SECOND EARLY POTATOES / ALLOTMENT GARDENING UK

I still recall the first time I saw you, I was so nervous to talk. Morning guys, welcome back to my allotment diaries. My name's Emma, these are the allotment diaries, thank you so much for tuning in. We are going to plant out our second early potatoes today, this is a very exciting day. Sorry, I've got my eyes on my seedlings because I've got so much growing in my greenhouse now, but it all needs the water quite desperately, so that will be the first job. They said that it would be cold today, they said it was dropping to like 9 degrees, 8 degrees. It's actually really warm, which is so annoying, I don't know why the weather people lie. So I've come sort of wrapped up in about four layers and I'm absolutely boiling already. I've literally just walked here and I'm sweating. So I don't know what that's all about. The sun keeps peaking in and out, so hopefully we'll get a bit of sun in this vlog. Anyway, it's all a go at the moment at the allotment plot. I have decided to plant out my second early potatoes now, but these don't have to be planted. These are Charlotte potatoes, they don't have to be planted yet. You can do it in April, you could even do it in May. The difference with the early, second early and main crop is the growing time, the time that it takes to grow. So these take 13 to 15 weeks, the earlies take 10 to 12 weeks, and then the main crop sort of takes four, four and a half months. So it's just about how long it takes for the potatoes to develop. It's not particularly, you don't have to particularly do it in order. Do you know what I mean? Do you see what I mean there? We just seem to do our earlies first, second earlies and then do our main crop a bit later. But if you are ever in doubt of what you should be doing at your allotment plot, a great way of finding out is to look in gardening magazines. And I have spoken about the Readly app quite a few times in this channel. It's an app that I use a lot and I find it incredibly useful. So if you haven't heard of Readly, it's an amazing app where you get access to thousands of magazines and newspapers, loads and loads of different categories to choose from. And there's a fantastic gardening category in there as well. As we know, gardening magazines are a great source of inspiration. And they often tell you what to do each month. So usually at the beginning of most gardening magazines, there's a section of sort of what to do this month in your allotment or in your home garden or in your vegetable patch. And the great thing about Readly is that you can bookmark those pages, those articles, and it appears in your bookmark section in a list so you can access them anytime without having to go through all the magazines again. So that's just one of the great features. You can also download the magazine so that you can access it when you don't have access to the internet. So it will always be available once you've downloaded it in the app on your phone. And also you can favourite your favourite editions of magazines. So when a new edition gets released, it will let you know and you won't miss your favourite edition. And of course you can backdate the editions as well. So I'm talking about, you know, what to do each month. If the magazine isn't out yet and you want to know what to do in June, July, you can backdate magazines and go back to last year because it will be preset of what to do every month. It doesn't change too much, too significantly. If you do want to try out Readly, I have a link and it's in my description and it will give you two months free. So don't take my word for it. Go and click on the link. Try Readly for two months free. If you don't like it, you can cancel. You can cancel at any time, it's super easy, but go and try it for two months. You might as well go and get the two months free and let me know what you think of it because I think it's great. All right, let's go water these seedlings. Gosh, right. Here you go, guys. You know what I really need? A smaller watering can for watering because I can't, oh, that's a bit better. Oh, no. I'm drowning them. I just end up flooding them all. I need a smaller watering can. I can hear you. Come on then. Come on. I can hear you, silly. Right, this is the bed our second early potatoes are going in. The one next to it already has our first earlies, which are nowhere to be seen yet, but we won't panic yet. This bed has had potatoes in it before, but I think a couple of years ago, so it's had a bit of a rest. It's been a brassica bed, so I don't know if that will help the potato situation or not. I know there's a lot to be said for sort of planting, planting the right things after things. I don't know. I think what I'm trying to say is that certain crops that you plant can help the soil in certain ways, making it better to plant certain things after it, but I don't know any of that because I'm not Monty Don and this isn't Gardeners World, but I've sort of heard that before, that certain things you plant sometimes can sort of help the soil, and then it's like, oh, put your peas in next because that did that, but we're not going to worry about any of that. We're just going to whack them in here because this is where I want them to go. It's also a partially shady bed, and I think potatoes do quite well