Autumn, harvesting and getting through some jobs.

Autumn is officially here and I love it. It has always been my favourite time of the year (possibly because it is my birthday in October haha!) even though I will miss the summer, crisp mornings, snuggly evenings, and the smell of bomb fires beats all that heat and blue skies hands down. Having an allotment hasn't changed my mind on that like I thought it might. The fact it now includes squashes and pumpkins, dried beans, apples and seed catalogues just makes it even more wonderful as does the brief spell of sowing and planting to look forward to. Of course it inevitably leads to winter, but we won't think about that just yet....
So what has been happening on the plot as the new season arrived?
We harvested 5 big pumkins and 8 butternut squashes which I am more than happy with. 2 huge carrier bags of dried beans are harvested and stored for the winter. The children enjoyed helping me with the podding so the task I was dreading was a breeze! I also harvested all the maincrop cartots and most of the beetroot to avoid too much slug damage. Both have been a great success. I am hoping they will store ok, although we will probably get through them fairly quickly anyway.

The tip run has finally been done so no more piles of rubbish, yay! We have layed cardboard down in the fruit cage as a final battle against any bindweed. Hopefully we will manage to plant some raspberries and a gooseberry in there this winter and we need it as ready as possible.

We also uncovered the area behind the fruit cage  which is where the fruit trees will go, I have been having some thoughts about this area of the plot but will get back to you on that in another post.........

I have recieved an email to let me know my garlic and over winter onions have been dispatched and it isn't long before I will start sowing the field beans.
Infact, looking at the jobs list, the plot is going to keep us pretty busy until Christmas, I can't wait to see how it looks in the new year.