I'M BACK AND LOOK WHAT I GREW! / ALLOTMENT GARDENING FOR BEGINNERS

Hi guys, how are you? How's it going? How you doing? Uh, good morning. Good morning. My name is Emma. These are my allotment diaries. I am back on the allotment plot today, raring to go. So I took about a week and a half off of my allotment plot. I've literally not been here. I don't remember the last time that I wasn't here for that period of time, um, without it being like winter time because over Christmas, obviously I'm not here for like two, three weeks at a time, but in the summer, I don't think I've ever been away from this plot for longer than like four days. So as you can imagine, uh, it doesn't take like a gardening expert to know that if you leave your allotment plot for like a week in the summertime, it's completely different when you come back. It's like, it's not the same plot anymore. And some of it is good and really exciting. Some of it, I'm really sad that I kind of missed. Um, and then some of it's been a complete bloomin' disaster. So just, you know, normal, really just normal allotment plot life. I hope that you've all been well. Um, I just needed to take a break guys. I've been making these videos for four years now. Um, recently I've changed from uploading twice a week to three times a week and it's just like, like burnout is real. Do you know what I mean? And I've just needed to take a little bit of a break from, from the whole thing. Um, and I feel really good for it. I feel great. I feel raring to go. I feel excited. There are so many jobs to be getting on with now and it's just really, really good. So sometimes it's really healthy to take a break and I'm saying that to myself more than you because I rarely take breaks. In this blog, because we haven't seen each other for a week and I haven't seen the plot for a week and a half, it's basically going to be like an end of July tour of the entire plot. I'm just going to take you around everything, show you what's going on, fix things that need fixing, um, and rejoice in things that have actually grown and done really, really well. So I hope you enjoy it. If you do subscribe to my YouTube channel, every subscriber helps, uh, leave me a comment. Let me know what's growing on your plot. If you've had any major disasters, because it will make me feel better when you, when you see my major disasters, um, it will definitely make me feel better to know I'm not the only one and let's start. Should we start, should we start with the shed because we've got bindweed. Look at that in my shed. Unbelievable. It's literally my shed is alive now. And isn't amazing that bindweed will like grow in my shed. Like there's hardly any light in here. It's like, it's just so happy. If you're struggling to grow anything on your allotment plot, just fill it with bindweed. It will grow like no tomorrow. It will fill your plot. There you go. You've grown something. Congratulations. Let's start the front of the plot. Purposely not showing you my pumpkin archway just yet because it's insane. It's insane. Leaving the suspense a little bit longer. So here we are at the front of the plot, which is where the brassicas live. And, uh, yeah, they're doing really good. I mean, I haven't died, so this is all good. As you can see, they're just getting bigger and bigger and bigger. Um, the nets have held up really well. I can't see too much caterpillar damage, though I'm sure there has been some. Um, and yeah, I, I can't see anything in particular happening to them. If you know what I mean, like they're not turning into anything, but at the same time they're not dying. So this is really good. This bed has done really well on the other side, another brassica bed. And when I got here this morning, I could just see these little bits of white and I was like, what on earth is that? And then I thought, oh my goodness, is that cauliflower? So the problem with this and oh, um, if you're new here, you might think that I'm just about to pull this up and be like, yay, cauliflower amazing. But no, this is not how this channel goes. There's always a problem with everything. So you will often hear me say the problem with this is, and then we will elaborate on the problem. Um, and yeah, so let's, let's lift it up. Let's lift it up and then let's elaborate, elaborate on all the problems. Cause there actually is cauliflower. It's actually insane. Now let's talk about the problem with the cauliflower. We have grown cauliflower. As you can see, there is a great big cauliflower in here. You might be able to already see the problem. The problem is that the blooming slugs got to it and I started to nibble it all. And also this is about to like go over and start flowering. So I think it's the same with this one too. Yeah. Though he's might still be edible, but you can see like a few little holes in him where they've got to him. And then this one in here. Yeah. Oh, look caught in the act guys caught in the act. We've got a big one and we've got a little baby one and they're just having a wonderful, wonderful meal. Just loving it. At least you're loving my cauliflower. I mean, is it delicious guys? Could you at least let us know that the problem is I either didn't notice that