in partial shade. I mean, I've planted them here before, they've done well, so trial and error. These are Charlotte potatoes. They are, like I said, a second early. They're a great salad crop, so salad potato. It says medium, they get to sort of medium, so they're not big, they're not like great big baking potatoes, and they're quite good for sort of salad, potato salads and things. They don't store brilliantly, so it's best to harvest them as and when you need them, not all in one go. Main crop you can harvest all in one go and store them because they store so well. Earlies and second earlies, best to pick as you need them and use them quickly. We're going to do the trench method, same as what we did before. So we're going to do some trenches. Right, here's our trenches. I did three and I did them vertically instead of horizontally. I don't know, it just felt like a change. Unfortunately, the soil in here is not very good. It's quite difficult to dig in, it's quite clayey, so when I squeeze it like that, it doesn't quite, well actually it is coming apart now, but it's not coming apart as easily as the other stuff. It just feels a bit boggy and muddy, but I'm hoping potatoes will be able to break up the soil because sometimes when you plant them, they do help to break up the soil a bit, so. Not everybody agrees with that, by the way. Some people don't think, some people think that's nonsense, maybe it is, I like to think it's true. Right, I haven't chitted these, but they've sort of chitted themselves in the bag, so that's a really good chit. So it chits up and then the roots come out the bottom and all around it, and that's the growth. Right, we can get about five in there. I'm not leaving tonnes of room in between, probably about just under a foot. I think the potatoes will be small anyway, whatever I do, so I might as well cram in as many as I can. Look at that, like some weird scientific experiment gone wrong. Like I'm planting little eggs, so funny, right. So now I'll use the mound just to cover them over halfway, using half of the mound I mean, just so they're covered, and give them a pat down as well, and look at this, little teeny tiny baby potato from where I last had potatoes here, so when you plant potatoes anywhere you will find them for the rest of your life in that bed. Honestly, I find them all over my plot now, all over my plot. So we're just pulling down from this mound that we've made, and what we'll do is when they start to grow and get foliage, we will pull the rest of the mound over them and earth them up, and then that way we'll ensure that the potatoes don't reach the sunlight, and if they reach the sunlight they turn poisonous and you cannot eat them, so we want to make sure they all stay tucked under the ground. Another potato. Right, so here's an interesting experiment, I've just watered this bed here, literally like a second ago, you can see that it's still quite wet, boggy, got a couple of puddles on it. I've also just watered my other bed, and can you see how the soil's a lot darker, a lot nicer, there's no puddles, it seems to have absorbed really well, so it's much better at draining, and that just shows you the difference in the soil. That really just highlights the difference between well draining, like free draining soil, and soil that's like clay, and not very good at draining, and the way that you fix that is to add lots of natural material into your soil, so when you layer it up or mulch it, mulch it with compost, manure, chopped up crops, straw, shredded paper, whatever you can find, and all of that will just help with the structure of the soil, and just making the soil more nutrient rich, but that's why mulching is so important, and I've clearly neglected mulching that bed, but that one's been really heavily mulched, and that's just the difference, and crops, most crops like free draining soil, so the better your soil drains, and the better your soil structure, the better the crops will do, so it's definitely worth taking time to mulch it. Right, that's the second early potatoes in, and that's the sun gone, I don't know where the sun's gone today, but it's decided to go. I think we're going to go round and do a little bit of weeding, I need to check on the broad beans, haven't really checked on these for a while, probably why they're all still alive to be honest. Right, we've got a little bit of problem, but I don't think anything significant, there's a little bit of discolouration on some of the leaves, but it doesn't seem to be affecting the growth, so I'm not going to worry about it, we've got some flowers, I can't see any bugs, that's a really good sign. I've always found that when I plant my broad beans over the autumn winter time, I'm less likely to get a bug problem, I think it's black fly, or black aphids, that seem to consume the plant, but all of my autumn winter sown ones, so when I've literally put tiny plants out, or even just sown a seed, I think we sowed seeds here didn't we, yeah I think we literally put a seed in the ground in the autumn time, I always find you get less of a bug problem, so they seem to be quite healthy, I think what I will do is support them a bit, because they're getting taller now, and it's quite windy, and I don't want them to snap. But we're getting some lovely flowers on them, and