TESTING SLUG AND SNAIL DEFENCES / EMMA'S ALLOTMENT DIARIES

He's well over him Actually seems to be quite enjoying it Einstein's flying around today like a little ninja bird He just keeps like sort of popping out from behind the tree or behind the bush and then flying into something else He's like sort of surrounding me like some kind of ninja trying not to be seen Every time I catch him out the corner of my eye, it makes me jump because I'm like, oh, what's that? Oh, it's Einstein. He's finally come back. I wonder if he'll come and eat on the table He hasn't been doing that recently and I think it's just that time of year where you don't really have to feed the birds So they don't tend to come down and eat. They've got plenty of food around the place I can hear him. I can hear him clicking away and stuff So maybe we will try and feed him to see if he turns up I just need to give my seedlings a little bit of a water We've had some really really hot weather Over the last couple of days like really sunny, but I wasn't able to get here because it was the weekend So I was sort of out doing house stuff. So I wasn't able to get to my allotment plot. So it's just been Sitting here in the Sun These are the new and improved Jack belittles they haven't germinated yet But I have high hopes for them. Also think in my last vlog I said that some of my Jack belittle plants at home had been eaten and destroyed by slugs and snails I have brought the plants back inside and they are starting to grow new leaves So I do think there's still hope for them I don't think they were I think it's when the middle of the plant is eaten or it's eating right down to the ground Your plants got no chance, but if they've just taken off like one of the leaves and one of the stems Then I think they have a chance of kind of Regenerating like Doctor Who and sort of growing back again, and I think that's what's happening So I have high hopes for the Jack belittles at home Obviously the ones out here that I planted were all eaten by slugs and snails I say obviously because I think we all saw it coming even I saw it coming and I'm the one who planted it outside. So Really stand a chance. I did purchase at last at last. I've got some slug and snail protection I don't know how Effective this is gonna be because I don't think any like any method against slugs and snails is foolproof None of them work a hundred percent But I think it's always good to have something down just to slow them down a little bit And these are my favorite things to use their wall pellets So you put them down around your plant? You have to make quite a big circle and make sure there's no gaps in the circle Then you water them or you wait for it to rain and they kind of merge together a bit like mushy go a bit mushy And then the idea is that the slugs and snails can't slither over it because they don't like the texture Against their slimy bellies or something But also it's got plant feed in these so when they finish working because they don't last forever You know, they will break down and end up in your soil. They will end up feeding your plant as well So these are like my favorite things to use as a barrier. We need to put everywhere We need to put it everywhere today So I'm gonna see how far we can make it stretch I thought it might be quite fun to do a bit of an experiment on a snail and see if it works before we use it so We'll be doing that Sorry about the weather by the way, I don't know why I'm apologizing on behalf of the whole weather in the UK But I feel very responsible for it and it was sunny yesterday and today it's like so cloudy It is a bit warmer though. And I think the plants in the garden will feel that extra warmth It's just that we don't have any Sun so it doesn't look that warm, but it is warm All the berries on this tree are starting to Fruit now, so the birds have got something really nice to eat. This is why I love this tree You see it gives me such beautiful blossom It gives me leaf mulch in the autumn time and then in a summer we get these are they berries or cherries? not sure what the Professional name is. I think they might be called like cherries It's type of cherry tree, but the birds sit here and eat them and they love them. So I love this tree The thing is about the allotment plot is you can never guarantee that things like your trees are going to remain Because technically this is sort of the council's property and they've already just been on my plot and chopped down the other Tree, I didn't even ask them to do that So they must have had like inspectors go round and decide that tree was dangerous and chop it down Which I'm not saying is a bad thing It's a good thing if the tree was dangerous and it was damaged or whatever. It's a good thing that it's gone But they didn't tell me about it. They didn't send me an email So I turned up and they were just literally chopping it down that day So I had to just turn around and go home and that's the thing about the allotment that it's the downside of it I guess is what I'm trying to say is that it's not really yours and you're not completely in control of it And that's what bothers me. It didn't bother me so much when I first got it But I feel like I put so much work into it. I want to have more kind of like autonomy over my space so but I always try to be honest about the allotment plot and the ups and the downs and the highs and the lows and the Good things about having it and the bad things about having it and I will always continue to be honest on this channel And because I don't want anyone taking on an allotment plot Seeing this and being inspired by my channel and then thinking it's like nothing like what I portrayed it as you know And I like oh, it's really hard work or oh, I don't like, you know The fact that I'm not completely in control of it So I always try to be