The Autumn Show

 Every year, our local Horticultural Society has 3 shows - spring, summer and autumn. There are classes for flowers, vegetables, fruit, flower arrangements, arts, crafts, domestic, produce, photography and children, and it is all good fun. The maximum prize is very low, and most first prizes win only 50 pence, so no one enters it for the money, only the bragging rights! Nevertheless, there is fierce local rivalry, and much leg-pulling about the perceived lack of quality in exhibits by one competitor or another. Most people do not grow things specially for the show, but see what they can put in a couple of days beforehand.

I entered a number of classes, and managed wins for my French beans, chard and sweetcorn. We have been eating all of these for weeks now - delicious! The sweetcorn in particular are splendid - extremely sweet, and the cobs are all completely filled. In fact I have blanched and frozen 10 cobs only this morning, and there are more to come.The competitor who came third in the chard wanted to buy my leaves so he could burn them! So we all had a good laugh. It was however somewhat frustrating to have dug the largest potato - 1 1/2 lbs - but to have eaten it prior to the show. The largest potato on show was only 1lb 3oz! Never mind, next year ....   All in all, a busy weekend, but well worth while - it would have been even if I hadn't won anything. Overall, there were 370 entries from 61 competitors, up from only 45 competitors last year, and it was an extremely colourful show, as I hope the photos show.

Harvest time

 I picked my first sweetcorn yesterday, 1 September. Perhaps a few days too early - they still had a bit of growing to do - but absolutely delicious. Each had 15 rows of kernels, and they had all set properly. I did a bit of hand pollinating, which might have helped. I cut off  a few of the top tassels and wiped them over the silks protruding from the cobs lower down a few weeks ago.
Also harvesting beans and courgettes (lots) and chard, cabbage, carrots, beetroot, spring onions and potatoes. This year's hard work has not been in vain!

This shows our 10 000 litre water butt, which is now plumbed in. It has a submersible pump, which (when necessary) feeds the smaller watering stations dotted round the plots. It is also topped up automatically from the mains, and there is also a supply of drinking water, protected by a non-return valve. Well done Alan!! (And not for the first time either. Alan has been responsible for, and has done the work on, most of the improvements made to the site since we started here 2 1/2 years ago.)