Where my shit's at

There really is nothing like competitive growing to bring out the inner wanker in people, and this is non more personified than in the worlds of giant veg and chilli peppers. I’ve been dipping in and out of various websites and forums devoted to these two aspects of horticultural competitiveness for a few years and they probably have higher percentages of illiterate, whiney tosspots than any walk of life I’ve ever encountered. Reading some of this garbage kept me highly entertained during my recent holiday, especially where it sudDENLY CHANGES INTO CAPITAL LETTERS FOR NO APPARENT FUCKING REASON.

Chief fucktard in the world of oversized and largely inedible vegetables is a twat called Scott Robb from Alaska who has the world record cabbage to his name, and who insists on calling it a sport not a hobby. Gareth Fortey has been running Giantveg.com for several years and does a brilliant job raising the profile of the hobby, but his website and Facebook page are constantly sniped at by this mullet-haired moose-shagger with his constant bleats about rules and regulations over what should or shouldn’t be allowed in weigh-ins. Giant veg should be the easiest of competitions to judge, for if it’s the longest or the heaviest then it wins, it aint rocket science, and indeed it’s why lots of limited growers who were useless at growing proper veg, like Unsworth and Bastow for instance, gave up and converted to trying their hand at ‘giants’. However, not for Scott Robb are cabbages with lots of offshoots, or tomatoes and marrows that have grown from fused fruits on a single stem, for these shouldn’t be allowed to stand in his egotistical opinion. Truth is the twat is just afraid of losing his world record to someone from the Motherland.

In the world of hot chillis the arguments are even more bizarre, with some growers even offering to fight others. For fuck’s sake, a chilli is a chilli is a fucking chilli but there are Facebook groups with thousands of members all trying to outdo each other by developing the hottest chillies that look like my dead grandad’s wizened willy. Recently a chilli pepper called Dragon’s Breath hit the news claiming to be the world’s hottest at 2.1 million Scoville units whatever they are. Quite why anyone would want to eat a chilli so hot it could give you a heart attack is totally beyond me, but someone claimed to be selling them and managed to convince many of the gullible fuckwits to part with 15 quid per plant. This sent some anonymous clown called Ashy Moko to go on a crusade to shame these growers, and he appears to have devoted his recent life to this task and involved university professors and other reputable tradesmen in the process, embarking on an incomprehensible paper and email trail to prove his point. He has hundreds of followers all proclaiming him to be their hero. Jesus H Christ….if you spent 15 quid on an unproven plant, you’re a thick cunt, get over it, file it in the life’s experiences folder and get a life.

Anyhoo, after 5 days away from the plot it’s always a relief to come back and find everything is still ticking over nicely, although there are always one or two issues that need immediate attention. After taking advice from Gareth Cameron on 1 ½ kg onions I decided to cull them at 17 ½”circumference to be on the safe side. This meant at least a couple of them would probably reach this size whilst I was on holiday and I would be relying on the mother-in-law to do the honours, which she was absolutely terrified about. As it transpired however, growth slowed meaning she didn’t have to wield the secateurs and I was able to lift the first one on my return Friday night, with another one following Sunday evening and another one now ready for lifting tonight. I have another 5 or 6 swiftly approaching size so I’m hopeful of staging a set of 5 in the 1-1.5kg class at the National in late September, something I’d never have imagined possible on my white rot infested plot, but thanks to my double pot system I’ve proved to myself there are alternative methods to produce quality veg. Once the bulb reaches the size I require I strip any split skins back and remeasure, leaving it to grow a bit more as you would have undoubtedly reduced the size by the stripping process. Once lifted I cut a long neck which will be reduced after tying, trim all roots flush with the base and give the bulb a good clean to wash off any dirt. When dry they are stored in wooden boxes on coarse sawdust shavings, in my garage with sheets of fleece draped over them to ripen slowly. I don’t bother talcing onions anymore because I always felt a bit gay doing it. Job’s a good’un.