the cauliflower was starting to develop and therefore didn't protect it in time or it's all grown within a week and a half. It's suddenly created like cauliflower all of a sudden. And then they've just got to it all. But I mean, it is still pretty incredible that there is cauliflower that has actually been grown here from a seed. It's amazing. And obviously these little guys in here agree, right? You can have that one. I'm not moving you. That's disgusting, right? This one I think possibly can be harvested today and we'll just see, see how that one goes. And then this one's really good. And then I've got a couple more around here, but I don't know. I don't know if there's actually cauliflower growing yet. So this one's a little bit behind. Yes, there is. There is cauliflower. There's a little tiny baby cauliflower is still wrapped up in the leaves. Um, I don't really know how to protect the cauliflower from slugs and snails. Like I know how to protect the leaves and stuff, but like the actual middle, when it grows, it just seems to be too late. Do you know what I mean? And also this is almost going over. So if you've never seen a cauliflower produce flowers, the flowers come from here. So these grow up into little weird alien stalk things. Actually, we shouldn't talk about aliens right now, should we? But they grow up into little stalk things and then the flowers shoot up here and come out and they're all yellow and lovely. Um, but that's almost gone over. So that's almost unedible. Well, I say unedible. I mean, I'll eat anything. I mean, not anything. I'm not like a psychopath, but I mean, I'll always eat something that I've grown just to try it. Even if I think it's gone over, it's gone bitter. Um, because that's the point, isn't it? The point of growing it is to eat it. But I say that, but you know, also to take pictures and just to grow it. Right. Anyway, exciting news. We've got cauliflower. So this is brilliant. Okay. This is, this is never going to be bad news. It's very exciting. It looks amazing. I'll disguise it for Instagram. If you follow me on Instagram, you're about to see a perfectly healthy cauliflower being harvested because I'm just going to hide that. Um, and who will know who cares anyway? Right. Okay. Moving on to the most exciting bit. The most exciting bit is the pumpkin archway. Here it is. Look at this. Have you ever seen something so beautiful in your whole life? No, you haven't. Now you have. You've seen my archway. Amazing. Why didn't it grow like this last year? We don't know. I did exactly the same thing and it like nothing grew. And this year I've even got pumpkins. Right. Let's take a closer look. So obviously it's doing really well. Um, but I haven't been here, so I haven't been able to tie it in and make sure it's going the right way. So we do sort of have a bit of stragglers sort of flapping about the place, which we don't really want. And unfortunately some of them have now got pumpkins. So I don't really want to move these sort of stragglers and bend them around in case I snap them. Um, but it's looking very full, very beautiful. As you can see, we've got a few pumpkins. So we've got one up there. We've got one here. Now another problem, here we go. Another problem with the pumpkin arch. These should be pulled through the gaps when they're little. So you see that one over there. I could pull that one through the gap now and he would develop a light on the other side and hang down. He's not. So I'm going to have to cut the wire because you see where he's sitting on it. See where he's sitting on it like that. He's going to start getting marks and he's going to start getting grooves in him and that's going to damage the pumpkin. So we don't want that. So I'm going to have to snip that out, which is a shame. Other side isn't doing as well, but it is still doing good. I mean, I've still got a little Jack B. Little pumpkin here, which is looking absolutely beautiful. You can see that he's really taking shape, the shape of a Jack B. Little pumpkin. He's hanging on really well. This is really nice and thick. He's heavy, but he's very secure. And I haven't tied this on here at all. This is all just the pumpkin clinging on. So anyone asking if these get too heavy, they really don't. It's really going to be okay. Just have trust in the plant. Okay. They know what they're doing. I didn't just grow pumpkins up here though. I actually put French beans and these are starting to grow as well. I've never done this before, but look here, we've got some lovely French beans hanging off the archway too, just up here, which is amazing. Absolutely beautiful. And here as well. So it's just adding a different variety, a different depth to like the pumpkin arch this year. And then over here, I think these ones are particularly pretty sort of hanging down in the middle of the pumpkins. Very, very cool. Love it. And obviously getting absolutely tons of pumpkins growing, which is the point. Amazing. So overall the pumpkin archway is just doing amazing. And I really don't feel like I can take much credit for it because I really just feel like I just did the same as I did last year, but this year it's decided to grow. And last year it just