Click on a thumbnail picture below to see the full size version. 121 Entries. Sunday, January 11 View Page Happy new year all form stu and I and we wish you all a great year in the patch. We put our tractor over the patch last week with the rotavator and got down to about 11inches which is great. Were looking for that nice well drained soil that holds moisture but has plenty of air for those tiny root hairs to spread over the patch and help give us a new PB this year. Iffy photo.   Sunday, January 11 View Page And of course the one and a half tonnes of manure   Thursday, January 15 View Page I did a 660 mile round trip to see Keith Foster yesterday, but well worth it as we got 4 hours talking about growing and I got 10 more seedlings from his first sowing of the year. I think they are about 10 days older than mine which is nice and I will now have enough plants for all my final planting stations. I did an EC test on his and mine to see what the salt levels were like. Keith’s had a reading of 2 and mine 2.5 which is spot on in my mind but I will be doing some investigating to see if I can find out the perfect salt level. I could just look and read what the plants look like but I’m after the perfect parameters every week. From experience it is not difficult to be quite a long way out before the plants show visible signs of over or under feeding, which maybe fine for general growing but not for what I’m after.   Thursday, January 15 View Page I also did a couple of final potting mixture trials 50% soil and 50% peat 40% soil, 40% peat and 20% Perlite The soil will becoming from our pumpkin patch before we add any more manure and at the moment it’s looking like the Perlite one will be the best. I will also use the same mix for the 80l pots.   Sunday, January 18 View Page Well I hope this will not be a big problem. The plants I got from Keith had some Scarid fly, so I gave them “Topple” drench to kill the lava. I gave all the plants the same dose but I must have got some on the leaves of my smaller plants and it has damaged the third true leaf on a few of them. Anyway is all part of the game and this is my first year back growing onions for over 10 years.   Wednesday, February 11 View Page Well after thrashing my onion seedlings Keith has kindly put a few more to one side for me. They didn’t like the drench I did for the scarid fly and I suspect I got the decimal point wrong on the chemical rate. Anyway I'm making good progress with the final growing area, but when it’s finished it will take a little time to fine tune the environment inside. I’m going to use an old cooling unit from a cold store to keep the temp down in the summer, unfortunately someone took part of it and I’m looking for a new bit.   Tuesday, February 17 View Page I’ve got some soil from the pumpkin beds before we put this year’s manure on them to go in my final bed mix. So today I took a pipe of our steam heating and sterilised the soil to get rid of any undesirable diseases.   Tuesday, February 17 View Page Job done, one hour fifteen min of cooking, the soil smells great.   Tuesday, February 24 View Page After steam sterilizing my soil last week, today I made my final blend and it is LUSH, they are some lucky onions. 40% soil 40% peat 20% Perlite I sent of a soil sample and now I will start to fill up the 80l pots while putting in the heating cables at the same time.   Friday, February 27 View Page I got a load of work done on the luxury onion pad this week, all fifteen pots are in and filled up. I put the heating cables right at the bottom of the pots and they will be put on two or three days before I plant.   Wednesday, March 11 View Page Here’s our line up for this year and we will put in our 1457 as back up plants for all of them.   Wednesday, March 11 View Page After god knows how many weeks working on my onion growing room it’s nearly finished. Sarah says I’m obsessed and see is probably right, if I’m not working on the room I’m researching onions, Hey Ho, lol   Sunday, March 15 View Page I did the 650 miles up to Keith and back on Friday to pick up the plants that he had put by for me after I managed to kill my first batch off (what a donkey), anyway I wanted to pick up a rotavator for the pumpkin patch which was half way there. I left at 2.30 am and by 7.30 pm they were all planted up in the onion pad.   