My spuds have been a big disappointment this year, the foliage having struggled for several weeks, suffering from yellowing at first (probably magnesium deficiency) and then dark blotching which has rendered them very messy looking and they haven’t reached a good size at all so I’m not hopeful of there being a decent crop of tubers beneath. Those that I have exposed appear to be riddled with scab so it’s going to be touch and go whether I have any to show this season. I’ve now stopped watering with a view to lifting them in another couple of weeks, although we had a biblical downpour on Friday night, drenching the peat which may in itself present problems for harvesting when you’re trying to get the skin lenticels to close down and the skins to start hardening. Growing spuds in bags is certainly not something I am going to miss when I finish with showing later this year.

My onions for the 250g class are mostly all up now and after topping and tailing as for the large onions they are tipping the scales at just over 250g which should be perfect once prepped for show, as they will lose a few grams in weight. They all look identical at this point but as sure as eggs is eggs they’ll all ripen to different shades of brown and picking a set of 3, 4 or 5 is never as easy as it should be.

My celery are looking healthy despite the usual slug nibbles. One thing I’ve discovered is that Slugclear is a total waste of money and doesn’t appear to work for me so it’s back to a carpet of pellets from now on. With 7 or 8 weeks to show time I just need the plants to bulk out now and it’ll soon be time to switch to a Chempak 8 feed for that process.

Now is the time your French beans should be popping through for the mid and late September shows, as they need 8-9 weeks from showing to showing. I’m going to be growing these in the tunnel where my onions were, but first I’ll need to give the bed a thorough drenching as I’d been allowing it to dry out in order to reduce the chance of botrytis on the onions. The variety that everyone grows is one called Hawkesbury Wonder and I’ve been saving my seed for a few years after Ronnie Jackson kindly gave me some. At all NVS Branch shows this season there is also an extra class for a bean supplied by Marshalls called Satelit with big prize money so I’m also having a go at that one with a view to getting an entry at the Welsh Branch show. Feedback from other growers indicates this is a very fast grower.

My Carmen cucumbers have been struggling to get going in the tunnel,  due to the heat I’m assuming, and I have lost a few to stem rot but they appear to have sorted themselves out now and I am training them up the wires to the tunnel frame where I then train them horizontally. I will pick off all small fruits as soon as I see them as I want a large plant before I allow any fruits to develop further. The idea is for them to hang down from the roof supports away from the foliage so they don’t get scratched. It also makes them easier to manipulate so they are nice and straight, and facilitates the measuring process also. Here is a photo of my tunnel from last year.

In other news there were recently appeals for gardeners to count the amount of butterflies in their gardens. I posted the attached on my Twitter feed.

Somehow the Butterfly Conservation knobs got wind of this and gatecrashed my account. I think they know my position on their fluttery little twats now.

In it to win it (part 2)

Apologies for making this blog invite only, but it had to be done as I was getting so much spam that it was taking too long to wade through each day. Also, I shouldn't be showing up in search engines before too long which should keep certain folk happy. I always found it quite amusing that people complained about my blog so much when there was this perfectly useful little 'X' thingy in the top right hand corner of all computers that could be clicked if you no longer deemed me worthy of screen time.

I took virtually all my big onions down to Westminster. Not that they were that great but after staging I realised I was going to be taking home a fair few quid. This was because I was one of only two entries in both the large onion class and the collection of onions, and although I knew they wouldn't get a 'first' the prize money for coming second was £50 and £40 respectively, so for the sheer effort of bothering to take them I was handsomely rewarded. Some of them were still green underneath despite having been harvested mid-August.

Whilst we enjoyed Westminster Tuesday really is a crap day to hold a veg show meaning at least one day off work but the venue is stunning and as I have intimated there is a fair old wedge of prize money on offer. I've never really understood mid-week shows and I believe it puts the working man at a disadvantage but I suppose each organisation has its reasons, some of them historical. I was contemplating giving Westminster a miss next year but as the entries were down by quite a bit then you do feel a certain responsibility to keep going for the sake of the future of the show. Hopefully I've persuaded a few of you to have a crack next year as there is some good prize money on offer if you are prepared to make the effort. I hope the RHS does a bit more marketing on the Westminster Shows as it would be a shame if the show died through lack of interest. Yes it's a real bind getting veg into the middle of London but if you can then try and car share and by using a website called ParkatMyHouse you can find a local address to leave your vehicle for about a tenner a day. I found a pub about a mile away. If you travel overnight and don't leave until 6pm you also avoid the congestion charge, although sadly not the crazy London traffic. Alternatively the North East Derby DA get a coach load up which certainly takes the stress of driving through London away and I'll be going back to this option next year. If anyone needs advice on entering, getting to and from the venue for future reference then drop me a line.

