Plot Lines

I do hope the weather forecast for this week is correct, if it is I’ll have to resume watering in the greenhouse and Polycrub. I was at the Armadale Market on Saturday where it rained almost all day. It wasn’t midgie though and not as windy as forecast (I’m searching for the positives here!)

This week I dug up the Pink Fir Apple potatoes. These are an old French variety, prized by fancy restaurants for their flavour. I wasn’t expecting a great crop after all the rain but they are surprisingly good. Pink Fir Apple are very knobbly so there’s no point trying to peel them, just scrub and boil.

I’m managing to resist the urge to start picking the autumn crops. It helps that the the French beans and courgettes are still growing well. This time last year all the French bean stalks had been bitten through by voles. I know that in theory vole populations go in cycles. There will be a few years where the population slowly builds up, then one year where the numbers explode, followed by population collapse. This appears to be population collapse year, there is an almost eerie absence of voles – what’s happened to them all? The buzzard population must be in sync with the voles too. Last year there were a few buzzards hanging about the croft, this year there’s hardly any. Next year I’m sure I’ll be complaining about voles again. For now it’s very pleasant to be able to plant purple sprouting broccoli for next year and watch it grow rather than see it all eaten by ravenous rodents.

Small – Pink Fir Apple potatoes, French beans, tomatoes, chard or salad leaves, carrots or beetroot and herbs.

Medium – Pink Fir Apple potatoes, carrots or beetroot, mange tout/sugar snaps, courgettes, tomatoes, broccoli, a green cabbage and herbs.

Large – Pink Fir Apple potatoes, carrots or beetroot, French beans, mange tout/sugar snaps, courgettes, tomatoes, kale, salad leaves, onions, a green cabbage and herbs.

I picked so many tomatoes last week, the sunshine really helped to ripen them. There aren’t as many of the cherry tomatoes left now, but there are still plenty of the red and yellow ones. I’m pleased with the new varieties I tried. They don’t have the astonishing sweetness of the little orange ones but they’ve grown well even in this terrible Summer. I would like to find a beefsteak tomato which is productive and can cope if it’s a damp year. I’ve grown lots of big heirloom tomatoes in the past. They do always taste amazing but generally succumb to mildew by September.

Finally after a Summer of struggling to get salad leaves to grow, the chard, mustards and rocket all look nice. I’ve also got pea shoots on the go again. Not something I usually grow in the Autumn but they are perfect for this time of year really. I’ve also started planting Spring greens for picking next year and I’ve sown all the Spring onions. We have so much self seeded kale that I’m not bothering to sow any on purpose! I can always move plants around if they come up in the wrong place.

Our Winter plan involves converting the net tunnel into a polytunnel. We were going to cover it in polycarbonate but that was looking quite pricey so we’ve come up with a cheaper option using a lot stuff we already have lying about the croft. The net tunnel has been less weedy and more productive this year, it’s a great space for Winter growing but as our weather seems to be getting wetter and more unpredictable it makes sense to grow more undercover where the environment is more consistent. Our new polytunnel plan involves having permanent sides to the structure and a removable plastic cover over the top. The net tunnel has a good mixed hedge as a windbreak, but one corner sticks out into the windiest bit on our croft.

This week’s Croft Shares will have:

Small – courgettes, French beans, kale, tomatoes and salad leaves or chard.

Medium – courgettes, French beans, sugar snaps, broad beans, potatoes, tomatoes and broccoli.

Large – courgettes, French beans, kale, sugar snaps, potatoes, tomatoes, broccoli, salad leaves, chard/spinach and onions.

The potatoes this week are Cara or Picasso. They look almost identical and are both multi purpose potatoes. We had some roast Picassos and they were very tasty.

Wow! What was that strange glowing orb in the sky on Saturday? What was that strange feeling of warmth in the air? I don’t suppose anyone has ever been so pleased to see the sun as the residents of Skye in 2024. This better spell should give all the veg plants a nice boost. The forecast is good again for next weekend. Sunday was a bit of a midgie fest so that made potato digging less than pleasant. I almost resorted to cutting eye holes in an old snood and wearing that as defence against the tiny biters.

