Parsnip canker

Pinnacle is supposed to be one of the more canker resistant parsnip varieties but I’ve had it with a vengeance this season. Virtually every root I’ve pulled up has had it to some extent although I have managed to clean a lot of it off with the rough side of a scouring pad if it hasn’t gone too deep. According to Dave Thornton of the NVS it starts as yellow spots on the leaves and then the spores get washed into the growing medium and hence works its way into the root from the crown downwards. The only surefire way to combat it is to grow them under cover so it looks as if I shall have to erect some form of enviromesh barrier in time for next season. Some people suggest that it can be carried on the actual seed casing so I must try and soak them in a fungicide next season also.

I’ve won at Leicester, Seagrave, Sutton Bonington and Sileby but could never have considered showing them at a higher level as I could have last season. Perhaps I just got lucky last season, but I had toyed with the thought of showing parsnips at NVS Branch level this season. Maybe next year?"



My winning set at Sileby.....





...and Seagrave.

A O Veg

I've tried growing butternut squashes for the past couple of years with little success as the fruits have tended to rot and drop off when still small. This year though the plants have gone mad and I got lots of fruits coming. I entered this pair in the 'any other veg' class at Sileby picking up a 1st.

Sileby 2009

13 red cards here but still not enough for most points in show yet again, that honour going to my flower arranging pal Gary Price (with not insubstantial help from his wife Margaret). This show is really going from strength to strength with good support from the local community, so there are no longer what I used to call 'cheap wins' anymore. All classes were pretty well contested and I had to put good stuff in to come out on top. Special mention to Melvyn Hoyes and Steph Green for all their hard work. Mel looked shattered last night but then he is 89!


Pick of my entries was my vase of 3 dec dahlias 'Emma's Coronet' which picked up best floral exhibit.





I also won the 5 ball class for these Mary's Jomanda.





And on another day of spudtastic success I won with these 3 Kestrel also.

Reasons to be cheerful

Things that have gone wrong this past week.....

Spuds suffering through lack of water. Despite staking the foliage is flopping about all over the place

Some parsnips leaves have inexplicably snapped off. It hadn’t been windy…..next door’s football perhaps?

I’ve lost some of my onion sets Red Baron and Setton to white rot.

I’ve got caterpillars crawling all over my brassicas.

Aphids are on everything…..literally. I even found some on my bollocks!

My long carrots are shite.

I’ve lost more Sweet Candle stumps to some wilting disease.

My ‘large’ onions are smaller than my 8oz onions.

I snapped the top off one of my Cederico tomatoes whilst trying to train it horizontally to increase the yield. This obviously isn’t a good idea. I am an arsehole.

My peas already have flowers on them. I don’t want flowers on them yet!

My beetroot germination has been very patchy.

At my allotment in Sileby the owner ploughed through some seed beds with a rotavator!

Something is eating my peppers ....probably a large caterpillar judging by the size of the droppings .....but I cannot find it

But for some strange reason none of these problems get me down.

Carmen

For the second year in a row I took 1st, 2nd and 3rd at Sileby with cucumbers. I have mixed views on this. I don’t really like doing it as I prefer to see different names on each prize card but if you have 3 good exhibits and the show allows it then on the other hand I think why not? I’d only have given them away otherwise. I’ve won my last 3 shows with cu’s and they’re still coming thick and fast. In fact my main problem has been finding enough fleece material to insert between the fruit and the foliage to stop them being marked. The variety is Carmen and is growing direct in my greenhouse border soil that had plenty of well rotted horse muck dug into it in the Spring. I tie it to a cane framework slightly angled so that the fruits hang down and away from the stem which is quite rough and prickly.

Unbeatable?

My tomatoes at Sileby signalled a 5th win this season with the variety Cederico. I won at Littleover the same weekend. I continued with the tactic of thinning out green fruits on the trusses during the summer to give the remaining fruits room to develop a more rounded shape. It seems to pay off although you need a bit of nerve as it seems such a waste at the time.

Salt and vinegar pays off!

I've won a couple of beetroot classes this season proving that my method of soaking overnight (sometimes 2 nights) in water with a dash of vinegar and salt really does work!

Having said that, I've had an awful lot of misshapen roots this season and it's taken a lot more effort digging up enough roots to make a matching set.

Runner beans so so

I really do envy people who can grow high quality runner beans but I guess it’s all down to the attention that you give them. I won at Sileby (pic) and Sutton Bonington but both sets were not of a high class as far as I’m concerned. My problem is that whilst I’m rushing around in the run up to the shows I’m not giving the beans much thought and usually pick them on the morning of the show. You really need to be ‘manipulating’ the best ones on the vine in the days before the show to make sure they hang straight. If they come up against their own foliage they can soon start to bend. You also need to make sure you pick beans regularly to make sure you keep new beans coming. If you leave large, ‘beany’ beans on then the plant may well stop producing new young beans.