I grew pot leeks for the first time this season and whilst I virtually neglected them after planting they nevertheless made a reasonable entry at Westminster and won me another first prize, although I was the only entry! Another ten quid. Ker-ching! I shall certainly be growing a few more of these next season, the variety was Cumbrian. I grew some reasonable Pendle blanch leeks last season despite almost total neglect so perhaps there is a theme running here? They were certainly a lot easier to prepare and transport than blanch leeks.

To round up the rest of my Westminster results I got a 3rd for two beautifully conditioned Blyton Belle marrows although one was a bit smaller than the other. Once we get to the end of September they don't grow as fast as they did and I ran out of time to match them up for size. The larger one had actually been cut at the end of August.

A pleasing 3rd in the coloured potato class with Amour. I really wish the judges at Westminster would rearrange the exhibits how they found them rather than slinging them back on the plate from a few yards away!

1st with 15 leaves of chard 'Vulcan'. I have to thank Leesa for choosing the 15 and arranging them.

2nd in the chilli pepper class with Hungarian Hotwax. Leesa chose these too!

3rd for parsnips 'Polar', sadly a variety that is no longer available. Looks like i'm back to square shouldered 'Pinnacle' next year!

3rd for courgettes 'Ambassador'.

1st for lettuce 'Saladin'. I dug the roots up intact, washed off all the soil, wrapped them in damp tissue followed by kitchen foil and the plants stay nice and fresh for the two days of the show no problem.

A very pleasing 3rd for my celery 'Evening Star'. I even beat former National Champion Geoff Butterworth so that has given me a real boost to carry on growing celery despite the fact that we don't eat the bloody stuff! Besides, celery doesn't last too well on the show bench and gets left behind every time.

2nd for french beans 'Prince'. The timing of my sowings were for Malvern so I was really struggling to keep these going and they were a tad 'beany'.

3rd in the 4 dishes class. I had to stage some pretty poor 250g onions in this class or I might have easily got a 2nd. Sherie Plumb won the class.

So that's my final show of the season done and dusted. I'll leave the final word to Medwyn.

Malvern 2012 Part 5

After last year's National at Llangollen I had a cretin-attack and stupidly announced that I intended to put up a large collection at Malvern. Once I looked into the logistics of doing this I quickly came to the conclusion that I just couldn't be f*cking arsed. The amount of metalwork, woodwork, cloth and support stands that I would have needed to take with me would have required the hiring of a van. The sheer effort, expense and time involved in putting up a collection of 6 wasn't viable to me so I quickly abandoned any ambition to do a collection in the future. Fair play to the 5 that did, with Midland Branch Chairman John Branham coming out on top in 'Class 1' this year.

The 5 Branches each put up a display of vegetables where imaginations could run riot. A few years ago these displays were very much like Class 1 except that the 'dishes' of vegetables were donated by several members from that branch. Consequently it looked like two pretty identical classes and the public were confused so an idea for a less fussy, more floral display was put forward and the stands are certainly well liked by the public. I struggled to get photos because of the volume of people admiring them. Winners this year were Midland Branch.....

......but I did like Scottish Branch's display which came 3rd. Being half-Scottish myself (the scottish bits being my hairy back, arse and short stumpy legs) I donated some of my mouse melons to their cause and I think it was probably these that got them elevated up from fourth! I await my share of the prize money!

They say that it's not the winners that make a successful championships but the people who don't win and yet still compete and have a go. If that is true then the success of this year's National Championships is entirely down to me! When I staged my french beans 'Prince' I was hopeful of a ticket but alas this was not to be, although my new lover Marcus Powell did manage a superb 3rd. I was struggling to keep them fresh for Malvern having just missed having them ready for Harrogate so I shall make sure I sow them a week earlier for next year's National at Harrogate when I feel sure I am bound to win. Andrew Jones took the honours at Malvern adding to his win in the parsnip class.

