Operation sprout

I am determined to crack this allotment thing.

Somewhere in my small mind I have a vision of being able to provide fresh, tasty and cheap food for my family whilst enjoying leisurely days amid the greenery of plot 65.

So after all of the hard work in clearing the site and managing to come back off the eviction warning status red, I really wanted to be able to have something this year to show for my efforts.

The potato bed provided another small pot of spuds, which were tasty, but not that exciting. I planted Swiss chard in another bed, but nothing seems to have appeared. My salady bed with radishes and rocket, well it's not done too well and I finally harvested our one strange cucumber, which yielded two small bites once all of the manky bits had been cut off.

This is the sum total harvest of the cucumber and three slightly nibbled radishes.

So when buying a hoe, I spotted the last tray of Brussels sprout plants. According to the label they can be grown now to produce sprouts in December. I snapped them up and then later purchased some netting to protect them against flies, slugs, rats, rabbits and anything else I can think of.

I now have a valiant goal in my mind for the tale end of this year. I am going to provide my family with our Christmas dinner Brussels sprouts! Now that would be something to be proud of, even though most people don't actually like Brussels sprouts.

As of today, they have been planted, and covered. When I last looked, they were still in situ, next to a row of lettuce seedlings I transplanted to act as a final slug magnet should any of the little sods get through my defences.