September Allotment Tour & Harvest 2021 / Homegrown Garden

It's a little windy today and it's a glorious end to September. It's coming to the end of September and it's been such a nice month that we've had sort of continuous sunshine and some rain, but it's been a good stretch. to summer because I didn't really feel like we had much sun, it was a very short season and we didn't get much of this glorious sun and you know, that means that things like the cosmos are now finally blooming and Yes, it's been a wonderful month and I was away during a part. I went to Wales for a while.

North Wales I stayed in Bethesda and took a short trip to Bottom and Garden. It's my birthday and oh my goodness you live nearby. If you've ever been, you'll know what I mean, but it's an incredible national

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, probably the best I've ever been to, and the scale alone was absolutely mind-blowing, like it's set in this valley and it's really really steep and you'll have these huge trees that are planted on top and you'll be standing at the bottom so you'll just be looking at these huge, amazing trees and yes they had some beautiful tropical plants too.

Now I am determined to put some enzettis in my plots and I may have bought a banana for the plot. It will be a few years until I get bananas if that ever happens, but it does happen, yes, anyway, today, if I don't say goodbye, I will show you around as usual and obviously you know we are approaching autumn, now things are in a slightly downward slope. Crops are being

harvest

ed, but there is still a lot to pick and I am going to

harvest

some things. Today I have the last of my sweet corn. I probably have many more berries to pick, including blackberries, raspberries, my apples.

I was a little late picking them up because I was out when I should have been and I'm a little worried that they're all going to fly away at this rate, so I need to get some of those. Well, I'm going to get some trucks, meet me at the door and we'll have some stuff. let's see what happens in September wow oh yeah, I've already started a little on some of my hedges, so one right at the bottom I trimmed so I could see the view of the city line again. I just want to hunker down here in this new frontier where the sedum is in bloom, big big pink pads and the bees have been everywhere and so have the vines, but yeah, I have a lot of sedum, which is great for extending the season of pollinators and a little further down, can you see I can smell it from here?

A huge lily I planted in a container and its color is so bright otherwise the rest of the border is starting to go overboard. now we had some more roses, it's just the greenery that's left, now let's take a look at the plot from here, those cosmos, I think they're my favorite things here right now, it's just changing, I want to take a quick look. Look at my parsnips, I want to see how they're doing, let's take a look and see if I can find one now. Sometimes I get carrot flies that affect both my parsnips and my carrots, but they usually do much better, so I'm just going to scratch around the base and see if I can see any signs of parsnip, so the I sewed in June and there we are, we can see that it's starting to thicken a little bit and again they will do.

They get a lot fatter during the fall months when it rains a lot more and obviously I'm also going to wait until frost because they will taste a lot better after the first frost. My blueberry bush is entering fall. The color and blueberries are one of those plants that even if you don't like the fruit, it's worth growing just as an ornamental because now they have amazing color, reaching down to my red sweet corn and this is a crop that I know is ready and I'm going to harvest what's left now before they start to get too ripe.

I'm not sure how many puppies I have left. Oh, I can see one over there. Look, so let me harvest, there's my corn cobs and this. The double red variety has been a lot of fun to grow because it has really vibrant ears and I thought they wouldn't taste as sweet as the yellow ones, but they still taste great and if I steam them instead of boiling they preserve them. color, ready for this, they look absolutely stunning, just look at it's so gothic, really good for Halloween, look at that color beyond the candy corn we have, oh the sunflowers, look at this one you've been eating for sure. probably rats, squirrels, mice, voles, yes it's most likely the rats, although at least someone is enjoying the seeds, but these hedges are completely covered in blackberries and I've been picking them all month and there are still more to come, the weather has been so good for them, oh.

Raspberries are flying everywhere. I also have a few more to pick up and it looks like all the gold is now here to join the party with Joan J who is the red one. Some of them have gotten a little moldy. It's a shame but it's the apple tree that I really need to pick right now because of this wind and I'm worried they'll all start to fall and rot before I get to them and yes there are quite a few to pick this year maybe not as many as before but look at those big ones oh look what I just saw blooming under the apple tree some lupins how strange the dahlias in this border are now in full bloom just like this cosmos they have had a bit of abuse from these winds lately you may have Seen my recent video where I cut them and I give you lots of tips on how to cut them.