The maincrop spuds have been affected by all the rain, some have a lot of slug damage but there’s still enough to go around. This week we have red potatoes, either Caledonian Rose, Alouette or Rooster. We won’t bother doing Alouette or Rooster again but Caledonian Rose was worth while. Caledonian Rose makes really good mash, it would probably make good roasties too. Alouette and Rooster are multi purpose, they both taste nice but the yield isn’t great.

Somehow despite the grey Summer I have successfully grown…an aubergine! I have a few plants purely as an experiment. They’ve grown surprisingly well, I planted them in the hottest, driest part of the greenhouse and we have a few little fruit now. I figure if they taste nice then it’s worth doing again with more plants.

In September veg starts to take an Autumnal turn although there should be a few more weeks of tomatoes, French beans and courgettes. I’ve some mange tout that was planted late for some September crunch.

This week’s Croft Shares will have –

Small – potatoes, French beans, broccoli, tomatoes and a green cabbage.

Medium – potatoes, French beans, chard, tomatoes, a green cabbage, courgettes and sugar snaps/mange tout.

Large – potatoes, French beans, broccoli, tomatoes, a green cabbage, courgettes, sugar snaps/mange tout, onions, kale and salad leaves.

The croft is not looking it’s best at the moment. There’s quite a lot of mud and the rain has halted mowing and strimming so the grass has got pretty long. The weather forecast seems to be toying with us, it keeps predicting sunshine in a weeks time, then the prediction slowly changes to the usual wet and windy. I really hope that very wet Summers aren’t what climate change has in store for Skye.

I’ve had a good look at all the Autumn veg. The leeks are still on the small side, but do look very nice. The cabbages and sprouts have been slowed down by the cool weather. The pointy cabbages are nearly ready though – we ate a couple and the insides are slug free! The swedes are enormous, cold and wet seem to be their ideal conditions. I’m also growing something called kalettes, it’s a cross between sprouts and kale. The plants are very attractive and it looks like they’re about to start producing the little sprout/kale rosettes.

I’ve sown and planted various salad leaves in the greenhouse. The rocket appeared at the speed of a rocket and so far hasn’t been scoffed by any slimy creatures. I’ve several trays of salad leaves waiting for gaps in the greenhouse. Anything planted now will grow slowly all Winter, ready for picking in the Spring. I think I’ll just fill up the Polycrub and greenhouse with over Wintering plants and figure out how to fit in Summer crops next year.

I spent a day tomato pruning. The tomato plants are laden with green tomatoes and it helps them to ripen if all the side shoots and old leaves are removed. Even on a cool day the Polycrub reaches 25 celsius. Some sun does help with the ripening though.

We did a taste test of some of the maincrop potatoes. I thought they all tasted good, Alouette was probably the tastiest, but the spuds are on the small side. Caledonian Rose seems to have a very good yield, big potatoes but quite a lot of slug damage. Rooster has grown very well and is the most versatile but probably the least tasty – it’s often the way with the more commercial varieties. I’ve also got a variety called Cara which I had read was pretty tasteless. I think it’s very nice, it’s grown well, cooks a bit like a Maris Piper and has that earthy home grown potato flavour that supermarket tatties are lacking. So far I think I wouldn’t grow Alouette again, it didn’t cope well with the clay soil and constant rain but the others are all worth doing. We’ve still got Picasso and Setanta to try. Our most frequent veg growing topic is how to improve our potato growing, really the answer is move to a drier location on a steep slope which drains well!

This week’s Croft Shares will have:

Small – French beans, tomatoes, courgettes, purple sprouting broccoli and kale.

Medium – French beans, tomatoes, courgettes, broccoli, potatoes, sugar snaps/mange tout and purple kale.

Large – French beans, tomatoes, courgettes, broccoli, potatoes, sugar snaps/mange tout, kale, salad leaves or chard, onions and parsley.