really honest about allotment life as he come down while I was nattering away Can hear the flutter of him? He's been into my sweet peas and then into my potatoes So I don't know what maybe just doesn't like the worms He literally just flew into my sweet peas and disappeared for a minute and I couldn't see him anymore aren't these just Gosh, they're just continuing to flower aren't they stunning and the fact that I've accidentally and this is complete accident color coordinated them To go from purple to sort of the darker pinks is so funny. This was complete accident. I Just sort of whacked them in didn't really know what they were. I mean you saw me do it I just whacked them all in and look It's like it was planned But it wasn't All right, I'm just busy looking for a snail because I want to test out those wall pellets Like they usually they hide under things like boards of wood and a lot of people put boards of wood around their beds on purpose It's a kind of catch To catch all the slugs and snails. There's none under there today. Can you believe that? Can you actually believe that are so convinced? We're gonna find them. Oh, no, there is one. There's one there. There's one, right? We'll go and grab him. Um, but yeah people actually put boards around their beds like this Wait for all the slugs and snails to hide underneath pick up the board and then you've got all your slugs and snails and you Can just remove them from the bed. I don't know what people do with them when they remove them I don't that's up to you really that's you know, how you feel about slugs and snails Right, here's the snail so according to David Attenborough, I need to tell the snail I'm about to pick it up. Otherwise, it can be really scared and go into shock. So you just sort of tap the shell Hello Excuse me, sir I'm just going to pick you up for a little bit, but I promise I'm not a bird and I'm not going to eat you Okay Well, could we maybe not bring all of your sticks today? Is that all right if we don't take your sticks with you? I'll leave your sticks there for you Right you can come back for your sticks. Okay, mate Okay, right. Come on then. I'll bring you right back Look at him seeing the world Yeah, this is the archway all the pumpkins you can eat Yeah, I'm gonna take you into the greenhouse now. There's lots you can eat in here. Oh Yeah, it's getting a full-on tour of the buffet Right, if you just wait down here for me just for one second. That's it, sir Thank you very much, and I'll get these opened. I'm going to do a little experiment for us. Okay Surprisingly, they really do smell of sheep It just reminds me of the countryside and a farm and it's just the most lovely smell and funny That isn't it being wool pellets that they smell like sheep And so the idea is when you put them down you're supposed to get them wet I've got some over there that I've already turned into a mush And I'm going to put down the dry ones and we're going to compare and see which ones deter him more Dry or wet wool pellets, so we'll just put a little You know as if I'm protecting these lettuces, basically, let's bring in Herbert Right, it's your moment to shine Let's see Let's see what he does He's definitely thinking about it. Oh, hang on a second. He's on it Hang on a second. Hang on a second. He seems to be mounting it Yeah, he doesn't seem to be finding any kind of problem with the dry ones, yeah, look he's away look he's over him He's well over him That was easy Right. This stuff here has been here a while. There's actually a dead Cucumber in the middle, but I don't think that's slug damage. I think that's I didn't water it And this has been here a while. It is wet and mushy. It's created more of a sort of mushy barrier. So Right, could you see if you can get over that one please for us? He's really thinking about it Doesn't seem to be having too much of a problem Just taking it all in his stride. Look actually seems to be quite enjoying it right Fantastic old Herbert look at you honestly, I Have named him Herbert by the way, that's why I keep calling him Herbert. Oh, he's loving it It's like a giant pillow for him a big mattress, it's like this is great. It's like a ball pit Doesn't seem to be any resistance at all He does seem to have become a little bit disorientated. I'm not quite sure. That's the point of them He does seem to sort of be doing loops maybe trying to get out of all the wall pellets But I'm pretty sure if there was a nice juicy carrot for him to eat or lettuce or something. He would be straight on that Okay, well that was our little experiment but you know what it's all I've got I use it all the time and we're gonna go Whack it all down anyway, because I feel like I need to do something to help my crops and that might just be all I can Do so despite the fact that every time I try out one of these slug and snail defenses it fails I still use them year after year in my garden and I do find that my crops do better When I put stuff down as opposed to not putting anything down. So maybe these experiments are a little bit flawed I don't know. I don't know I'm not a scientist But I'm still gonna go whack it all down because I believe that when you use defense like wall pellets or eggshells It does help to some degree. So Call me naive It's loving it. I will give him a little lettuce leaf just to say thank you for all his hard work today. There you go, mate Go on you can reach. Oh, sorry Didn't mean to poke your eyes out There you go That's your reward for your hard work we appreciate it Right some of this stuff up the archway has survived quite well It's just the Jack belittles that were all eaten which is a bit annoying. This pumpkin is doing great so you can climb up there I think there's a runner bean here. There's a sweet pea bit rogue, but he's happy and then there's lots of nasturtium Such a shame those