pants during an extremely turbulent landing but the change in weather from Tenerife made me fear for any progress on the plot. I needn't have worried. My tomatoes in particular have grown off the scale, to the point I probably need to get them planted this weekend rather than at the end of the month. I've never had such strong plants as these before and the roots have already gone right out of the bottoms of the 4" pots.

Elsewhere, my shallots are also looking good, with strong, thick tops that are bigger than I've ever known at this stage of the season. I wonder if the deeper planting has had anything to do with this? I really am hopeful of getting some good bulbs this season and will be spraying with Rovral towards the end of the month to avoid the usual yearly botrytis losses in storage.

All of my stump rooted carrots Sweet Candle are through and will need thinning in a couple of weeks or so. The long carrots are also through but a little on the small side for now, as are the pre-chitted parsnips.

I've had several folk saying to me something along the lines of 'my roots are just sitting there and not growing' and getting quite worried about the fact. Whilst it has been quite cold on occasion recently I do think there is nothing to really worry about, and things will be happening below the surface that you cannot see, so as long as the seedlings look healthy then don't panic. I find that parsnips especially will suddenly take off in June. There's a long way for most of us until show-time. Before I went away I made sure I scattered a few slug pellets on the drum and sand bed surfaces, as snails in particular will happily scrape themselves across a gritty surface for a few carrot seedlings. The snotty trails and empty shells lying around on my return have indicated I was right to do so, especially as I have lost a few onion sets planted outside to the little buggers. It just goes to show that when food is scarce on a cleared plot they will eat anything if they have to, even plants that you wouldn't normally associate with slugs and snails.


Before the holiday I visited Dave Thornton's plot in Derby as he had a few 'goodies' for me that I won't mention by name on here for fear of upsetting those of you who actually want to eat the veg you grow! He gave us a quick tour of his plot and it was reassuring to note that his long carrots and parsnips had only just popped through in many cases. We can all learn from each other, no matter how experienced we are, and when he mentioned that one of his parsnip stations had drawn a blank despite being primed with a chitted seed I said "why don't you place two chitted seeds like I do?" He never said anything but the look on his face told a story along the lines of 'now why didn't I think of that you smug Loughborough bastard!'


One of the things Dave supplied me was an industrial sized bag of seaweed meal which I have been using to top dress where a lot of my leafy crops will be growing.....cabbages, celery, beetroot and leeks. I also chucked a handful in the bottom of each of my spud bags. I'm very scientific as you can see! I managed to get 15 bags of Kestrel done before I went away, leaving them on the floor in my garage, and as yet no shoots have emerged.

These will be put in trenches outside this weekend. The chitted shoots on the Kestrel were 1/2" or so long and therefore ready for planting, but the Amour are still quite small so I'll be leaving those until next weekend. I'm only going to bother with 20 bags of each, as I only need a few dishes this season and I won't be bothering growing any whites at all.

Actually, that last statement isn't strictly true as I am growing some Maris Piper at the request of my wife. These were planted in the ground purely for kitchen use and as a way of breaking up the newly dug ground that i've recently cleared of trees and shrubs.

They'll no doubt have a few slug holes and scab marks but will be perfectly fine for eating, but as I haven't grown spuds in soil for 10+ years it'll mean reacquainting myself with the method of earthing up. I well remember my first forays into showing veg, when I proudly placed my scabby earth grown spuds in a class where there were several plates of spuds that were gleaming in comparison. The concept of growing in bags or pots filled with peat was in its infancy and it took several years for me to work out why I could never get the skin finish on mine, mainly because no-one was forthcoming with the method when I asked them. Thankfully, this need no longer be the case if you join the National Vegetable Society where problems are aired in the online forum and solutions are usually forthcoming within a few hours. There is now a nationwide network of members who are all only too willing to share their growing methods and ideas, all for the measly sum of 19 quid a year!


This is a diagram of how I grow the spuds in bags in the ground...

This weekend as well as planting my tomatoes, I'll also have to get my blanch leeks in which are straining to get out of their pots.

My onions need tidying up and i've started putting bigger ring supports around them to support the leaves. I've made them from some aluminium welding rods that can easily be formed into hoops.

That's pretty much it for now. I'm happy with the way things are progressing and looking forward to entering my 2nd National in September and catching up with friends and 'foes'. As a final thought, John Branham has been our top showman for many years, winning the National Collection class on many occasions. In the individual classes I believe he has won virtually every one at some point or other, but at Llangollen last season he didn't win anything, some new faces coming to the fore for once. But John is still the best and he will be back this season at Malvern I have absolutely no doubt. Manchester City, Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool and Leeds United fans might do well to remember it takes more than one lucky season to achieve true greatness! Manchester United have shown true dignity in congratulating their City counterparts and I shall be showing the same restraint, decorum and etiquette. Now fuck off and stop texting and emailing me you Yorkshire bastards because you're annoying me now!

