Liz’s Allotment Life: Planting out the tenders

After weeks of nurturing seedlings

A seedling is a young plant grown from seed.

in my grow hut, this weekend was finally planting-out time, which is one of my favourite jobs of the year. The recent heatwave meant I delayed things slightly, as the grow hut’s shady location made it much easier to keep everything watered there than if it had already been planted in the ground. But with temperatures dropping it was time to plant.

I don’t tend to have a particular planting plan when I do this. Instead, I walk around the allotment looking for gaps and squeezing plants in wherever I can find space. After a busy weekend of planting, I can now say that the allotment is full. Every bed has something growing in it, and it took a good hour to water everything in afterwards. There will be gaps later in the season as crops are harvested and I’ll have spare plants ready to fill them, but for now, every available inch has been claimed.

Planting out

Winter squash

Quite possibly my favourite crop, I have dedicated almost 1/6th of my allotment to these plants, plus planting a couple into my compost

Can refer to either home-made garden compost or seed/potting compost: Garden compost is a soil improver made from decomposed plant waste, usually in a compost bin or heap. It is added to soil to improve its fertility, structure and water-holding capacity. Seed or potting composts are used for growing seedlings or plants in containers - a wide range of commercially produced peat-free composts are available, made from a mix of various ingredients, such as loam, composted bark, coir and sand, although you can mix your own.

heap, where they always go bananas. My favourite cultivar

Gardeners often use the word variety when referring to a specific plant, but the correct botanical term is 'cultivar'. Whichever word you use, it means a distinctive plant or plants, given a specific cultivar name and usually bred to enhance certain characteristics, such as flower or fruit size, colour, flavour or fragrance, plant size, hardiness, disease resistance, etc. Additionally, it is worth knowing that, botanically, variety has another meaning - it refers to a naturally-occurring distinct plant that only has slight differences in its looks. For example, Malva alcea var. fastigiata differs from typical plants by having an upright habit.

remains ‘Crown Prince’ for its gorgeous flavour and ease of storage overwinter, but I am also looking forward to ‘Pink Banana’ and ‘Uchiki Kuri’. Unfortunately, none of my ‘Bon Bon’ seeds germinated, so I may have to see if I can get hold of a couple of plants of these from somewhere.

A winter squash seedling planted out after being raised under cover, now that the risk of frost has passed

Courgettes

I always have a battle over how many to plant. When the seeds have gone to the trouble of germinating, it would seem rude not to plant them, but I think the six courgette plants I have planted will be far too much for one person. I tend to pick courgettes that are really small, about 10cm, to keep on top of them.

Leeks

I have planted these far smaller than the books will tell you, but hopefully they will be ok. They have not grown in the grow hut for the last couple of weeks, so I thought I would plant them and see what happens. I tend to multi-sow leeks, growing them in clumps of 3–4 so that I can fit more in. They end up a bit smaller than individual leeks, but I don’t mind that. I had really run out of space by this point, so the leeks are all dotted around my fruit bed because there was nowhere else to put them.

Cucumbers and tomatoes

Another case of planting more than I probably need simply because I couldn’t bear to waste the seedlings. The 10 tomatoes should be fine as I love making and freezing tomato sauce, but 8 cucumbers seem excessive. I have grown ‘Marketmore’ and a personal favourite ‘Crystal Lemon’, and I am not quite sure what I will do with all the fruit if they succeed.

Outdoor cucumber plants benefit from a warm, sheltered position and regular watering during the growing season

Sweet potatoes

This is a crop that I love to grow, and I let them ramble across the beds rather than trying to train them upwards. I bought and potted up sweet potato slips, though if you save a tuber

Tubers are swollen, usually underground, parts of a stem or root used by a plant to store food. They allow plants to survive through dormancy or tough conditions, such as winter or drought. Examples include potatoes, dahlias and cyclamen.

, you can simply take slips and propagate them yourself, as you might with a Dahlia. Here in Surrey, I simply plant them outside with no special attention or care, but in cooler parts of the country, a greenhouse or poly-tunnel might be needed to get a good harvest.