the flowers are where the beans come from, so we should get quite a nice harvest out of this, oh my gosh, what are you doing there? He didn't come for his worms today, I think he knows that I'm going to be doing lots of digging, I think he knew I was doing digging today, he's more interested in the real worms. A little bit of discolouration on some of the leaves, can you see that, but not significant enough for me to worry about it, my goodness Einstein, you're right there, my goodness! Yeah, not enough for me to worry about, so we'll just support them today I think. Made me jump Einstein! I'm just doing the same thing I did last time, tying the twine right around like a loop, except this time I'm going a bit further up, it's such an easy way to support them all, and I know not all of them are tall enough yet, but as it gets taller I will just slot it in like that, and then it will all stay supported and hopefully won't snap, like they usually blooming do. I was just about to say, oh I've had it quite lucky with these and not really had any pest damage, but I've just noticed an entire row has been eaten here, and there are a few that have been completely annihilated, I actually can't work out if this is slugs or birds, what do you think it is Einstein? Slugs. Yeah, you need to be more on this Einstein, you could easily protect these for me. Right, I've just filled some of these pots up with some compost from outside, because I don't have a bag of it, but I sort of just feel like, well, this is what I've got, and also, when I pot things up into this, this is the actual soil that the plant will be going into eventually, so maybe that's a good thing, I don't know. But I'm going to pot up some of my kale, because it's just looking very full and busy, and do you know what I just thought? I just thought, oh my gosh, I don't have enough pots for all of these, I don't need all of these bleeding plants, I way over-sowed. These are Cavlonero, and I think they're sort of perennial, I think they come back quite a few times, I don't know if they come back forever, if they're biannual, I don't need that many plants, I probably need about five plants, they also get very big, so where am I going to plant them? Think about it Emma. So we're going to just pot on about five, five are the best ones, that means we've got to be really selective and choosy, which I really don't like being, I want to save all of them you know, but some of them are looking a bit healthier than others. Right, I'm not very good at this guys, it's really not something that I've ever mastered, but I know that you hold it by the leaf, and I've got like a pencil here, that's all I've got, and you sort of wiggle it out, but it's going to come out in a clump, that's the problem. So now what do I do? Now I've got to sort of gently pull them apart, pull two clumps apart maybe, that's probably not the way to do it at all. I think as long as I've got quite a good root system on it, I think it should be okay, and then we just make a hole and stick him in. I absolutely hate this job, I know a lot of people feel the same as me, it's fiddly and it's scary and you just feel like you're going to kill it straight away, but hopefully it will survive in there. Right, he looks really small and vulnerable now. That one looks really strong. Really strong, really good roots. Right, in you go mate, in you go, in you go, in you go. Just tuck him in. He looks a bit stronger. I might have to replace you mate, because I think you're a little bit small. I'm sort of getting all of these from one module, so I don't really know why I've sown so many. I didn't need to, I could have sown literally just one module, but, well, I mean, think of the amount of things I could sow if I just used one module for each thing. My theory of sow a million, get one, is sort of not standing up now, I guess. The next time that I sow in this, I'm literally going to do one crop per square, so like broccoli in one, cauliflower in one, kale in one, Brussels sprouts in one, and then I'm just going to because they seem to be quite happy to grow like this together, and it just means I could get so many more crops from a seed, and I'm sort of quite obsessed with growing stuff from a seed now, because I feel like the greenhouse is changing my life. Yeah, I think we'll do that next time. Anyway, I'll give these a water and put them on the shelf of hope, and hopefully they'll grow. Wow, it's actually getting more miserable now, and windy, and actually quite cold, so this is more like what they said it would be like today, so I will give them that well done. But when I got here this morning, blue sky is really, really warm, so I don't know what that was all about. Anyway, as it's getting so windy and cold, I think I'm going to call it a day there and go home. I hope you've enjoyed today's vlog. Don't forget to check out Readly, and use my link below for two months free. You might as well get the freebie. It's not 20% off, 10% off, it's literally free for two months, and then you can cancel at any time, so if you decide you don't like it, just cancel it straight away. Super easy to do. I will be back again on Sunday with a home diary, or you can catch me here on the Allotment again next Monday, so I will see you when I see you guys. Thanks for watching. Bye!