Jack belittles got eaten, isn't it? Oh We do still have some of the sunflowers and the cosmos here is getting really bushy So a lot of you said about the bushiness of cosmos Did I pinch them out? I don't think I did I didn't pinch these ones out and these are getting quite bushy I think they just might like the soil around here a little bit better So we've got another sunflower got some cosmos which is starting to flower another sunflower So a lot of it has survived which is quite good I think this is the side of the archway that sort of suffered and I think it might be because we've got this great big Boreage so we've got all of this slugs and snails hiding in here So they're finding it a lot easier to kind of come out at night and eat everything Whereas the other side is a little bit more empty, isn't it? So that could be a reason But I've just found a pack of these in my greenhouse patty pan custard white I think I am growing some patty pans And I'm a little bit concerned that I put them up the archway because I didn't label them like I never do I never label stuff I always just forget and can't be bothered on that little simple step at the end to label it If I have put them at the archway, they will not grow up the archway patty pans Apparently because I I've never successfully grown a patty pan, but I've seen a lot of them I've seen them in other people's gardens allotments on Instagram On Google everywhere and they're more bushy. So they're like a great big bush So if they don't grow up an archway, whereas like a pumpkin is a vine a patty pan is more of a bush So these I will know are patty pans because I don't have any other pumpkins growing. It's let the Jack be littles I'm gonna pop a couple in a pot and We'll just see if we can get some germination Because things in the garden will be harvested and I'll have empty beds and it'll be good to have things to put into the empty Beds like a couple of patty pan plants and that can just kind of take over. So I think that's The plan it's that time of year really where if you if there's something you want to grow Now's the time to do it whack it in whack it in whack it in and because we are fast approaching July Believe it or not. We're fast approaching July and you know what July is all about planting out your autumn winter crops So if there's anything that you want to grow that's more of a summer a summer crop Now's the time to put it in if you haven't done pumpkins yet do them now Otherwise you will find we're going into July and then it's August and then really things haven't got a chance Because you haven't got enough time left You really need to get a wiggle on if you haven't done pumpkins or courgettes or any summer loving things now's the time now's the time All right. Let's do a little bit of harvesting. I've got a few bits here that I can harvest. So definitely some of these salad leaves Which I didn't pick last time I grew And they kind of like went over and they went massive and then I sort of got overwhelmed with them So I really do think I just eat more salad in the summer So I think though it's ambitious and it's possible to grow it in the winter I just sort of don't eat it very much in the winter. I think I'm a salad. I'm a summer salad lover So, you know sticking with the idea of growing what you actually eat I think maybe I should stick to salad in the summer because otherwise the plants just go to waste These have been growing for a little while. These look really good. So they're salad onions They've got like a little bulb at the end and they're really delicious. So let me pick a couple of the bigger ones. I Can make a little salad when I get home These would be really nice. They do taste really nice. They're like spring onions. I mean they are spring onions They're just like a bulb version of it I can't remember what their official name is, but they're a little bit more spicy They've got a little bit more of a kick to them then sort of your your long Spring onions, but I really like them Obviously grabbing a great big bunch of sweet peas because I have to pick them every time I'm down here at the moment I have got so many bunches around my house and I love them and the more you pick the more you get so it's a really good idea to keep picking and also If you see any of these seed heads take them off because that means the plant will stop producing flowers soon It's just trying to make seeds, isn't it? So stop the seeds where you can and you'll get more flowers Look at that bunch how absolutely gorgeous and all of these have got really long stems I thought all my long stems are gone and because the stems do get a bit shorter as the season goes on But no, I've got really long stems Beautiful How gorgeous I got myself a little mini salad and some sweet peas to take home I think next time I come down I'm gonna pick some of those Potatoes my first earlies and just see what's going on under the ground a lot of them have got flowers now And a lot of you are saying to take the flowers off I actually I think they're almost ready to pick so I'm gonna leave the flowers on for the bees because they absolutely love them I'm gonna start slowly picking some potatoes. Don't forget I've got first earlies second earlies and main crop potatoes growing and I can always whack in another set of main crop potatoes So I have potatoes coming out of my ears So I think I'm gonna be potatoed out if I just keep them going for too long Yeah, I'll pull up a couple of those next time and we'll just see what's going on and until then Thank you so much for joining me today. I'll be back on Friday most likely with another vlog I'm gonna go home now straight home put these into water. Hope you're enjoying your allotment plots Hope you're finding these vlogs interesting and helpful and I will see you again when I see you. Thanks for watching guys. Bye