That's just about it now as far as Malvern 2012 goes and I'll leave you with some photos from Mo Robinson's camera. Since she called me a twat across a crowded car par on Saturday morning I feel no shame in nicking her photos. Now i'm turning my attention to the Westminster Show next Tuesday morning. I've entered a whole rook of classes as usual but I already know several won't make it, my cherry tomatoes in particular as Oscar has bloody eaten them all! If you're in the Gainsborough/Lincoln area this Saturday then get along to Sturton-by-Stow's 125th annual show. It's always a good afternoon out and i'm only sorry I'm unable to attend again myself this year. Meanwhile, an interesting university study has shown that 100% of car crashes are a woman's fault. 55% of the time she's driving and the other 45% of the time she's walking down the street dressed provocatively.

Survival

Well now, I've been suffering since Thursday from what I believe is quite simply the most severe case of manflu that has ever been recorded. Today my voice went and meant I was unable to take phone calls from customers. Bliss! Quite how i'm still alive however is a miracle and is testament to my amazing fitness and powers of recovery.....plus a wife who tolerates my pathetic whinings and runs around after me! Along with torrential rain it meant I was unable to do any gardening and I fear certain things may have got away from me as a result. I have one cucumber in the fridge at 17.25" having left it too long on the vine despite my intention not to do so. Due to my weakened state of health I only got around to cutting it on Sunday. The others are straining just over 16" but I doubt they'll catch up as the weather is so cold and miserable.


I've been cutting french beans at 7" since Sunday as I find they start to go beany much after that and I'd rather have a smaller set showing no bean bulge than hope for a longer set that I may never achieve. Quite how certain growers get beanless pods up to 9" is beyond me. Perhaps heated greenhouses? I mentioned this method before of storing beans on the incline with their stalks in a shallow pool of water. Kept in a darkened garage it does seem to keep them in good condition for several days meaning you can pick many beans to give you a lot from which to make your final choice. A word of warning....try and make your final choice at home before travelling when you are less stressed and only take a couple of spares. That way you can just lay them out with confidence at the show knowing they are your best set.

I am still very unsure how my long beet is going to turn out. The recent rains and high winds have absolutely battered the foliage so thank God all tap roots have to be displayed with 3" leaf stalks only. This is the scene that greeted me at lunchtime today.

I'm really looking forward to trying to get the long beets up. Of all the tap roots long beet are the ones most likely to snap and the few that I've grown in the past have often snapped at the 2' mark when I've pulled them a la parsnips and long carrots so I'm going to go to extra lengths to try and extract them complete from the bore holes. I have been advised to sink a bore pipe next to each root and take out a plug of the growing medium. Using a hose pipe I shall try carefully washing the soil from around the root and hopefully it will fall into the hole and come away intact the full depth of the drum. They're not huge shouldered but long beet only need to be about 3" diameter at most to look their best as long as they carry their weight down the root for the first foot or so. I've never exhibited a full dish of long beet before so this one is a totally new one for me if I manage it, which is a tad ambitious as I've only grown two drums of 7!

So at the moment I don't quite know which of my 15+ entries for Malvern will actually make the benches (if any!), but that is no matter because if the weekend is anything like last year's National at Llangollen we'll have a very enjoyable weekend with our NVS friends, swapping tips, ideas, not taking things too seriously and generally ripping the piss out of each other. On the NVS website's members only forum we are having a fruit cake competition and several growers and their wives/girlfriends/hangers-on going to Malvern are entering this most prestigious event of the weekend. Despite a certain amount of bureaucratic red tape that was originally thrown in our path (and which we have decided to ignore and indeed ridicule) the cake-off is still going ahead. There is also a class for a vegetable animal and I have a plan for an animal so lifelike it would fool Bill Oddie. To me this is what being a member of a Society is all about and whilst I would love a ticket of any description in the National Championship classes I am totally looking forward to meeting up with the friends we made last year and making new ones from the many, many people I speak to on the forum all year. One young chap who lives in Ireland is even going to enter next year's championships by sending me his spuds via the postal service to stage for him!