Thursday, March 19 View Page I took a couple of photos of the onion pad from outside to give anyone interested an idea of the layout. That line on the plastic is where I put a hole in it and not part of my plan.   Thursday, March 19 View Page The four sodium lights are programmed to come on at sunrise and go off at sunset, they also go off when the light level gets over 45Klux and come back on it goes below 10Klux.   Saturday, March 28 View Page Here’s a photo of the new smaller onion pad. I couldn’t control the conditions well enough when it was bigger and as there’s nothing to do on the pumpkins until the 7th April it gave me something to do. All this for a 12lb onion, Sarah thinks I have lost the plot.   Saturday, March 28 View Page And a photo of one of the onions   Friday, April 3 View Page Just four days to go before we sow the pumpkins and I have been making some supports for the onion leaves. I couldn’t make up my mind to support them or not but after a chat with Stuart he said “Well you wouldn’t get a hose pipe to work if it had a bend in it” and that was enough for me.   Tuesday, April 7 View Page At last we sow the pumpkins and at last I’m in my comfort zone. The onions will take a couple of years to get right but I'm learning and enjoying the chalenge   Friday, April 17 View Page All our main seeds germinated ok so we got them all planted today with 1457's as back ups for them all.   Friday, April 17 View Page The onions are looking ok I think, but they are getting too wet at the bottom of the pot. I made some holes for the soil probe and at the bottom of the pot it was too wet for my liking so over the next few weeks I will change the watering to compensate. This is the same plant I took a photo of 14 days ago.   Sunday, May 3 View Page Stuarts been looking after the pumpkins while I’ve been on holiday and everything has really grown in the last 2 weeks. All of the plants are about the same size and doing well apart from the 1041 which did not look great so we have had to go with our back up which is a shame. This is a photo of the 1161   Sunday, May 3 View Page My onions have been growing well but I have lost three that have doubled up. I’m not sure why this has happened it may well be that my growing conditions are different to Keith’s and the change has shocked them into splitting. Anyway although I expect to see a few more go the same way I hope I will have enough left to get my 12lb bulb.   Tuesday, May 5 View Page Well I’m having a bit of a torrid time of growing onions over the last few days. I found two leaves, on two plants, had collapsed. After a long chat with Keith Foster we think it is probably a bacterial disease. The first thing I did was to get some more air movement over the plants and apart from keeping my fingers crossed that is all I can do.   Tuesday, May 5 View Page And here's a photo of the other plant cut in half. On a brighter note both of these plants only had the one growing point.   Sunday, May 17 View Page After a few weeks in the ground the pumpkins all look fine. Stuart and I would like to see a little more colour in the leaves but we are working all the time on the conductivity levels and feel it is better to under do the feed than over do the feed at this point.Here's the 1385   Sunday, May 17 View Page I’ve had a turbulent time with the onions over the last few weeks but this year was always my trial year and I’m learning a great deal. Then, oops, just when I felt they were settling down I found a bad mistake. I’ve been changing my sodium lights to come on the same time as sun rise and sun set every 4 or 5 days. I changed the time to 20.40 but somehow missed out the 0, what a Donkey. Anyway what’s done is done and I can’t put the lights back or they will start bulbing up for sure. I think I have to leave the lights the way they are for the next six weeks and see what happens. This onion is 11 inches round.   Monday, May 25 View Page The pumpkins plants all look fine and probably better than other years and the onions are growing faster by the day. Here’s a photo of one of the onions, the yellow tint to the photo is the sodium lights.   