Barry Cuff | Voice of the Allotment

The Voice of The Allotment with Barry Cuff

May was a very difficult month on the allotment. Night frosts and nights with very low temperatures, days with below average temperatures and gales and heavy rain.

Only on the 26th were we promised better things to come, with average temperatures and sunshine. We did need the rain as April was exceptionally dry with little or no rainfall. Many plot holders lost plants either from cold nights or buffeting by the strong winds.

Newly planted runner beans, squashes and courgettes are particularly prone to damage as they are rocked back and forth.

The heavy rain also brought out the slugs which were not evident during the dry April. Despite the unseasonal weather our currants had an abundance of flowers, much loved by bumblebees on sunny days. We look forward to a bumper harvest in the Summer.

Much of our planting has been delayed due to the weather; now things are improving we will be planting out sweetcorn, courgettes, squashes, gherkins, French beans and runner beans during the last few days of May and into June.

Our last 3 lines of potatoes (Picasso) were earthed up on the 20th and the earlier rows are putting on good growth. Red and white cabbages were planted out on the 5th, followed by Brendan Brussels sprouts on the 23rd - both rows covered with net cloches to protect them from pigeon damage.

One disappointment this month is our peas. They

were slow to emerge because of the cold conditions and then suffered a bad weevil attack

Barry’s flowering redcurrant was popular with the local bees.

despite being sprayed twice with an insecticide. Two treatments is the maximum permitted dose. In a normal year they would have grown away from the damage. Farmers are having the same problem with crops of field peas and beans. Today (26th) it was great to see a good emergence of Palace parsnip seedlings with very few misses. These were sown on the 27th April. Three to four weeks is normal for parsnips to germinate. June will be a busy month on the plot with maximum sowings and plantings so fingers crossed for good weather.