Each year there is one meal that is a barometer for whether the allotment year was a good one, or a not so good one, and that meal is Christmas dinner.
How much home grown veg can I get on the Christmas dinner plate?
Well this year, the answer was a very positive 'more than the plate could cope with'... as on top of the roasts (potatoes and parsnips) there were also sprouts, carrots and red cabbage with some swede, cabbage and kale all back in the fridge considered surplus to the meal's requirements, given that there were only three of us partaking this year, due to the ongoing pandemic restrictions.
So, if Christmas dinner gets a good mark, how would I look back and rate the success of my complete allotment year 2020 harvest?
Well here is my veg by veg 'marks out of 10' run down, with anything I have learned from my trials and tribulations from this year, thrown in for future reference.
Beetroot (6/10)
Didn't get too many to germinate but those that did cropped well in raised beds.
Broccoli 4/10
A couple of really good heads but a mystery 'attack' mid season took out all but two of the early tops
Cabbage (red) 10/10
Best ever growing year. I don't sow many but every one survived. The lime and calcified seaweed and effective netting will be repeated next year.
Cabbage (white) 9/10
Ditto red cabbage, just a bit more evidence of slug damage, but still a great harvest.
Carrots 8/10
Grown in raised beds, pots and in the ground and all harvested well. The slugs did like the tops of the raised bed ones though.
Chilli (9/10)
4 plants - over 100 chillies in the freezer - won't need to grow any at all next year
Courgette (7/10)
Grew just about the right amount although not too many marrows this year as they seemed to stay (almost) courgette sized!
Cucumber (10/10)
Again, another best ever year. In the greenhouse and outside the fruit just kept on coming...for four months!
Dwarf (French) beans (8/10)
Only grown in pots and worked pretty well. WIll do that again.
Garlic (5/10)
The wet spring rotted quite a few bulbs but a good '6 months' worth' survived
Kale (9/10)
I've grown too much this year - the 'cut and come again' nature of this plant means fewer kale and more cabbages next year. Have discovered making crispy kale seaweed (below) this year because we have so much - delicious!
Leeks (6/10)
They cropped earlier this year and evidence of 'rust' (orange 'rash' on leaves below) has reduced their size a bit but still a reasonable haul in prospect.
Lettuce (4/10)
A tale of two methods. The growbag lettuce didn't really work (slugs mainly saw to that). The hanging basket lettuces were better...until the sparrows discovered how to get through the netting!
Onion (white and red) 5/10
Grown in the ground, not raised beds. Average harvest, average size so I'd say...average. Ran out by December.
Parsnip (3/10)
Nothing germinated so I had to buy a tray of seedlings from a garden centre. Grew them in the ground and they were stunted and twisted and only 2-3 meals worth survived (one of which was Christmas dinner!). Pictured still in the ground.
Pepper (2/10)
Another disappointment. Grown in the greenhouse, had a couple of small examples but most rotted on the plant before fully grown.
Potato (6/10)
Again a tale of two methods. Those grown in the ground had the annual battle with the bind weed and slugs - the salad potatoes lost that battle but the maincrop were ok. I also grew in small 'potato sacks' unsuccessfully and in a large flower pot very successfully so will do more of that next year (bigger spuds with no slug damage). Ran out of potatoes just after Christmas which was earlier than usual reflecting a smaller harvest.
Purple sprouting broccoli (7/10)
This year's plants are still to be harvested (early spring) but last year's were good and 3 plants are growing for a second year!
Radish (5/10)
Didn't get these right this year. They are easy to grow but I didn't get the succession right so it was all or nothing.
Runner Bean (5/10)
Grew them in the garden but I still seemed to have too many stringy beans. Must learn to pick them when smaller.
Spinach (6/10)
The truth is I have spinach plants where I thought we had sown parsnips. A plentiful crop though.
Spring Onion (0/10)
Did I even mention them during the year's blogging? Well, no, basically they didn't germinate. Disappointing....and no picture - obvs!
Sprouts (10/10)
The disaster of 2019. The triumph of 2020. For success factors - see cabbage.
Squash (8/10)
A first time success and we have more than enough to see us through the 2021 crop.
Swede (8/10)
Can never usually get them to survive the flea beatle attacks, so growing them in the conservatory to get them established and then treating them like a brassica (net, seaweed, lime) worked wonders.
Sweet Potato (5/10)
Another first time success but I must learn to store them better as most of them rotted in the sacks in the garage. I don't think you store them in the same way as normal potatoes. See - we are always learning!
Sweetcorn (1/10)
A bad year. Attacked as seedlings by something in the greenhouse, attacked by peacocks when planted out and then not enough in the soil to grow them on when they were established..before the birds helped themselves. Only had a couple of meals' worth of cobs. Elsewhere on other allotment plots they grew really well though (?). Will try again next year.
Tomato (7/10)
I grew cherry tomatoes in baskets (they always seem to do well) and some old seed in grow bags in the greenhouse and garden patio which also did well. Anything planted in the ground on the plot got bad blight. More positives than negatives though.
So there you have it - a pretty good year all told? Well yes, but if I can't make a success of a year when I'm around every week of the year (because of the Covid-19 virus restrictions) then I would be doing something wrong!
So now to do it all again in 2021...
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