Friday was a lovely sunny June day with the temperature reaching a very pleasant 20.9°C and more importantly it was dry for the second day in a row.
On Thursday afternoon I’d gambled on being able to cultivate one of our allotment beds ready to plant out our runner bean plants. It was only possible to cultivate the top few inches of soil which had dried out a bit but lower than that the soil was still very wet and claggy. The tiller dealt with the top few inches of soil pretty well but if the tines were allowed to go any deeper then they just became clogged up with extremely wet soil.
Once tilled and edged the bed looked neat and tidy and the soil looked pretty good belying the fact that a few inches below the surface it was still saturated with water. The bed was covered with weed control fabric which was held down around the edges with wood chippings and four barrowfuls of manure were tipped on the bed to spread out around the runner beans when they were planted to stop the fabric from lifting or blowing about in the wind. This was how the bed looked when we left on Thursday night ready for planting up.
So Friday’s lovely weather allowed us to get our runner beans planted out although I'm not sure what they’ll make of the very wet ground. Normally we grow our runner beans up a wigwam of bamboo canes. This works well even though once the beans reach the top of the wigwam they continue to grow upwards before collapse back down the wigwam. I decided to try to avoid this by planting out our beans in rows this year as seen in the photo below.
I’m not particularly happy with the way this has turned out as the beans have taken up far too much space. Normally when we've grown our runner’s up wigwams we've had space in the centre of the bed for our sweet corn crop but that’s not the case with them planted like this. We did have space to plant a row of Inca berries across the middle of the bed. I think it might be back to wigwams next year.
In the plot greenhouse the tomatoes were provided with some supports in anticipation of the weight of tomatoes they are going to produce. So far they seem to be growing very well and have recovered from any minor set back when they were planted out into their grow bags.
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I think your Runners will be OK. They love moisture, so as long as they get some sunshine soon (optimism...) they will probably thrive. At least you won't need to water them for a while.
ReplyDeleteMy concern Mark is that the soil is not only wet but cold and I don't think they'll appreciate the cold.
DeleteYes the soil is still incredibly cold and wet.
ReplyDeleteI've recently been to Madeira where they grow most veg in the bottom of a furrow to direct water to the plants,but I don't think that system is needed here this year.
Mind you my lettuce and radish seem to be thriving.
Not sure we have anything that is thriving in our wet weather at the moment but time will tell.
DeleteNice work! I always love the look of a freshly tilled and neatly edged bed and how it contracts with a green lawn.
ReplyDeleteThanks Thomas
DeleteIt looks in much better condition than it really is. Our soil is still cold and very soggy just below the surface.
A few years ago when I was still at my cottage a farmer neighbour said to grow them like this however I found the wigwam method did work better for me. Let's see what happens and I do hope they haven't been too affected by the awful rain storms today.
ReplyDeleteI don't think they'll need watering after another wet day.
DeleteThe beans and tomatoes are looking fantastic. The grass edges are beautifully neat and straight, something I really struggle with. Must try harder! I thought I might do cucumber wigwams this year, with just three plants in a small circle. I must have put them out too early because they've gone yellow and not grown at all. Very disappointing.
ReplyDeleteOur outdoor cucumber plants are still in the greenhouse. They're not growing very quickly though. My old battery strimmer converts into an edging mode. Quick and easy for edging the beds on the plot.
Deletethats a lot of work by the look of it, bountiful harvest come September?
ReplyDeleteFingers crossed!
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