Having said all that I’ve just been through my fence today and found 3 of the most perfect beans I’ve ever grown….all about 16” long…… with plenty more coming. And I don’t have a show for 3 weeks. TYPICAL!!!!

Parsnips at Sileby

No one else to compete against in the parsnip class at Sileby but I had a nice set nonetheless. If I'd been judge I'd have gone for these as best in show instead of my leeks. Every single one I've pulled this season has been totally blemish free and a joy to clean up.

I have about 12 stations left to pull a set or two for my last show in 3 weeks at Sturton so if the last few weeks has been anything to go by I should be able to get a cracking exhibit together.

I'm certainly on the lookout for the variety Pinnacle in the catalogues as I will definitely be growing it again next season.

(Snigger!)

I also picked up a bonus win in the ‘funniest veg’ class at Sileby for this twisted carrot although my other entry next to it (the one with the willy!) was making everyone titter more! I suppose the judge assumed it belonged to some dirty old pervert with a childish mind…..and essentially he was right!

Winning onions at Sileby

As you can see not the most uniform onions ever exhibited but in pretty good condition and all about 2 ½ lbs each. Next season I’m going to make sure I have my polytunnel finished so that I can give my onions optimum ‘titivation’. At the moment they are grown in my two greenhouses in the borders but they can get swamped once the tomatoes and cucumbers start to grow, so I lose a few weeks extra growing time. By having them in a line in my polytunnel I can make sure I can construct some sturdy support systems for keeping the foliage growing erect and hopefully exhibit even better specimens this time next year.

Tired but happy

When I first started showing I couldn't understand why most of the top exhibitors would leave straight after the show and not stay for the auction. I know now. After another 2 shows on one day for the second weekend running and another 60 or so entries I'm absolutely shattered! I had another successful weekend however, winning 19 red cards and 4 trophies including 'Best in Show' for these leeks at Sileby. I also won my first ever red card for large onions at Sileby although I do think I was a little lucky as my onions weren't that uniform although they have ripened quite nicely in the past week.

I lost out on 'Most points in Show' by a single point to Mick Mills again. Mick says he's had a disastrous year. God help me when he has a good one! The show has gone from strength to strength since starting up again 2 years ago and attracted over 270 entries, due in no small part to the hard work of Melvyn Hoyes and Stephanie Green. Sadly, and perhaps predictably, my Victoria sandwich was just outside the cards in a class of 4 entries! Looks like the Hairy Bakers haven't got much to worry about there then!

At Littleover I won two of the main awards for the 'Grange Collection' for 3 flowers and 3 sets of 3 vegetables, and the Littleover (Top) Tray award. Having travelled all the way there I received a call from my wife to inform me I needed to put the battery in the camera.....the battery that was still at home! So I'm indebted to Paul Harvey taking a few photos for me which he'll be emailing in the next few days I hope.

I now have a few weeks off from showing until my last show at Sturton in Lincolnshire in October, so I can now do some tidying up in the garden and some walking, starting with a walk in Derbyshire next weekend.

Another busy weekend

I've just got back from staging at Littleover in Derby where I put in 24 entries. It's a lovely little show with very high quality exhibits so any cards here are well earned, especially in the dahlias that are as good as you'll see anywhere. The problem with staging on a Friday night is that you cannot make last minute alterations once you've been able to assess the opposition......for instance moving carrots from the main class onto your Top Tray if you feel they'd have a better chance there, but it's a chance I have to take. My thanks to Brian Eagers for waiting for me to finish and for the coffee!

I'm now just waiting for my Victoria sandwich to cook in the oven for the 'men only' class at Sileby tomorrow (it's a long story!). I'll need to be up early to get some more parsnips and carrots up and washed, as well as a pair of leeks. I also have some corking Kenora Sunset picked and safely stored out of this bloody rain! It's going to be another busy day! And thanks to talking to you lot I've only just remembered my Vickie sandwich....tis a bit scorched around the edges but a bit of icing sugar should mask that!

Dahlias blooming at last

I won two classes at Sutton Bonington after being able to cut my first blooms of the season. I only grow 20 or so plants, 8 each of Jomanda and Kenora Sunset and a few more of Emma's Coronet that is only just starting to colour up.

The vase of Kenora Sunset won best dahlias in show after opening up overnight in my living room. I'm hoping to have plenty more flowers ready for this weekend's shows at Littleover and Sileby.

400 up!

Again not many successes at Sileby on Saturday, but my winning tomatoes signalled my 400th 1st place since I started showing in 1996. It's a very small show in only it's 2nd year after a break of ten or so years, but is going in the right direction with the people involved and will hopefully go from strength to strength.