Sutton Bonington Show 2011

This is my local show and the one I'm most involved with being on the committee and arranging the programme of talks each year, so I like to put in plenty of entries across the range of categories. And believe it or not at 5a.m. yesterday I was to be found in the kitchen cooking! I was determined to get a ticket in the 'men only' rock cakes class, after 11 years of complete an utter failure...not even a third. This year I was armed with a surefire recipe from Ian Simpson and Fiona Shenfield of Scottishland. However, my first attempt went something like this!

Not to be defeated I quickly knocked up another mix and didn't leave them in the oven quite so long this time. The result was a lot better, but I still didn't win anything yet again!. So it appears not only do the Scots send me 2nd rate peas they also send me duff recipes too! To be fair the judge was wavering between mine and another plate for the third place ticket so I really must have been 4th which is as near as I've ever got. There's always next year!

As I say, I put a shedload of entries in each year and my car is absolutely packed to the gunnels, even the passenger seat is loaded with my flower exhibits. I have various contraptions for making sure they are secure for the trip but it's still a very slow journey as I try to ensure none of my dahlias snap during transit.

As for the show I got 21 red cards, mainly in the veg classes, but I also picked up bonus wins with dahlias and cacti. For the 10th time I won most points in show and this year it was television's Midlands Today presenter Dominic Heale who did the honours with the prizegiving. Thoroughly bloody nice chap.

I got best veg for my long carrots which was a very nice change after a few iffy years and I've got plenty of equally good, if not better ones to come. I reckon I may put this one down to seed. And no....before any other tits apart from Unsworth ask those are not my footprints on the fridge!

As usual Leesa managed to construct a superb trug for me. Thankyou my dearest! We even managed to fool the judge by using one of the leeks that had gone to seed and was actually oval in profile section.

This year was the 25th Show and it's a big country fair these days attracting thousands of visitors, so there's plenty to see and do, including the dodgems at which I was particularly skilful and wily. My neck should recover by the end of the week I'm told. Bloody kids came from nowhere!

Sutton Bonington Show 2010

A busy weekend. This is the show I'm most involved with being on the committee, and the one i've been most successful at over the years. It's also a large country show, the horticultural marquee being only a small part of the whole thing, which attracts some 4000 visitors the first Sunday in September each year. A true British tradition.

Yesterday morning and the exhibits start to arrive. My car was absolutely packed to the gunnels and I had to make a couple of trips back to Loughborough.

Inside the marquee there are classes for everyone to have a go at. We had 750+ entries although the veg was slightly down on numbers this year.

I keep the wraps on my carrots, potatoes and beetroot until the last possible moment. At this show I actually act as steward for the veg judges and I'd strongly recommend you do this if you ever get the chance. Following them round you pick up all sorts of tips and pointers as to what they're looking for.

Meanwhile, outside a couple of my fellow committee members are overseeing the hugely important kids' paper plane competition.

As for my performance this year, I got 11 red cards, 11 seconds and 6 thirds which is actually my worst ever result here. I got 1-2-3 in the onions under 1.5lbs.....

.....1st and second in shallots.....

.....and first with the leeks. These were closely pipped for best veg by John Barton's superb parsnips. I think a little pest damage on the leaves went against me.

I got a 1st with my long carrots. These were actually saved from Leicester last week......

......as were my 2nd and 3rd placed stump rooted carrots. The stumps that beat me were absolutely humungous.

I won both potato classes, winning the coloured class with these Blue Belle. I shall definitely be growing this variety again and giving them plenty of TLC.

It's been a few years since I've won with french beans, but I followed up 2nd place at Leicester last week with 1st and 2nd here.

I'm on a roll with Cederico tomatoes. These were all taken from the bottom two trusses and I have some real crackers to come once they ripen. I think I should definitely have a set for Malvern.

The mexican mouse melons caused a lot of interest, and as at Leicester last week we had to put a label on them to stop people coming to the hort. soc. bench and asking what they were.

Lots of big marrows and pumpkins this year, but I saved Ester to grow for another week. She should make her bow at Seagrave on Saturday. If she carries on growing at the pace she is now, I reckon she could outweigh Heidi from last year.

Leesa demanded a mention for her expertise in arranging my winning trug. Brilliantly done as always darling......but she does of course require top quality veg grown to perfection by a master of his art!!!

So for the 9th time in 10 years I won most points in show and collected the trophy from the Mayor of Rushcliffe.

And if I can just give myself a pat on the back, I've been inundated with texts and emails the last few days from several of my show growing pals thanking me for advice given over the last few years as they all won prizes at their own shows. The next best thing after winning yourself is providing winning advice to your pals, so well done to (amongst others) Paul Wlodarczak in Cumbria (cracking parsnips mate), Rob in Solihull, Craig in Ibstock and Paul Bastow and Dan Unsworth at their mutual gay Yorkshire love-in.

http://paulsallotmentblog.blogspot.com/2010/09/dan-cleans-up-at-ingleton.html

Well done one and all.