Saturday, May 30 View Page It won't be long before we start to pollinate this years pumpkins, it might even be next week. Here's the 1350 in the glass house   Saturday, May 30 View Page And the 1350 in the poly house   Saturday, May 30 View Page The 1566   Saturday, May 30 View Page Our 1457   Saturday, May 30 View Page The 1161   Saturday, May 30 View Page And finaly the 1385   Monday, June 1 View Page Keith tells me that my six remaining onions are doing well and that’s good enough for me. As it’s the 1stJune and I only have the six I thought I would put the measurements of each in the diary. So here’s the first and smallest. 12.5" ht 14.5" cir   Monday, June 1 View Page No2 14.5 ht 15.5 cir   Monday, June 1 View Page No 3 14.5 ht 17 cir   Monday, June 1 View Page No 4 14.5 ht 16.5 cir   Monday, June 1 View Page No 5 13.5 ht 16 cir   Monday, June 1 View Page And No 6 14.5 ht 15 cir   Thursday, June 18 View Page All of our plants are looking great at the moment and without doubt the best they have ever looked. They have all had females pollinated in the last 10 days or so.   Thursday, June 18 View Page This is one of two onions tapping 20.5 inches   Monday, June 22 View Page We have three pumpkins set and moved to their final positions. Here's the 1385 X 1566 pollinated on the 6th June and 14ft out.   Monday, June 22 View Page And the plant   Monday, June 22 View Page The 1161 X 1385 pollinated on the 10th June at 14 ft out   Monday, June 22 View Page And the plant   Monday, June 22 View Page And last up for today the 1350 X 1161 pollinated on the 8th June and 13ft out   Monday, June 29 View Page So we have now worked out which pumpkins we will be going with and here are all six of the little darlings. First the 1385 x 1566, 23 days old and 14ft out, total waist line 186 inches 146lb and up 111lb for the week   Monday, June 29 View Page The 1350 x 1385 in the glass house 14ft out and on day 16 112 inches and 38 lb   Monday, June 29 View Page The 1161 x 1385 14ft out and on day 19 123 inches and 48lb   Monday, June 29 View Page Our very own 1457 x 1566 15ft out and on day 15 85 inches   Monday, June 29 View Page The 1566 x 1385 15ft out at day 13   Monday, June 29 View Page And last but not least our other 1350 x 1385 17 ft out and 12 days old   Wednesday, July 1 View Page As it’s one mega drive to the Harrogate show I set myself that target of tapping 12lbs before I go. I have about eleven weeks to go before the show and hopefully still have a chance. It’s been very hot, but I have been able to keep them nice and cool. The first one up is 16” high and 20.5” round.   Wednesday, July 1 View Page This one is 16.5" ht and 22" round   Wednesday, July 1 View Page 16.5" ht and 20" round   Wednesday, July 1 View Page The smallest at 17" ht and 19.75" round   Wednesday, July 1 View Page And the biggest 17" ht and 22.25" round   Monday, July 6 View Page Cool, the 6thjuly and we still have six pumpkins going on six plants which makes a pleasant change. Stuart and I always remember back in the 70’s as kids coming back from our holiday, legging it round the back of the house to see how big our pumpkin was. So that’s why we grow them and I doubt if anything will ever change. So first up this week and is the 1385 up 199lbs for the week (our best ever weeks growth in a week, the best being Bart’s 905 which put on 182lbs in a week) and finishing on 345lbs.   Monday, July 6 View Page Next our 1350 in the glasshouse on day 23 is up 86lbs for the week and is 124lbs   Monday, July 6 View Page The 1161 on day 26 has put on 124 lbs this week and is now 172lbs   Monday, July 6 View Page Our 1457 on day 22 is 94lbs   Monday, July 6 View Page Were not sure about the shape of the 1566 but on day 20 is 60lbs   Monday, July 6 View Page And last is our other 1350. Both of the 1350 plants have shortish leaf petioles like our 1041 plants last year but there is a lot of potential none the less.She is 66lb on day 19   Monday, July 13 View Page On day 37 the 1385 tapes 533lbs and up 188lbs for the week   Monday, July 13 View Page The 1350 in the glass house on day 30 is 259lbs and up 135lbs for the week   Monday, July 13 View Page The 1161 on day 33 is 329lbs and up 157lbs this week   Monday, July 13 View Page Our own 1457 on day 29 is 228lbs up 134lbs for the week   Monday, July 13 View Page Bills 1566 on day 27 is 157lbs up 97lbs for the week   Monday, July 13 View Page Last up is our other 1350 which on day 26 is 174lbs up 108lbs for the week   Monday, July 20 View Page Well, quite a good week in the Paton patch this week. Although the weather has been a bit iffy on the sun side, having all the plants inside has put us in great control of the conditions. The 1385 put on 170lbs this week to end up on day 44 at 703lbs.   