Apparently many years ago it was a huge event and the whole village would turn out in their Sunday finest. We're a long cry from those heady days and I can only imagine what the local rivalries must have been like and I bet the quality was amazing, especially among the crysanth growers. I only know of a couple of local growers who show chrysanths these days and it seems to have become a bit of a dying art. As usual it was Mick Mills from East Leake who took all the awards at Sileby as he did at Seagrave with his superb 'crissies', pot leeks and potatoes. He's the man to beat as far as I'm concerned.

My '1sts' were for cucumbers, tomatoes, longest runner bean and pot plant. I managed a rather pleasing '2nd' for runner beans and a 3rd for my onions. With only one show left this season my tally of 35 wins so far is going to mean I will finish well down on last year's total of 62.....unless everyone else fails to turn up at Sturton! Having said that in many ways it's been a successful season despite the difficulties as my leeks, parsnips and onions have been my best ever so far. Some of my carrot entries have also been exceptional if lacking in uniformity from time to time. The important

Nearly all over for another season.....

The garden is looking a little sorry for itself as it often does at this time of year. I have tried to tidy up as I go along, but inevitably as I'm rushing around getting everything ready and loaded for the various shows things get left lying around......secateurs, string, canes, cabbage leaves etc.



The wet summer seems a long way away now, and we've had a few weeks of sunshine and fine days........a good job at the moment as we're having an extension built and half of our roof is off! I'm starting to get a few runner beans at last and my cucumbers have been one of the season's success stories. The plants in the greenhouse have gone mad and the foliage is still lush and rampant. My dahlias have been ok but I wonder what size tubers I will get up in the autumn. The plants just sat there for weeks because of the incessant rain in July and only started to grow about the middle of August. A stange thing is that all the blooms seem to be at their optimum in the midweek between shows and have gone over slightly come show day. They don't seem to be holding as long as they used to.



The potatoes have been a total disaster. There's been plenty of small ones for the kitchen but I haven't exhibited a single spud all season. After spending so much money, time and effort on the preparation it was a real heartbreaker to lose them to blight.



But it isn't all doom and gloom. I've displayed my best ever carrots, parsnips, leeks and onions although I haven't picked up as many wins because the competition has been so high. I'd rather get a place in a good contest than a win against far inferior exhibits, and I think it shows that the future of the hobby is good as I'm seeing quite a few new exhibitors on the local scene.



I only have a couple of shows left now....Sileby this Saturday and then Sturton at the beginning of October. In between those two me and Leesa are having a weekend away at Malvern Autum Show where it's the National Championships of the National Vegetable Society. The setting for that show is truly stunning, at the foot of the Malvern Hills and you could spend a fortune on plants and sundries at the hundreds of stalls on the showground. It's well worth a visit and although it gets busy there's plenty of room to move around and it's also a doddle to get in and out of......a far cry from the likes of the NEC, Tatton Park and Chelsea.

Controversy!

I've always said that growing for showing is my hobby and I will never let a judges decision get to me. I've said to my wife that the day that happens is the day I should give it up.

A situation occurred at the weekend that I've come across every now and then that could leave a bad taste in the mouth if I didn't find it so funny. I grow Jomanda dahlias which are technically a 'ball' type, but I have from time to time entered them in the decorative classes. It's taking a chance but at small village shows I believe that you can enter them as a dual purpose bloom. Having said that, if I found that I had been given a NAS card (not as schedule) I would accept it and not bleat about it.

Last Saturday I entered a new show in Sileby that had been restarted after a gap of 10 years by Norman Byatt who had died last week as I have already mentioned in the previous post. I wasn't going to enter originally but felt that I ought to support the dedicated volounteers who had decided to go ahead with the show, and as I had quite a few dahlias I went specifically to enter those. I entered two vases of 3 cactus Kenora Sunset, a vase of 5 Jomanda in the class for poms or ball type and as I had 3 Jomanda spare I put those into the class for 3 'Decs'. A gentleman then approached me and more or less demanded that I remove them from that class as they were technically a ball and shouldn't be in the decorative section. He said that if I won he'd lodge an official complaint as he had entered that class also.

Now, if there's one surefire way of making me not do something then it's insisting that I do, so I decided to leave the vase where it was and let the judge decide. Looking at the competition I didn't think I would win but you never really know.

Anyway, on returning later that afternoon, lo and behold I had won the class in question! (In fact I won all the dahlia classes) And sure enough when the gentleman turned up himself a few minutes later he saw the 'red card' against my vase and went straight to the organisers to lodge his complaint. Like I said these organisers are all volounteers who give up loads of their spare time to help put on these events and when they have to listen to plonkers like him it must make them wonder whether it's worth the effort!

Chill out fella!