Uig Gala made a triumphant return at the weekend. The weather was very kind, no sun but only a few spots of rain. A bit of a breeze kept the midgies away. Dylan (age 15) entered a “guess the weight” of a huge trout competition and won! The trout was 4.7kg. Obviously figuring out how to cook it was left to me – I cut it into three pieces and baked them. It was very tasty with some French beans and the last Jazzy potatoes. We didn’t eat it all at once – even three teenage boys can’t eat 4.7kg of fish in one go. I’ve suggested in future Dylan enter competitions to guess the weight of cakes rather than enormous fish. The organisers of the Gala did a brilliant job, everyone was kept well fed and very entertained. Our stall did well too, we sold all our veg, lots of jam and a few crafty bits as well.

The bulk of our Summer Fairs are finished now. I’ve a few between now and November but with decent gaps in between. I’ve sold almost all of the stock we produced over the Winter. October is going to be spent making for the Christmas Fairs.

The yellow courgettes are growing very well in the greenhouse. I’ve no idea why, the weather is the opposite of good courgette weather. The follow on French beans are all producing now. I’m very pleased with the flat yellow podded beans. They were slow to start with but seem to keep going for longer than the green Cobra beans. They appear to be pretty resistant to red spider mite as well which helps. I’m not a fan of runner beans, I do think flat podded French beans make a good alternative, tasty and less stringy.

I’m trying to tackle the salad leaf problem. I’ve started peas for shoots and have sown rocket in the greenhouse. In a normal year slugs don’t eat rocket so hopefully there will be rocket and pea shoot salad at some point. I have some nice looking tatsoi in trays which I was planning on planting outside, I think the weather’s too rubbish for that, so I’m going to find space in the greenhouse instead.

This week’s Croft Shares will have:

Small – potatoes, tomatoes, French beans, sugar snaps and blackcurrants.

Medium – potatoes, tomatoes, French beans, purple sprouting broccoli, kale, courgettes and blackcurrants.

Large – potatoes, tomatoes, French beans, broccoli, kale, onions, courgettes, salad leaves or chard, parsley and blackcurrants.

Ohhh, the rain isn’t helping – we’ve had to speed dig the remaining Jazzy potatoes. By “we” I mean Dom. He dug the spuds, I washed and arranged them for drying. Next is bagging and weighing. We may also dig up the Sarpo Una potatoes – these are another second early type with an attractive pink skin. After that I’ve a few rows of Charlotte then a maincrop called Allouette. I’ve no idea how the weather will have impacted these. This year I have some emergency potatoes in a well cultivated, better drained bed. If all else fails I can dig these up for August and September.

The dodgy weather hasn’t impacted the mange tout or broccoli at all. I’ve some green cabbages which seem to be a snail magnet, I blame the rain for that. Hopefully the snail damage is just external and cosmetic.

The main casualty of the rain has been the salad leaves. I’ve managed to keep a small amount going but most of the rows I’ve sown have been instantly mown down by slugs. In the Spring I grow pea shoots in old fish boxes, set on top of metal frames to keep them away from anything that might eat the seeds. I think I might have to try that arrangement for Autumn salad leaves.

This week we have another Kilmuir Hall Craft Fair, lunch and cake available, and a nice selection of stalls. On Saturday the 17^th me and some teenagers have a stall at Uig Gala! Fingers crossed for some sunshine. We set up at Armadale Market outside on Saturday in torrential rain, then the rain stopped and it was sort of sunny for a while.

This week’s croft Shares will have:

Small – potatoes, courgettes, onions, French beans and tomatoes.

Medium – potatoes, courgettes, onions, mange tout, tomatoes, kohlrabi and broccoli.

Large – potatoes, courgettes, onions, French beans, tomatoes, sugar snaps, purple sprouting broccoli, salad leaves, chard and kale.

Finally I’ve reached a point were there isn’t a queue of little plants waiting to go in the ground. Just about everywhere that can be planted has been planted. I’ve just sown more salad leaves outside, and will be sowing mustard greens and planting Tatsoi at some point, but really if it’s not in the soil now we’re not eating it before Christmas! Salad leaves can still be sown undercover but there’s no space just now. Once the first batch of French beans are over I can pull them up and follow with something, probably chard.

