Carrot Success

You may remember that I named this year the Year of the Carrot. I've never grown carrots successfully on the allotment yet, I manage to grow round stumpy ones in containers at home, but I really wanted to get some growing at the allotment. I've never even got them to germinate in the past. When we took on the allotment, we inherited an old bath which had been left on our plot, and hubby has put it to good use this year filling it up with old compost and sowing some carrot seed in it. Meanwhile, I sowed some carrot seed in the bed which had been allocated for my root vegetables this year. Well, the biggest success has been the bath. The picture is of carrots which have grown there, all different sizes, shapes and colours as hubby sowed all different kinds, he can't remember which varieties though now. The carrots which I sowed in the ground did grow, so I've had a success of sorts, though because I didn't cover them with fleece, they were decimated by carrot root fly. I'm not too bothered, at least I got them to grow, and I know what to do next year now, though I'll definitely be utilising the bath again.

As I've mentioned before, I'm really pleased with my Tangella tomatoes. They've produced a very good yield and are still cropping now. My Gardener's Delight were very leggy and produced tiny tomatoes early on, but are now giving out some decent sized ones. The San Marzano have suffered from blossom end rot and haven't given one edible tomato yet, though there's some ripening at the moment. I might end up with half a dozen this year. I don't grow a huge amount of tomatoes as I only grow them in my 4X6 greenhouse and have already decided that I'm going to grow some outdoor ones in the garden next year. I was telling hubby's auntie that I want to make some soup and sauces next year, and she kindly popped round with a bag full of tomatoes for me from their allotment. I shall turn these in to soup.

Hurricane Katia was forcast to hit our shores yesterday, and it's certainly given our area a battering. Part of the garage roof over the road from us blew off yesterday and my greenhouse is in bits. Archie, the dog, was frightened on his walk last night as the street lights were out, and temporary road signs were following him down the street being blown by the wind. The rain has started now too and it's being driven by the wind. I haven't been to the allotment so I don't know if there's any damage there, I hope my bean wigwams are still standing.