WHACKING STUFF IN / EMMA'S ALLOTMENT DIARIES/ MAY 2021

Morning guys, welcome back to my allotment diaries. My name is Emma, these are my allotment diaries. I'd love for you to hit the subscribe button below if you are new around here. I put up loads and loads of vlogs just showing you my progress in my allotment and also a little bit in my garden at home and there will be a vlog up soon showing you some of the projects I've been doing in my garden at home so do hit the subscribe button, follow along, watch my videos, see what you think. Sometimes if you're lucky I even answer your comments. Right, I brought some stuff with me today. It's very exciting stuff so I'm going to get straight into it and show you what I brought with me. It's one of those days. You might have guessed these are my cabbages. I think they're cabbages, yeah they are cabbages I think. I'd love to be able to tell you what variety they are but actually I didn't label them and I forgot the seed pack at home so I can't but I might show you now on the screen. That's what variety they are if I manage to find the packet. Here they are. So I grew them from seed, pricked them out and I've got five that sort of survived. I mean I say sort of survived, this is the best looking one and then we've got like that but I'm hoping I can sort of prop him up a bit but they sort of did okay. This one I'm not sure if he survived the journey but you know normally I would wait for them to be a bit bigger before I want to put them out but it's the beginning of May and I just think they need to get out you know so we're going to try and find somewhere to put them in the plot because as usual I haven't got much of a plan with my plot. I sort of know where some things are going to go but other things I don't so I've got to find room for cabbages now somehow. Right zinnias and I want sunflowers in front of there. That's strawberries, that's sort of taken at the moment I can't put anything in there. Got carrots there, got some room here, can't remember what was going to go there. Spinach, squash, chard, stuff like parsnips, a little bit of room there maybe possibly. I've got garlic and then the squash will go in front of that, won't be much room there. This is going to be my three sisters bed, it's going to be sweet corn, courgettes and runner beans. There's my broad beans, that's all flowers and that is miscellaneous. Could they go in the miscellaneous bed? Always create a miscellaneous bed is my advice for extra things you grow that you weren't going to grow that suddenly you grow and then you think where can I put it? This is that bed, that's what the purpose of this bed is but I don't know if that's good enough for cabbages actually. I think over there, I think here, I think here next to the carrots here, two, three, four, five, six, I can get five in there easy. All right I think here, here's a good one with Sally. You'll look after them won't you Sally? Has your hat gone again? Sally will look after the cabbages. Right let's get them out. I'm excited about this, this is one of the first things I've planted outside that I've actually grown from a seed inside that I'm now putting outside. It's very exciting. Cabbages are quite big plants so I need to space them properly. I'm sort of imagining it getting that big, sort of like that big, one, two, three, and then we'll do two like that to make it look good. Yes, whack them in, whack them in. Right here they all are, sitting lovely, all pointing up towards the sun now. I think they're quite happy to be out of their pots to be honest, like most plants. Now I'm going to protect them so I'm thinking I've got to protect them from slugs because they're going to love them and because they're so new and I'm also going to protect straight away against cabbage butterflies because I don't want them laying their eggs on them this year. Last year they did do that to my broccoli and it was an ongoing battle for ages to try and keep the caterpillars at bay and everything so this time I'm going to cover them straight away but first of all slugs and snails. I'm going to do the egg trick again. I think eggs are just such an easy way. We eat so many eggs at home, I'm sure I've said that before, we practically are chickens. Oh no, chickens don't eat their own eggs do they? You know what I mean. Anyway, yeah I've brought loads of eggs with me. I just think it's such an easy way of keeping slugs and snails at bay and I enjoy it as well. So I've got my hammer out. Always a good day when you get your hammer out. I nearly hit myself in the face with it then. Yikes, I've got to calm down Emma. I swear I'm going to have a serious injury on camera soon. It's coming. Someone suggested smacking it while it's still in the bag so I'm going to try that this time. Right last time I don't think I used as many eggs as you're supposed to use, so I'm some of the leaves still got eaten so this time I've gone all out on the