Sweet potato plants produce long trailing stems that spread across the soil surface as they grow

French beans

After the disaster with the mice getting at all the seeds in the grow hut, I only had five of these, and they are not looking amazing, but hopefully they will pick up now that they are planted. I only grow French beans and not Runner beans, as I have a distinct preference for them when it comes to eating.

Seed sowing

Sweetcorn

None of my sweetcorn germinated due to those pesky mice, so I have direct-sown some between my squash plants and will keep my fingers crossed. I sowed 3 seeds per location. Ordinarily, squash rambling under sweetcorn works really well, a sort of ‘two sisters’, but I am a bit concerned that the sweetcorn seedlings, if they emerge, will be too small and will get swamped. I will need to keep an eye on them.

Sweetcorn can be raised in modules under cover before planting out, or sown directly outdoors once the soil has warmed

French beans

As I didn’t have enough plants for both my obelisks, I direct sowed some more around the base of the second one. If they fail, then I do have some dwarf French beans as a backup.

Carrots and lettuce

It's a good idea to keep up with the successional sowings on the allotment, and I decided it was time for another sowing of these two crops. I was really struggling for space by this point, so I sowed the lettuce under and around my cordon

A plant that is restricted by pruning to usually one main stem, either upright or at a 45 degree angle, with short fruiting side-shoots (spurs). Apples, pears, gooseberries, tomatoes, redcurrants and whitecurrants are often grown as cordons, especially where space is limited. Sweet peas can be grown as cordons to produce large flowers for exhibition.

tomatoes, trying to make use of every inch.

Other jobs

Managing water in your garden

Watering

I'm always watering, fingers crossed for the cooler weather and predicted rain in the coming week.

Supporting plants

I tied in my tomatoes and French beans to their supports, and my Caucasian spinach was getting really leggy, so I tied it into its obelisk.

Strawberry runners

The strawberry plants are looking excellent, and the first fruits are starting to turn red. However, I still needed to go around and remove the runners that the plants were sending out. Later in the year, I will let a few of these roots grow to increase my number of plants and gradually replace the older ones, but at this stage, I want all the plants’ energy to go into the fruits.

Thinning parsnips

These have germinated really well on the allotment, typically much better than those I am growing at RHS Garden Wisley, and they needed thinning

Pulling out some of the seedlings, usually along a row, so the remaining seedlings are spaced further apart. It reduces overcrowded, which can hinder their growth.

out. I love parsnips, so I always do a lot, and it is heartening when this tricky-to-germinate crop decides it is going to work without a fuss. I do make a point of watering them every time I am down on the allotment from seed sowing right through to germination

Germination is the process by which a seed develops into a new plant. It starts with the seed coat absorbing water, expanding and splitting, which allows oxygen and water into the seed so its food reserves can be broken down and used by the embryo for growth. The first root (called the radicle) pushes into the soil to anchor the new plant in place and start absorbing water and nutrients. The first shoot (called the plumule) then grows upwards, out of the soil, towards the light.

.

Freshly lifted parsnips from RHS Wisley in 2025 reveal the long taproots that develop beneath the soil surface over the growing season

Crop of the week: Spring onions

I direct-sowed these spring onions, a lovely and reliable cultivar called ‘White Lisbon’, earlier in the year, around March time. I have thinned them out a little since then, and it is now time to harvest. I really like the flavour and a little bit of crunch they add to summer salads, and I also enjoy cooking them into omelettes. I find them a great complement to feta cheese and pesto. They stand in the ground fairly well, and that one March sowing should keep me fed for the next month or so, but hopefully the next batch will be ready for eating by then.

Alliumcepa ‘White Lisbon’ is a reliable spring onion cultivar that can be harvested over several weeks

Coming up on the plot

Over the next week or so, I’ll be keeping a close eye on all the new plantings, replacing anything that doesn’t make it and carrying out the usual round of watering, weeding and tying in. For now, I’m simply enjoying seeing the allotment at its fullest and most promising point of the year.