didn't. Plants are like that sometimes, aren't they? Right. We come to our first major disaster, which is, I'm sure you can guess, it's the French bean structure that was very vicariously put together, which is no longer put together at all because now it's broken. Let's see if we can fix this. This is why it's really important to make your structures really strong and secure before the plant starts to grow on it, which is pretty self-explanatory, but when it falls down, it can crush the plants and also the plants can grow funny. And anyway, it's fallen down, so. Sunflower's looking a little bit sad as well. It's given up, given up. Are you giving up? Yeah, I think you've given up. I think maybe you need to come out mate. It's had enough. He's like, no, I don't want duct tape on me. No. I feel weird. I know. So, I mean, they have produced green beans, um, not green beans, French beans. So they've done what I wanted them to do. They've completed their task of life. I've got beans on them. They're looking absolutely fantastic. I will have to harvest some today. They look great. They look great. They've not got as high as they did on the pumpkin archway, but I don't blame them because they spent most of their life on the floor. Um, but they are looking amazing. They're doing really good. They're growing up the string. Obviously you don't need horizontal string for these. I was, I wasn't sure. I thought I might need to put some horizontal ones, but look, they've just gone straight up the string. Really happy. And then in front of them, we whacked in some carrots, didn't we, for Christmas and look, flipping carrots coming up. Can you believe it? Can you believe it? I don't know what I did different or what's happened, but I've actually got carrots growing. And in the middle, these are Swedes and these have actually been munched by slugs and snails. And I'm wondering if they just preferred the Swede and ate that and left the carrots alone, which would be great. I mean, that's, that's, that's the definition of a sacrificial crop. Um, let's get that bindweed off of those ones. Come on, bindweed, carrots. Are you serious? Leave them alone. It's quite messy. My allotment plot. I didn't tidy it before I came. It always looks like this. When I come back from a week or something, I've just left stuff everywhere. Um, but these are my runner beans. Again, this structure is actually held up and it's doing really well. Look how high they've got gone all the way up there. I've never grown anything that tall before. Um, and the runner beans, these ones probably won't taste as good cause they're too big now. Um, the best time to harvest a runner bean is when it's small like this. Um, and then you cook it and then it goes quite nice. It's just nice to eat. These ones can be a little bit stringy and a little bit horrible. Um, I suppose you could just take the beans out and just cook the beans, but if you eat them this small, you can eat the whole thing and they're really delicious. I love this variety cause they've got all the red flowers. Look, the bees are loving it. Bees are so happy. Oh, you're welcome mate. You're welcome. Um, yeah, doing really, really good. That looks so beautiful. I have had one dahlia flower. It's got a couple of buds on it as well. It's this beautiful red one. Unfortunately it's the only one that actually grew, but that's okay because in front we had the beautiful corn flowers, which did amazing. I've actually had over here, one of my gladiolus has started to flower. None of the others, but just this one. And he's a lovely color and he's beautiful. So I'll take that. The, um, sweet pea flowers have gone over. They finished and I'm waiting for these now to collect the seeds. So I'm going to wait for the seed pods to develop and then I'm going to collect the seeds. Oh, is that my friend? The Robin? Oh, nice to know that he's okay. I still haven't chosen a name. I will choose a name by the end of this week. I promise I will name him. I will name that Robin. Um, right. Yeah. So I'm going to collect the seeds on these because these have gone over and now we come to the polytunnel. These looking really good, really healthy. Fantastic. Just brilliant. Um, and then this one here, you can see it's fallen down. It's supposed to be up there like that, you know, and you're just not. Let's have a look at you. You've got some growing on you. That's good news. I don't know what you are. You are looking fantastic. Got some tomatoes. This is a great big kale. He looks amazing. I need to harvest some of this today. And you have also fallen over. Okay. Let's do a bit of fixing up in here. I think. Just a couple of maintenance jobs really today. Um, because obviously what the plot really needs is a good weed and it needs me to come down here and spend an entire day and just basically get it back into ship shape. It shouldn't take too long. Um, because it is just weeds and stuff. Put my headphones in, get my head down and just literally spruce off everything. Other than that, things are looking quite good actually. Um, I just, it's just a couple of things I need to do straight away to make sure that things stay on track. And one of them is releasing that pumpkin that