End of July and the courgette's just keep on coming!

I now have 9 courgette plants, between home and allotment. I realise this might be a bit of overkill (especially given I have a monthly vegetable delivery from Abel and Cole and someone forgot to request NO courgettes...)

So needless to say, the fruits are starting to come thick and fast and the usual hunt for recipes is afoot. I also have a couple of very thick rows of kale and am getting a bagful of leaves a week off it so today I made my first proper soup of the summer season, Courgette, Kale, Pea and Mint and it's delicious!

The rest of the plots are coming along nicely. Runner beans are doing better than ever. Had about 8 batches off so far and still flowering like crazy and my daughter's sunflowers are well over 6' tall

First crop of cucumbers are coming through and cherry tomatoes are just starting to ripen.

This year is my first attempt at corn in the home garden and it's looking good!

And the small plot at the allotment is thriving. Hard to believe I've had it less than two months!

Growth comparison - a week in July.

It really is incredible what the space of just a week can do. Below are a couple of before and after pics, just 6 days apart. The courgettes are doing really well and should be flowering any day now.

Here the potatoes are flourishing and in the centre, beetroot and Curly Kale are flying!

On the left side I have planted some strawberry plants I managed to pick up at a local fair for 20p each. Bit late for fruiting now but will be established for next year, and I'm planting the runners from the plants at home which I plan to grow along the right hand edge next year.

Bloomin' 'Eck! It's Fost o' July

First of July was a glorious morning in Greater London and I got to spend a little time in both Allotment (well raised bed!) and my garden. Here's a few pics of what's popping up.

First stop, the raised bed . Popped another couple of courgettes in this morning and found a lot of seedlings making an appearance - Beetroot and Kale doing well but not a single spring onion germinated.

Here's one of courgette's I just planted. They've been raised from seed in the windowsill (unlike my others at home which were mostly from ready grown plants from the local greengrocer) Shouldn't be too long before they flower I suspect.

Back at home, here's my block of corn, all 12 plants doing well. To the right, you can just make out the yellow flower of my first courgette of the year, companion planted with the corn. There are about 5 courgette plants spaced throughout, some doing better than others.

Runner Beans are doing very well, two varieties, Moonlight and Prizewinner Stringless, with lovely yellow and red flowers covering the plant. First couple of beans has started appearing so shouldn't be long before I can start harvesting.

A couple of weeks ago I saw a video on vertical training of cucumbers and squash so I constructed a couple of circular fences, buried in the ground, from some wire my neighbour was going to throw away. The cucumbers I climbing voraciously and I popped another three Butternut Squash to get best use out of it.

Tomatoes are doing well as ever, lots of little fruit appearing. I found a tip online for drying out banana skins and grinding them to a powder to use as fertiliser, so have given that a go (mixed with some crushed eggshells) and added it to all my tomato plants today.

And finally, my daughter's first Sunflower of the year has opened. It's a good 5' tall, so not as big as last year but they're growing in very poor soil alongside the fence.