Several growers have used the forum to great effect to win prizes at Branch and National Championships by asking advice over the Winter months and then putting it into practice. I've said in the past that before the internet we would have to get by if any problems arose and then come show time you would be able to ask the winning growers how they achieved their success. Now we can talk to each other all year via the various online forums, emails and texts and quickly resolve any problems you come up against rather than having to wait until showtime. So if you want to improve your produce and you haven't already done so make sure you join the National Vegetable Society where growers are only too willing to help you out! However, one bit of advice i'm never divulging is my prize winning fruit cake method!

I don't like harping on about it.....

..........but this was my 'winning' exhibit in the 'BBC' at Harrogate at the weekend.

I didn't bother with a photocall with Dan or Paul this year after some of you contacted me last year to say that they have the sort of faces that can make an onion cry. In fact, after beating them yet again and each having to hand over ten pound notes to yours truly they both looked as if they'd been ducking for apples in a chip pan.


I scored 44.5 points, including a 17 out of 20 for my celery which at the time I felt was very generous indeed. However, as I'm not exactly a celery expert I still don't quite know what the best attributes the judge is looking for so I may be doing myself a disservice and they could well have been worth 17 points, I just don't know. I guess as long as the judge is consistent then the correct result will always come out on collections and I was gratified to notice that I was only a half point outside the tickets which went down to fourth. It's a good job me, Paul Bastow and Dan entered otherwise there would only have been 5 entries.

I thought my celery was a bit on a small side because when I pulled them up I had to take off a few stalks that had split round the back of the plant where I couldn't see when I uncollar them to tend them, thus reducing the diameter quite a bit. However, they were fresh and clean with no sign of pest damage, definitely no heart rot and no blistering on the concave inside edge of the stalks which I understand is a sure sign of an aged specimen that is past its best. When I returned from Harrogate I made sure I went over the remaining plants, uncollaring them and discarding any split stalks. Hopefully there will enough time for the plants to swell out a bit more before Malvern where I have entered a set of 3. I shall also be using a pair in the 3x2 class at Malvern, although all three pairs in the National Championship version have to be from the 20 pointer veg (celery/potatoes/long beet/large onions/parsnips/leeks and long carrots). This isn't the case at Harrogate where I used 2 stump carrots which are 18 pointers.

It was noticeable that there weren't any very large parsnips anywhere at Harrogate. I don't think the winning ones in the main class would have got a look in in normal years but of course if you're not in it you can't win it so the exhibitors that managed to get an entry benched deserve credit. Having said that I reckon I might have come at least 2nd if I'd bothered to enter the class, as Dave T came 2nd and his parsnips were much smaller than mine were on the collection. I cleaned 4 parsnips for Harrogate, 2 for the 3x2, one for the 6x1 and one for the tap root class, and I was really pleased with the condition although in other years they would have been much bigger to go with it. As it is, it appears everyone has suffered the same problem this season, when they just seemed to stop growing from July. I have quite a few to select from for my set of 5 for Malvern, as well as a pair for the 3x2 class.

I'm really looking forward to having a go in only my 2nd National Championships. Exhibiting a set of 5 parsnips and 3 celery at National level signifies another step up in my development and something I only dreamed about when I first started showing nearly 20 years ago. Constant improvement is always my target and with that in mind I am aiming to try and get a single 5th placed ticket next weekend, seeing as I only won a wooden spoon last year! Even that seemingly modest aim is a huge feat when you start ticking off the names that will be present, so a 5th place is a great achievement. Last season the likes of John Branham, Trevor Last, Gerald Treweek, Jim Pearson, Jim Thompson and Derek Aldred were all out of the winning positions as new names such as David Peel and Owain Roberts made a breakthrough, so they'll be no doubt trying even harder to turn things round at Malvern. Throw in champions past and prsent, Medwyn, Ian Simpson, Ian Stocks, Dave Thornton, Mark Hall, Peter Clark, Jeff Parsons, Mark Roberts, Jim McCartney, Gareth Cameron, Ronnie Jackson, Chris Hewlett, Bob Brown, Graeme Watson, Ray Bassett, Ray Sale, Vin Throup, Allan Young, Ron MacFarlane, Dave Metcalfe as well as the female superstars Sherie Plumb, Helen Vincent and Sue McCall and you can see how much of a tall order it is to get in the tickets.

