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water and frozen too as it takes a good while for me to eat a season's corn. Paul doesn't like sweet corn - or so he informed me after we grew an enormous bed of it the year before last! This year we only grew half a bed so about 10 plants and that seems

in their gardens or on their allotments. The results will help them in their assessment for the prestigious Award of Garden Merit (AGM). The first 200 people to register will receive one packet each of 'Oregon Sugar Pod' mangetout seeds and 'Sugar Ann' sugar snap

will admit to sneaking the odd strawberry when I'm picking.Anna, my assistant at work and fellow allotment holder, is a Grazer. As soon as a tomato turns even vaguely red she starts giving it a sly squeeze to see if it's ripe. She munched her way through her

be surprised to hear that this week I couldn't wait to get up to the plot and start picking. Even Paul braved the icy winds to give me a hand with the harvest. And why were we so excited? Because the purple sprouting broccoli was ready.Luscious green, purple

built me a coldframe/hot box (I know how to pick 'em!). A quick clear out revealed a couple of surprisingly perfect pak choi. It really must be toasty in there! Everything around it is shades of brown mush and white frost, and inside the hot box it

I'm not a great one for growing flowers on my plot. Maybe I shy away from raising flowering plants on the allotment because I grow so many in my main job (as head gardener at The Bath Priory Hotel). I've grown marigolds as companion plants

next year. So here are my allotment New Year resolutions for 2009:I must grow crops that don't require regular picking as I don't live close enough to the plot to get there more than a couple of times a week. That's just not enough to harvest runner

!I was busy, though, while the snow was lying deep and crisp and even all over the allotment. I spent a couple of happy evenings planning the plot and deciding on my crop rotations for this year. I kept to my New Year resolution and decided to only plant

It's been very dry lately, so I've had to water my crops on a daily basis. The poor plants need every drop they can get as my allotment has turned into a dustbowl.Despite the dry conditions, my strawberries have been fantastic this year. I've got

and sandwiches. But the most spectacular growers have been the courgettes, or are they marrows? I guess it’s been a good 10 days or more since they were last picked, and they’ve loved this warm, wet weather. I groaned out loud when I saw them – well you couldn