Harvesting spuds

Today got a chance to go the lottie. I got wrapped up but as soon as I started working I got too hot. The first job I tackled was to tidy up the patio. I had left some brassica stalks to dry out on the patio. I got a couple of bags out of my lottie store and bagged up the remaining stalks. The wheelbarrow was full of Huckleberry plants that I dug up on my last visit. I bagged them too. Next I went to brassicas bed [Bed3] and dug up the remaining cabbage and broccoli plants. I trimmed the leafy bits off into the compost bin. The stalks went to the bags. I have given up on the wormry at the lottie. I shovelled the contents of the wormry into the adjacent compost bin. It was good stuff but very few worms in it. It topped the compost bin up nicely.

The last but most important job was to harvest the last nine rows of spuds. The haulms had died back months ago but the straw like remain marked the rows. I worked along each row. Despite the rain we have had the soil was still quite dry a few inches below the surface. The spuds came out clean. The soil is light and dry so I was able to rifle through the it for the spuds. I put the harvest into trays and the tray in the back of Degsy.

It had started to rain, slowly at first but getting steadily harder. The trays were in Degsy, then I put in the bags of stalks in. They are going in my green recycling bin at home. I put the kettle on whilst I secured everything. The patio area of the lottie looks nice a tidy. The beds are covered in weeds. I have decided to leave it that way for the winter. My idea is that the weeds will hold onto the nutrients. When I prepare the beds in the spring I will put the weeds in the compost bins which will recycle the nutrients. The compost now in the bins will end up in bean and pea trenches next year. I have lots of manure cooking down which, depending how I feel, will be spread over or dug into certain beds over the winter. If the weather is mild I might get a head start of the spring digging.