The carrot bed is a bit of a fail this year, my nasturtiums became a bit unruly and covered. I left it for a while, but the seeds, I mean, germinated, but they're not doing very well and I can already tell by some of the dark streaks that the carrot fly has already gotten in, which is not great because I don't I couldn't, I couldn't write them down in time, but it doesn't matter, it's one of those things where you win some and lose some every year right now, if I go back to my seating area where some things are happening, oh, but In actually first I want to talk about this and this was a gift that was given to me earlier this year and it has these beautiful little berries and I keep checking them and they were very hard and not ripe but now they are ripe and they are super super sweet and I actually discovered that the skin is a little tough and a little bitter, so what I usually do is just squeeze the inside into my mouth, it reminds me of um.

Starburst Candy um, it's like a chewy fruit candy if you don't get it wherever you live. Starburst Opal Fruits, you know, yeah, pretty strawberry, a bit like the one in every sentence you get when you were a kid and yeah, just the skin is a little tough. but otherwise very good at the back, my trellis is starting to fill in quite nicely, especially as there is my winter clematis which has grown quite a bit this year so hopefully it will start to fill in there and flower. December January time maybe even February we have some of my tropicals there in the back and oh yeah, in this tub here it was a bargain at work I bought another blueberry um, you know, it has a little bit of I'm sure, but it's well, it just needs a little pruning, maybe a transplant with some fresh compost and I have another blueberry that is fantastic and will also help with pollination of my other plants.

Let's take a look at plot from this end obviously the beds are starting to be cleaned now um the zucchini let's take a look not so many zucchini now I've been oh god this keeps happening you don't visit for a few days and then you look at the monsters oh yeah two there are definitely enough plants, possibly too many just for me and my boyfriend we can't pick them up fast enough and now I have too many here. I actually have my beans and the other day I noticed that some of them are starting to dry out pretty good hello and this is a Greek variety with very large white beans and you know when your beans are ready to be harvested to dry, that's when the skin is They come back brown and crunchy and if you shake them you can hear them rattle inside and you want to pick them up before they start to mold which can happen if it rains a lot but I'm trying to do this one handed oh can I get it?

Last one out, we have five big, beautiful white beans, so that's just the beginning of what will hopefully be a pretty good harvest, so since I've been here, before it rains, I'll harvest what's ready on the side border look at these absolutely huge penn hill dahlia watermelons now this is one that I actually left on the ground and it has led me to a bit of a conundrum yeah so I'm thinking maybe this year I could leave more of my journals on the ground the kind I lift because it's too much work. You know, I have too many journals now and the tubers are getting so big that it's hard to find big enough pots and then if I divide them. so I have more to deal with and it's too much nonsense and I know there are people in Nottingham but they don't put up their dahlias either and it all comes down to the soil really and my soil is pretty free draining and I'm in a pretty sheltered spot so I think this year I might take a chance a little bit, we'll see, maybe I'll change my mind, but we'll see in my pumpkin patch, well the foliage is now starting to die back which means it's almost time to start picking my pumpkin and look, I have a lovely little Turkish turban down here.

I haven't grown this one before, quite a small pumpkin, but it suits me, I actually quite like small pumpkins. I only have one considering I have one plant, a pumpkin, it doesn't seem like that many, but I also have a buttercup and what we have here, this beast, oh, it's the Queensland blue. I'm going to grow quite a bit, it's a good size. happy with that, I have some nuts too and this one is crawling on my little makeshift fence which I'm really glad it actually worked but I might need to hold it up because it's getting pretty heavy and I have another little nut lying around so which Yes, there are a lot of smaller pumpkins this year which, like I said, I actually quite like and oh, I have the bold curry here too disguised by all the nasturtiums.

Well, she fell in my hand, so I guess she's coming home with me now. and down in this bed, the squash still has quite a bit of foliage left and we have a lot of those honey pot squashes and there are at least seven or eight hidden underneath and I also have another buttercup down there I have spinach that has been gone very very well and I think they love this quite wet summer that we've had and it's not screwed which is fantastic and of course all those lovely little daily um not daily. cosmos, I also have some straw flowers there.

