A wedding one weekend, then a virus laying me low the next weekend – so two weekends without a visit to the allotment.
Big mistake.
I now own a jungle.
Waist high grass, check.
Nettles, check.
Around nine tons of bindweed, double check.
The weeds have grown at a ridiculously alarming rate. I mean it is insane how quickly they have grown. Completely one hundred percent totally batshit crazy. Day of the Triffids level crazy.
So, out came the strimmer. Or, it came out one I had fought my way through to my storage box.
After completely draining the rechargeable battery (and I do mean that literally) and using the remains of some weed control fabric, I at least had access to most of the beds I have tried to plant. One is lost somewhere further back and clearing a path to it is a job for another day.
Top left of the picture is the bed of onions and garlic, still growing well though a significant amount of bindweed needed to be removed to be sure of that. Bottom left, and centre, had all sorts of stuff in it – I think that some of the broccoli may have survived but, other than that, I think it is mostly weeds now.
On the right are two beds and two bags – mostly potatoes but one of the beds had some tulips in it for the brief period they flowered.
The potatoes in the bags have just gone nuts, as have those in the full bed. Pretty sure I planted waaaaaaaaay too many in each. The half bed looks okay but they have all grown a crazy amount.
As I said, the onions and garlic look okay, probably close to being harvestable! The other bed … well I think I could see some broccoli still growing but I think the rest is mostly weeds. A real shame as that is a lot of wasted effort.
But what about the beds I recently dug out at the front of the plot? The ones where all my carefully grown seedlings went? Well …
Looks like a beetroot or two may have survived but the rest is mostly some sort of ‘Spurge’ (either ‘Petty’ or ‘Sun’) according to my ‘Picture This’ app. Along with bindweed, bindweed and more bindweed. Really disheartening after all that work.
After all that bad news, time to end on something a bit more positive. The apple tree.
Little apples everywhere! Hopefully they will continue to grow and stay healthy.
Floating Down The Maran . . . 