I’m failing spectacularly at cucumber growing. In the past I’ve grown very tasty ridge cucumbers. Last year I grew my usual variety of ridge cucumber, for some reason every third cucumber was horribly bitter. This year I thought I’d try a classic greenhouse cucumber. I started out with ten plants, I’m now down to one. The rest have succumbed to slugs. The one remaining plant looks pretty healthy but I’m sceptical that it can produce enough cucumbers for all the current customers. My next cucumber plan is to go back to ridge types, but try a more modern variety. I once grew ridge cucumbers outside (yes, in Bornaskitaig) but I think the weather must have been unusual.

I’ve four craft fair type events coming up in fairly quick succession. I fitted in a bit of basket weaving and some jam making over the weekend. I hadn’t forgotten how to weave a basket so that’s a relief. The willow is more pliable in the Summer and the whole basket dries faster once it’s finished. I’ll be in Armadale on Saturday, probably with a lot of potatoes, eggs and jam.

This week’s Croft Shares will have:

Small – tomatoes, broccoli, French beans, mange tout and spinach/chard.

Medium – tomatoes, broccoli, French beans, sugar snaps, courgettes, kale, and potatoes.

Large – tomatoes, broccoli, French beans, mange tout/sugar snaps, courgettes, kale, potatoes, salad leaves, beetroot and onions.

A few months ago I was given two Cape Gooseberry plants. I haven’t tried growing these before but the plants were very attractive so I planted them in the greenhouse. According to the internet Cape Gooseberry bushes should live for several years and grow to quite a size. The plants I have look lovely and are adorned with little lanterns. I really hope they ripen properly, they could make a great addition to the veg Shares in 2025. Even if they aren’t super productive they’re worth it for the little lanterns.

I think the glut may have arrived. All three types of French beans are now producing, so expect to see purple, green and yellow. All four types of tomato are ripening (hurray.) The squash plants in the greenhouse are truly enormous, there must be many metres of vines now. The greenhouse was always the best squash/courgette environment. We think there may be a spring running underneath as some areas in there never really dry out. The Polycrub does a good impression of an arid dessert, the soil is super dry and needs a lot of watering. Some spiders are still in residence in the Polycrub. I did have a spider in hair incident, the spider was OK, I had heart palpitations. I have actually got used to them – I have a favourite one now. She’s not in the most helpful location but has a very large, symmetrical web which I’m trying not to walk into.

Outside the slug menace have retreated somewhat, not before doing a lot of damage to the cauliflowers. Will there be any more cauliflowers? Maybe if the slugs take a holiday. Slug damage to a cauliflower doesn’t make it inedible, it just looks awful. I think some cosmetic damage to organic veg is acceptable and to be expected, but zombie cauliflowers are a step too far. The broccoli is excellent this year though. The purple sprouting broc looks good too. The cabbages have got a lot of cabbage white caterpillar damage, hopefully this is just the outer leaves.

Me and the youngest boy had a busy time at the Kilmuir Craft Fair, I now have one basket left! The next Kilmuir Craft Fair is on August 14^th. Before that I have Armadale on the 10^th and the Gathering Hall on the 8^th.

This week’s Croft Shares will have:

Small – potatoes, courgettes, broccoli, tomatoes and mange tout/sugar snaps.

Medium – potatoes, courgettes, broccoli, tomatoes, French beans, chard and a cauliflower if they look reasonable, if not something else instead.

Large – potatoes, courgettes, broccoli, tomatoes, French beans, onions, kale, kohlrabi salad leaves and herbs.

I’ve done a better job of sowing and planting follow on crops this year. The greenhouse is stuffed full with French beans and courgettes which will hopefully be pick-able in September. I followed the first early potatoes …with more first early potatoes. I’ve just planted more broccoli for the Autumn and have sown a lot of chard. I’ll be following the onions with mustard greens and salad leaves.