I actually haven't grown as many strawflowers this year as last time because, to be honest with you, that whole bed at the bottom next to the shed was too much and I'm a bit fed up with them because I had to keep picking them all the time. time, they were a lot of fun for my projects, but yeah, I definitely wanted more cosmos this year and the double dahlia patch there looks nice, the Wizard of Oz actually looks pretty weird. washed today I wonder if that's the case, I wonder what that has to do with maybe the rain, we had a little rain but they look pretty dull, there's not much pink in them at the moment but the beautiful natal burgundy color is like that .

What we are doing, let's take a look at the polytunnel where things have changed because all the tomatoes are gone because of the pest. By the way, they ripened very well at home and I picked them and also some of my made peppers and chilis. some chutney and I have a special recipe for making chutney coming soon on YouTube. You better watch the video on how I do it but yes there are a lot more chillies coming and my chillies haven't been the best this year and that's mainly because I didn't pot them enough so the crops are quite small , but it's also very cold and not the right temperature for chilies, but I've also had some cayenne and some peppers, which you need. a drink um and I have a few trays of seedlings here that are intended to go outside once they're ready but they've come loose it's like a Japanese green let's see how it tastes good that's the sprout anyway the cabbage tastes just like cabbage and more.

Below we have my new banana that is in the tunnel at the moment because it is very windy out there and this one needs to be planted in a pot because it is seeing well, it no longer fits in its pot and I have a little love for tropical plants in a minute and you know if I ever have my own back

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I would love to surround myself with these and my lemon is doing very well it has recovered now it doesn't have any buds yet. I don't think so, but we might be able to get some in late fall, maybe even winter, if it keeps its foliage long enough, we'll see, and my little lime is doing pretty well too.

I continue to feed them every fortnight and give them citrus to keep them happy. and on the opposite side I replaced my tomato plants with my currants and although they are bearing fruit they are not ready yet because they are still green and turn quite yellow and papery when ripe so we have some fruit on the way that is everything for the polytunnel. Maybe you'll get more salad crops here once they grow a little bigger, plant them, but most of them are nowwill use to get through the winter and maybe a little in the fall. Sowing seeds at the top of my plot is a tree I planted in early spring this year and it didn't do very well because it rusted and is a bit sad, but look, I got my first small fruits from Nottingham Medler . they're pretty small but they're there, this one here is a little bigger and they need to be blessed before they're completely edible so they have to rot a little bit and usually you wait until the frost comes and blackens them a bit. and then the inside gets soft and caramely, but I'm glad I have at least a couple of fruits, so here we are at the end of September at the top of the plot and this is going to look very different next month. oh you can see how I have cropped that headline at the bottom so I can see directly on this beautiful afternoon that the blue sky is absolutely beautiful, make the most of it now that the days are getting shorter, this is my September harvest for

2021

. we have my double red sweet corn, my first little red pumpkin curry of the year.

I have some beans that I already dried. I have a lot more to pick up that are still drying. Some chilies. Some peppers. Obviously, zucchini. I can't leave the patch without some zucchini and some spinach that are behind my head and all these apples and this is probably only a quarter of the apples that I have to harvest. I have more to pick up but I don't have enough boxes and tubs with me today so I'll have to come back tomorrow to pick up the rest, but luckily the wind has died down so they won't fall off the tree and, um, yeah, I really am.

I'm very pleased. , You know? When I think about last year's September harvest, I was surrounded by a lot of food, but you know I had to harvest some things quite early this year, like potatoes and tomatoes, because of the blight. This year has been a bit of a challenge, I think for all of us for a number of different reasons, so no, I'm very happy with this and I still have a lot more to come. I have all those beans, more berries and also the squash and soon it will be bowl planting season. I just ordered my garlic, tulips and spring bulbs for next year, so I'll be planting them in the next few months.

I have a lot of winter projects that I want to start planning how to organize things. You know, I really want to clean the beds and get everything ready for winter and start over in spring because you know everything is going to start to die down a little bit now, but secretly I'm like I really want to put on sweaters and snuggle up at home and browse through the large number of secure catalogs that are being delivered through my door right now. Anyway it's starting to get cold so I better head home with my harvest today so thank you so much for watching I'll see you again very soon take care bye