Monday, July 20 View Page Our 1350 in the glass house on day 37 is 398lbs up 139lbs for the week   Monday, July 20 View Page On day 40 the 1161 is 507lbs up 178lbs this week   Monday, July 20 View Page Look, I know this is our own seed but you have to say it is cracking good shape. On day 36 the 1457 is 403lbs and up 175lbs for the week   Monday, July 20 View Page The 1566 on day 34 is 293lbs up 136lbs for the week.   Monday, July 20 View Page Our other 1350 looks great and just like the Thads 1528. It had a good week and on day 33 is 329lbs up 155lbs for the week.   Monday, July 20 View Page How about that for four nice healthy plants and their pumpkins.   Monday, July 27 View Page This time last year we lost two more pumpkins and all of our hopes rested with just one plant, the 1041. So no complaints this year when we still have six growing quite nicely in the patch. Sure they will all not be record beaters but most of them have a chance of going way over the 1000lb. The weather is normal for the UK, cloud and bit of rain, some more cloud and a truck load of rain and every now and then we see a big orange thing in the sky. Saying that temps are not too bad and August has to throw us a good week sooner or later. Anyway first up is the 1385 which on day 51 tapes 869lbs up 166lbs for the week and going well.   Monday, July 27 View Page The 1350 in the glass house had a “Funny” five minuets as when I looked at it in the morning it looked fine, but when Stuart looked 1 hour latter it had a fine crack in it. At first we thought the pumpkin was toast but ever since it has been fine and the crack is only about 1mm deep. On day 44 she tapes a respectable 560lbs up 162lbs for the week.   Monday, July 27 View Page The 1161 is as soft as a “Babies bum” and on day 47 is 672lbs up 165lbs for the week.   Monday, July 27 View Page Our own 1457 had a very good week putting on 191lbs to end the week on 594lbs. Stuart and I really hope we can get this one over the 1400lbs because we sent out god knows how many seeds and very few are in the soil. Hopefully if we do a good job this year it will see a few more patches next year.   Monday, July 27 View Page The 1566 on day 41 is 458lbs up 165lbs for the week   Monday, July 27 View Page Our other 1350 on day 40 tapes 477lbs up 148lbs and could well be the “Dark horse” of the patch, time will tell but I just like this one. I will put an onion update in the diary in a couple of days time.   Friday, July 31 View Page My first year growing big onions has gone well I think and my best one,in the photo is just under 25 inches with just a chance off getting to over 25.5.   Tuesday, August 4 View Page Here is a quick round up of the Paton patch this week with yesterdays numbers The 1385 on day 58 was up a slightly disappointing 97lbs to end up as 962lbs The 1350 in the glass house on day 51 was 659lbs up 99lbs for the week Our 1161 on day 54 was 811lbs up 139 for the week Our very own 1457 had a great week and on day 50 was up 189lbs for 783lbs The 1566 on day 48 was 600lbs up 144 for the week And finally our other 1350 on day 47 was 600lbs up 123lbs Here is our 1457   Monday, August 10 View Page Here we go then, this weeks update from the Paton patch. On day 65 our 1385 was the first in the patch to get over 1000lbs and taped 1052lbs up 90lbs for the week Our 1350 in the glass house on day 58 taped 756lbs up 97lbs for the week Our 1161 had a great week and on day 61 was 946lbs up 135lbs for the week The 1457 had an even better week and on day 57 was also 946lbs up 163lbs for the week The 1566 on day 55 was 733lbs up 143lbs for the week And our other 1350 on day 54 was 703lbs up 103lbs for the week Here's our 1358   Monday, August 17 View Page Another reasonable week in the Paton patch and only our 1385 was a little disappointing. The main thing is that we now have 3 tapping over 1000lbs for the first time ever. So on day 72 the 1385 was 1086lbs up 34lbs for the week On day 65 our first 1350 was 826lbs up 70lbs this week Day 68 saw our 1161 hit 1035lbs up 89lbs this week On day 64 our 1457 hit 1044lbs up a very satisfying 98lbs for the week On day 62 our 1566 got to 862lbs up 119 for the best gain this week And finally our other 1350 on day 61 got to 777lbs up 74lbs for the week Here’s the 1161   Saturday, August 22 View Page I lifted three of my five remaining onions and they were all just over 8.5lbs. My two still growing are about 3inches bigger which means I may get very close to my first year goal of 12lbs.   