is balanced on the pumpkin archway, because that is just going to die. That is going to die. Um, so I want to save it. Oh, always there. Always a nerve wracking moment when I take out scissors around a pumpkin plant. Do you know what I mean? Right. We freed him. So he's no longer going to be balanced on this. So you can hang down quite nicely now, which is really good. These ones on this side, look like they've lost their way a little bit. You can see they're trailing on the ground and you know, I've built you an arch. I've built you an arch. Ah, sorry bee. Sorry. I'm sorry bee. Jeez Louise. Bees are ruthless. Right. I've built you an archway so that you don't have to sit on the ground with the potholes. You've got the arch, can't you? Problem is that Jappy little's gone over onto the baby boo side. I don't want him there. So I'm going to try and move him. I'm about to witness the death of one of my pumpkins. The cut on that was the suckers and I'm just moving the plant over, you know, just sort of squishing my over to where I want him to be. Just gently manipulating his life choices ever so slightly, like the government. They're tied in at least. I mean, they're not happy with where I put them, but they are where I put them. You know, they have to deal with it. Remember you are the CEO of your plot. You decide who goes where, who gets fired, you know, or so I've got to tell these plants sometimes. If you didn't understand anything that I just did, basically I just scooted this Jappy little over a little bit and then I've tied in this baby boo so that he's got room to climb over the archway. And then I don't know where this baby boo is. So there should be another one here somewhere beneath all of this jungle of stuff. No, he's gone. He's gone missing. This here looks like powdery mildew, which is a very common disease on a pumpkin plant. It's basically like white powdery stuff that comes over the plant. It starts on the leaves and it spreads to all the leaves and then basically it kills the whole plant eventually. But it's not surprising because what causes it is all the plants being so close together, which as you can see, they are. So I'm just going to remove this leaf and if I see it on any more, I'll remove those leaves too, but I'll just, just get rid of the leaf it's on. Oh God. So my last job of the day is going to be to harvest one of these cauliflowers and take it home because I've got to harvest one of them and hopefully it will taste nice. So I'll let you know how it tastes, but I can't leave it when I've grown an actual cauliflower, I can't leave it. So let's choose our victim. I think it's either going to be you or you. I think you. I think you because I think you just look a little bit rounder and a little bit neater. Right, if he doesn't taste good, I don't care. Look at him. He looks amazing. Oh my goodness. An actual cauliflower. Look at the size of it. It's massive. I bet he's got a ton of slugs and snails stuck on him, but wow. He looks amazing. I'm going to take him home. I'm going to cook him anyway. I'm going to try him because he looks incredible and yeah, I'll just have to wash him up and cut the slug bits off. Like I think that's actually a bit of slug or which is lovely. Not really what we want on our food, is it? But once you've given it a wash and stuff, it should be fine. But wow, just that look. I didn't think these were going to turn into anything. And here I am with a live cauliflower. I mean a dead cauliflower now, but a cauliflower, an actual cauliflower. We have to get him, get him washed up and get him home. I think. Cool. I hope you enjoyed this vlog today. I'm going to leave it there just because I'm aware it's going to be quite long and it is sort of supposed to be a bit of a plot tour because I haven't been here for like a week and a half. I thought it'd be quite good just to show you what's been going on and what's changed. As you can see, a lot has changed. So if you're going away from your plot in a week, for a week, two weeks even, you know, be prepared for when you come back, there's going to be a lot of changes. Some things you're going to miss, like I missed the cauliflower and it's sort of got eaten by slugs and you know, some of the pumpkins grew a funny way and stuff, but other stuff has really surprised me and just done well. Like the sweet corn, the runner beans, lots of the flowers growing. I mean, it's looking incredible and yeah, I can't wait to get back here and just start, start gardening again, really, because that's what it's all about. It's just getting stuck in and just doing jobs here and there and just, yeah, you just get into the rhythm of it. So I hope you enjoyed the vlog today. I'm going to do my best to get three up a week in August, but my kids are on some holidays. So it might be a little bit touch and go at times. So if I do miss a couple of uploads, I apologise. I hope you're enjoying them. If you are enjoying these vlogs, please subscribe to them. And I can't wait to show you more of my allotment plot and particularly my pumpkin archway as it develops and grows. Let me know how your plots are going in the comments and I will see you in my next vlog. Thanks for watching guys. Bye.