eggs. I mean there must be about 15 eggs here. I mean this is like nuclear, this is like a declaration of war really isn't it? That's exactly what this is. No slug and snails getting through that and if it does it probably deserves a bit of lunch to be honest. Right so that's the slugs and snails taken care of and now I'm going to cover them to protect from cabbage fly, no cabbage butterflies. Bloody bug for everything isn't there? Cabbage is done, planted out and protected. Obviously I won't be able to see them for a little while now, they're just going to be under that fleece for a while but hopefully that'll just keep the butterflies away and as soon as they get a bit bigger I'll net them instead. I'll take the fleece off but for now I think I'll just use fleece because that's all I've got really because the zinnias are used in the net and that's to stop old foxy's relatives from digging and the cat and everything so that's part of what being a gardener is isn't it? It's just protecting everything and just trying to keep everything alive. They're not very good at fending for themselves vegetables, they need a lot of help, that's the thing about them. This is supposed to be spinach in here that I sowed ages ago but it doesn't look like spinach. It looks like everything's grown except spinach. It's just like a mass of weeds. I've got a feeling that these little little seeds here with the red stems, I think that is spinach and they are coming up in a bit of a line so yes I think that is spinach but I think I can see some of the weeds now so I'm going to be brave and weed it. Hopefully the spinach will see I'm just trying to protect it and it will sort of respond. I don't know, come on nature help me out today. I should be clear I'm keeping the spinach cupboard covered to stop cats and things from digging in it, not to keep it warm anymore because I think spinach can do with a little bit of cold. I'm not worried about the cold, I'm worried about the cats and fox relatives, relatives of the bloody fox digging it up so that's why I'm covering it. A bird over there, there's two birds. Oh what are they doing? What are they eating guys? Worms probably. They don't eat gladioli bulbs do they? Birds eat gladioli bulbs, I hope not. No I don't think they do, they're too big I think. Oh I have a feeling it's these. These are my calendulas coming up I think. Yeah these are my calendulas, that's a calendula seed. Oh they're coming up, my calendulas are growing. That's brilliant news, I only put them in a couple of weeks ago didn't I? They're all coming up, oh that's exciting so I am going to have calendulas, brilliant. And there's people here and I don't even care, I'm going to tell you this, gladioli, look that's a gladioli coming up, oh my goodness. And there's another one, there's another one, look it's a gladioli. My gladiolis are coming up, this is incredible. I better stop standing on them now. Oh that's exciting, what about my dahlias? Panicky, it's growing still, it's getting bigger since yesterday, it's got bigger, oh I can't believe it. This one, oh look at that. Panic, every time I put bulb in the ground I panic, it's not going to do anything and then they start doing something and I just feel so happy. It's just a miracle every time something grows, it's amazing. I mean literally a miracle on my plot because I'm just whacking it all in, this is just great. The whack it in method works, genuinely. I just jumped up and down, I don't even care because I just feel so blooming happy, I can't believe things are growing, it's so exciting and I was here yesterday and that dahlia is probably twice the size it was and the gladiolis were definitely not up yesterday, so the rain I think has just made everything grow and I knew it would, I knew it would, I could just stay here forever now, I just literally just want to move here now and live in my shed, is that okay to do that? But yeah things are really growing, it's so exciting and I'm just going to come every single day now until November and that's it, that's my life now. So I hope you enjoyed the vlog today, if you did leave me a comment, give me a thumbs up, subscribe to my channel and I will see you in my next vlog. Thanks for watching guys, bye. Morning guys, welcome back to my lotment diaries, my name is Emma, these are my lotment diaries, I'd love for you to hit the subscribe button below if you are new around here, I put up loads and loads of vlogs just showing you my progress in my lotment and also a little bit in my garden at home and there will be a vlog up soon showing you some of the projects I've been doing in my garden at home, so do hit the subscribe button, follow along, watch my videos, see what you think, sometimes if you're lucky I even answer your comments. Right, I brought some stuff with me today, it's very exciting stuff so I'm going to get straight into it and show you what I brought with me, it's one of those days.