Monday, August 24 View Page Well what a week, who would have thought out of six plants, three would tape the same at 1130lbs at this time of year. Although the 1385 has slowed down faster than we expected it will still be a very big pumpkin and both the 1161 and 1457 could be huge. So on day 79 the 1385 is 1130lbs up 44lbs this week On day 75 the 1161 is 1130lbs up a great 95lbs for the week On day 71 our 1457 is 1130lbs up a sweet 86lbs this week The 1350in the glass house on day 72 is 877 up 51lbs this week On day 69 our 1566 is 946lbs up 84lbs this week And finally our other 1350 on day 68 is 847lbs up 70lbs Here’s the great shaped 1457   Monday, August 31 View Page How cool is that; our 1566 tapped over 1000lbs today and like the 1161 “Thumps like a rock” which gives us four out of six plants over 1000lbs. So here are the stats for our patch this week. On day86 the 1385 tapped 1166lbs up 36lbs this week. Day 79 saw the 1350 in the GH get to 907lbs up 30lbs On Day 82 our 1161 tapped 1193lbs up a great 63lbs On Day 78 our 1457 juuuuuuust snuck in the lead tapping 1202lbs up 72lbs this week Day 76 saw our 1566 hit 1019lb up 73lbs for the week On day 75 our other 1350 was 900lbs up 53lbs for the week Here’s this weeks star the 1566   Monday, August 31 View Page Here's our poly tunnel with four pumpkins tapping a total off 4314lbs   Monday, September 7 View Page Things are slowing down in the patch and we have 33 days left till the weigh off. As it’s been warmer this year we are a little further forward than the last few years but we’re sure we will need most of those days to get them all to max out. The one exception to that is the 1358 which is growing very slowly now but were happy with that. So on day 93 the 1385 just put on 9lbs to get to 1175lbs On day 86 our first 1350 put on 23lbs to end the week at 930lbs Our 1161 on day 89 put on 37lbs and tapped a total of 1230lbs Our own 1457 on day 85 put on 38lbs to get to 1240lbs The 1566 on day 83 put on a great 59lbs and ended the week on 1078lbs The other 1350 also had a good week and on day 82 up 54lbs at 954lbs All the pumpkins are between 82 and 93 days old and ours tend to max out at between about 110 to 125 days old. Here’s our 1385 beast, slowly (but we don’t care) putting on the pounds.   Monday, September 21 View Page I took my onion the Harrogate show on Friday and it weighed in at 9lb 15oz. No where near Peter Glazebrook’s 14lb 10oz winner but I’m really happy with that and also a big well done to Peter for a terrific onion.   Monday, September 21 View Page We decided to weigh the 1350 in the glasshouse it was still growing slowly but we will have nowhere to show all our pumpkins and it was the smallest of our six. She tapped a total of 358inches which is 962lbs but like most of our pumpkins it went heavy. So meet the 1030lbs Paton 7% heavy   Monday, September 21 View Page The rest of our pumpkins are still doing fine The 1385 on day 107 tapes 1221lbs up 46lbs in the last 14 days The 1161 on day 103 tapes 1288lbs up 58lbs in the last 14 days The 1457 on day 99 tapes 1278lbs up 38lbs in the last 14 days The 1566 on day 97 tapes 1157lbs up 79lbs in the last 14 days And the 1350 on day 96 tapes 970lbs Here are the winning leeks at the Harrogate show, how amazing are these.   Tuesday, September 29 View Page Here’s Stuarts granddaughter Ellie on the 1457   Monday, October 5 View Page Here are the final measurements of the patch before we weigh them on Saturday. As we only have one GPC show to go too,the 1350 will be weighed mid week and the other four will go to the show, off which two will be exhibit only On day 121 the 1385 taped 1240lbs On day 117 the 1161 taped 1317lbs On day 113 the 1457 taped 1307lbs On day 111 the 1566 taped 1249lbs And on day 103 the 1350 taped 1002lbs Rite cheer I recon I spotted Festus or Cletus in our corn patch   Thursday, October 8 View Page We weighed in our other 1350 today. It taped 1002lbs on day 107 and weighed in at a very pleasing 1024lbs   Sunday, October 11 View Page At last time to weigh the best from the Paton patch this year, check out the new lifting frame.   