For Malvern I've got 4 nice cucumbers growing so close together that you can barely get a sheet of paper between them. I need 3 for the class.

I also have an absolute glut of french beans maturing, having grown the plants in large pots and bringing them into the greenhouse for the past three weeks to keep the pods from getting spoiled.



These are both very strongly contested classes so I'll have my work cut out to get near the tickets. For now I'll have to content myself winning the BBC and chugging along with the Deliverance Duo from deepest, darkest Yorkshire. I must admit though that it was a tad embarrassing seeing them get their wallets out and handing over the tenners to me, the worthy victor. I really think we shouldn't have to demean ourselves like this in future contests, so with this in mind I was just wondering boys.......next year, can you not set up some sort of direct debit?

Bummer!

It took me a while but I finally managed to bench a set of runner beans and cucumbers at a high level of showing at Harrogate over the weekend. Whilst I wasn't placed I was very happy with how they looked and they certainly didn't look to be in the wrong company.

My cu's were much bigger than everyone else's but as the only two I had ready I had to go with them. They were 17" long and about 3" diameter.

One of these had been cut 5 days previously, wrapped in clingfilm and stored in the fridge whilst I waited for the other one to catch up. The one cut earlier kept in great condition but the second one didn't quite catch up in length, being about 3/8" short so I would have lost points for uniformity. One also had a strange wiggly line etched into it about an inch long at the flower end which I think was the work of a tiny snail I found when the fruit was quite small, so again I lost points on condition. And I managed to retain the flowers without having to glue them on, although I was convinced this wouldn't be the case as the roads around Harrogate appeared to have many potholes. I managed to hit every one in the dark and I was felt certain they they would be shaken off before I got to the showground. I need a set of 3 for Malvern and have 4 contenders all growing away nicely, about an inch or so different in length, the longest being 14" already. I won't leave the longest to grow so long or so big this time (I'll settle for 16"), so that I have plenty of time to let the others catch up, now that I know the clingfilm trick works nicely.

My runner beans weren't world beaters but Dave Thornton was impressed and said they were a tidy set.

Well done to my chum John Ellis for coming 4th in this class. I'd actually started picking my beans nearly two weeks before the show, storing them at an incline on a pane of glass set in a tray with the stalks only in a puddle of water. You couldn't tell the difference between the ones picked earlier or the day before so that's another important tip to be used in future, my thanks to John Trim for sharing this one. I have entered the National at Malvern but as I'll need 15 beans here that may well be a tall order. I settled at 15" rather than trying to be clever and getting longer beans that were showing signs of being 'beany'. I have quite a few about 12" long on the vines so I hope to start cutting in the next few days.

My french beans 'Prince' are all starting to come at once and this is another class i've entered at the National. I was speaking to former champ Ronnie Jackson over the weekend (he supplied me the seed) and he felt my timing was cock on. What I need to do now is to keep banging the water into the pots so that they don't get a check in growth and start to run to seed i.e. go beany. I won't try to get superlong pods, and think i'll settle at 8", cutting them when they reach length and storing in a similar manner to my runners.

This is the set that won at Harrogate, benched by my pal Paul Wlodarczak.

Paul had a stunningly successful weekend, winning the tap root class and coming a tantalisingly close 2nd in the National Carrot Championships. He let slip that he wasn't intending to show next year due to a prior family commitment. Needless to say he is now very tempted to have a go at Harrogate next year when it stages the National Championships. How can you even begin to think about not doing it next season Paul?

Peter Glazebrook once again broke the record for the heaviest onion at Harrogate, raising the benchmark to a staggering 18lbs 1oz. Peter also won all the other 'giant' classes so he had a very lucrative weekend.

Dan came 3rd in the heaviest marrow class and I was very amused to see that he and Paul Bastow put 'Simon' down on the variety cards. Morecambe and fucking Wise they aint!

I couldn't resist having a quick photocall with my namesake at the breakdown however!

Dan actually spent Sunday continually rolling his tongue back up into his mouth and causing concern to the security guards looking after Carol Vorderman, after he took hundreds of photos of her backside! My only comment is I'd like to see the size of the shoehorn used to get her buttocks into these jodphurs! I've seen less dramatic dead heats in a zeppelin race! I know arse botox injections are all the rage these days but I think she may have overdone it a little!