The tomatoes have ripened more quickly this week. I’m trying a new yellow variety called Honey Delight, it’s grown a lot of leaf and a plenty of tomatoes which are just beginning to ripen. My favourite variety is called Honeycomb, but I don’t think it’s a good idea to be too reliant on one type of any plant. Each year I try a few new tomatoes but so far I’ve not found anything as reliable or early as Honeycomb. In the past I’ve tried lots of heritage varieties of vegetables. Sadly when it comes to tomatoes the modern, hybrid plants are more disease resistant and dependable. I have found heirloom kale and broccoli which are better than modern varieties. I grow a traditional allotment type of green courgette and a mix of old and new French beans. The problem with hybrid plants is that the seeds can’t be saved – well they could be saved but the resulting plants wouldn’t be the same as the parent.

We’ve dug up a lot of potatoes. There were some first earlies left and then we tackled the first row of Jazzy. This is such a good variety. I discovered it by accident. A couple of years ago the seed company didn’t have the variety of potato that I’d ordered so they sent Jazzy instead. I’d never heard of it, but it turns out to be a fast growing, waxy type, which produces lots of oval potatoes with very little slug damage. They taste good too! Just scrub or scrape, then boil and smother in butter! They hold their shape well so would be good in a curry with some leafy greens.

If anyone fancies extra tatties or some blackcurrant jam I’ll be at the craft fair in Kilmuir Hall on Wednesday with some produce, loads of eggs and a few baskets and pictures. The craft fair stock that I built up after Christmas is on the verge of running out, I’m hoping to fit in some basket weaving next week. I do feel a bit out of practice but I only have three baskets left!

This week’s Croft Shares will have:

Small – potatoes, broccoli, French beans, tomatoes and onions.

Medium – potatoes, broccoli, mange tout, courgettes, kale, salad leaves and beetroot.

Large – potatoes, broccoli, sugar snaps, courgettes, kale, onions, salad leaves, cauliflower, broad beans and garlic.

This is the point in the year when I spend a lot of time staring impatiently at plants willing the glut to begin. I’ll be climbing a ladder to pick the French beans so that’s a good sign. There will be tomatoes for Medium and Large Shares this week and potatoes for everyone. I’ve dug up most of the first earlies. I had a rootle around under the second earlies and the first row seems to be nearly ready. We staggered the planting of the second earlies, so hopefully they won’t be ready all at once.

Outside broccoli picking starts this week. All the broccoli so far has been grown in the greenhouse. I’m looking forward to removing the indoor broc and replacing it with French beans and chard. Once that job’s done, the greenhouse will be completely planted with Summer and autumn crops. Last year there was a lot of red spider mite in the greenhouse so I’m on the alert for that. These little critters aren’t visible but they can suck the life out of a French bean plant. There were a lot of green caterpillars in the greenhouse but they seem to have vanished. I’ve seen some cabbage white butterflies fluttering around, I think they must be the green caterpillar parent.

Me and the middle boy had a stall at the Armadale Market on Saturday – I don’t have nearly enough ducks to satisfy the demand for duck eggs on the South of the island. We also did very well on the jam selling front, I only have a few jars left. There’s a bit of a gap now in the market/craft fair schedule so I’ll be spending a week weeding, interspersed with a spot of jam making. We still have plenty of blackcurrants waiting to go in the jam pan. Our next craft fair is in Kilmuir Hall on the 24^th, it’ll be such a luxury not to have to get up at 6am and drive for an hour. The residents of Kilmuir prefer a chicken egg to a duck egg and I have plenty of those at the moment. The new hens are laying very well now that I’ve separated them from the older chickens.

This week’s Croft Shares will have:

Small – potatoes, Spring onions, kale or courgettes, mange tout and broccoli.

Medium – potatoes, Spring onions, kale, courgettes, French beans, tomatoes and onions.

Large – potatoes, Spring onions, kale, courgettes, French beans, tomatoes, onions, salad leaves, black currants and herbs.

This will be the last week of Spring onions, it’s not really Spring any more and the proper onions are nearly ready now.