Sunday, October 11 View Page On the way to being loaded   Sunday, October 11 View Page Our new sponser "Thompson and Morgan,s" Paul Handsort came down to help with the weigh off   Sunday, October 11 View Page Tilly Hewitt age 5 with her best pumpkin from the patch   Sunday, October 11 View Page Our 1030 Paton carved by David Loh   Sunday, October 11 View Page David Thomas with a terrific new PB cabbage off 107lbs   Sunday, October 11 View Page Our 1566 became the 1211 lbs Paton   Sunday, October 11 View Page The 1385 became the 1219 lbs Paton   Sunday, October 11 View Page Our own 1457 became the 1238lbs Paton   Sunday, October 11 View Page And finaly our best of the year was the 1161 which became the 1317lbs Paton   Sunday, October 11 View Page A big thank you for Paul for taking the trouble to come down to help with the show and also to all the XPG helpers for their work on the day. Some growers came from miles away even though they had a difficult year in the patch and lost their pumpkins. So a huge thanks to them and I wish you a better year next year. Stuart and I might have a short patch tour next summer as a one off to help you all in your patches and a good excuse for a beer.   Monday, October 12 View Page Well not a bad year in the patch for us Six Plants Six Pumpkins 1030lbs 1024 lbs 1211 lbs 1219 lbs 1238 lbs 1314 lbs 7036 lbs of pumpkins 1172 lbs average   Thursday, October 15 View Page No sooner have we finished with the pumpkins and I am sowing the onions. I’m sowing them a lot earlier than last year but in my mind it is about right for me to put them in now.   Thursday, October 29 View Page The onions are up and two weeks old. I should have enough for 50 or more of the most vigorous ones to prick out tomorrow.   Monday, November 9 View Page Our poinsettias are colouring up nicely and this little lot will be off to the shops in the next ten days or so.   Monday, November 9 View Page The onions are also looking fine with the second true leaf developing. The sachets you can see in the photo are Amblyseius mites which will control any thrips. I also released some Atheta beetles which feed on scarid larva.   Sunday, November 22 View Page At the moment the onions are looking fine and I spent a few hours today trying to pick out the most vigorous plants and putting some bigger supports on them.   Friday, December 4 View Page I spent hours and I mean hours potting up the best 25 onion plants today into 2L pots. They all had very nice root systems and I managed to pot them up without doing too much damage to the leaves. Out of these 25 plants I will only need 15 to grow on for the rest of the year and I’m guessing that they will be ready for their final positions in 6 to 8 weeks time. The plants also look about 6 weeks ahead of last year.   Friday, December 4 View Page I’ve made this neat little system of a pot cut in half put into a whole pot to help me when I do my final planting   Friday, December 4 View Page And all the 25 plants in the grow room   Monday, December 14 View Page It’s exactly 60 days since I sowed the onions and today I decided to go from 24 to a natural 8hour day length. Keith Foster sent me some photos of his seedlings and I have to say they look superb. He has been using more lights than me so he is getting me some cool florescent lights which I will put up over the next few days.   Friday, December 18 View Page I’ve now ramped up the light levels in the grow room, in fact I have doubled the amount of light they are getting and I have also lowered the temp from 18C to 15C. There’s a lot to learn and finding the right balance between lighting and heating is not easy. Hopefully I will see the plants develop a more stocky appearance and I’m looking forward to seeing them in 10 days time after they have settled down to the new 8hr regime.   Thursday, December 24 View Page I think I can see the beginning of some stronger growth but I guess it will be 5 or 6 days till I know for sure. Keith wanted a photo of my potting up system so that I can plant without turning the pots upside down to knock them out. I have to say it is spot on ( just patting myself on the back lol ) but if you follow this idea don’t be in a hurry to look at the roots all the time because you will damage the root hairs each time you look.