Millennium misery and Medwyn missives

Whilst the Sun God Helios was paying homage to my magnificent body last week, back in Loughborough we had a hailstorm that made the kids turn up the television very loud as Oscar was frightened. If I'd been at home I would also have been very frightened...for my celery mainly! When I got back in the early hours of Saturday morning to be given this information it didn't immediately register, but on inspection of the plot Saturday afternoon I was horrified to see a lot of damage to the leaves, with many marks, rips and in some cases holes where the hailstone has gone straight through. I spent 30 minutes carefully snipping off any ripped leaflets and with the best part of 4 weeks to go til Malvern hopefully they'll recover a bit by then.

I have huge concerns also with my parsnips. A few growers have reported that growth seemed to stop back in July and mine did to a certain extent when the foliage went a bit yellowy. Now growth has pretty much stopped altogether and much of the foliage has gone brown. I assumed it was red spider but can find no trace so it's another disaster I can only put down to this year's disastrous weather patterns.

I had one very small specimen that was a re-sown station so I decided to pull this one to check on skin finish, and I was delighted to note it was very clean with no sign of carrot fly damage so hopefully the rest will be the same. However, plants don't seem to know whether they are coming or going......I even have a sole wisteria flower. Wisterias flower in May for crying out loud!

We didn't get in back until 3am Saturday morning but I had no chance of a lie in as I judged a small show at 11am in a local church. It was quite a small scale affair and to be honest there wasn't a great deal of quality but it was an enjoyable couple of hours and the organisers made us a decent lunch for our troubles. They told me that entries were well down on previous years, a situation that is being echoed up and down the country.

On Sunday it was my local show at Sutton Bonington and it was nice to be able to enjoy the day as a spectator although I did do my stint on the front desk. Here too entries were down a bit, mainly due to me not entering this year. Although it was a bit strange not being called upon at presentation time to collect a trophy or two I am glad I decided to have a 'gap year' and a few other growers enjoyed their day in the limelight. I even signed up a nine year old boy into the society. His mum said he was mad keen about growing veg to show so I shall be keeping an eye on him over the next few years and mentoring him as much as I can. No doubt he will lose interest during his late teens when he discovers girls but hopefully a spark will be lit that will never go out and he'll return to the hobby when he has his own garden or allotment.

Winner of best veg was my old adversary John Barton with a plate of excellent speckled french beans.

Meanwhile I took a stroll round the showground with Oscar and we put the World to rights.

I emptied out 20 bags of 'Amour' potatoes yesterday evening. I'd cut the haulms off before we went away and stored the bags in the garage to they didn't get wet and the potato skins could set hard. I was very disappointed to uncover a pretty poor crop although I was expecting it as growth had been so poor. If I'd planted in April instead of May I'd probably have done a lot better as the roots would have been down sooner. As it was young plants sat in puddles of water for weeks on end and the die was cast. It just goes to show that Lady Luck plays a part and i'm hoping that another 10 bags planted later as yet still growing will yield me 4 tubers that I need for the Millennium Class at Malvern (4 potatoes/4 tomatoes/4 globe beet/4 stump carrots/4 250g onions). I have set aside a set of 4 but they are a little on the small side but if needs be I will have to go with them. However, as my 250g onions are also on the small side (nearer 190g!) I really don't want to have 2 undersize crops out of my 5 sets if I can avoid it. It might all be academic anyway as I may well struggle to harvest a decent set of globe beet because these too are very small at the moment, and I will only have 50 or so to choose from as I really struggled to get germination during the June deluges. Mother Nature really does have us all by the testacles at the moment and for now she aint letting go.

It is however reassuring to know that even the best are having problems and Medwyn now has a blog that he is regularly updating so I do recommend you have a look-in from time to time.

http://www.medwynsofanglesey.co.uk/blog/

Maybe this year will prove to be the year of female domination. Despite early setbacks I understand Sherie Plumb has returned to form and the Scottish Branch Championships saw success for my friend Helen Vincent with caulis and celery in only her second year of showing, and Sue McCall won blanch leeks at Welsh Branch in only her second ever show I believe, both pretty amazing successes. They make me bloody sick!

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.