onions drying

All of the main onion crop has been lifted now and is drying in the greenhouse.

This is part of the crop on the wire shelves of a plastic 'blow-away' which is home to most of my seedlings in spring. The open shelves make for good air circulation so the onions dry quite quickly and will then be stored in net sacks.

I had some onions growing in an old supermarket produce box about 22 x 15 inches. From it I got 21 good onions weighing eight pounds before drying which should give me six pounds for storing.

container-grown onions

We had some strong winds recently which have battered the Alderman climbing peas. Because they don't actually climb in the sense that a runner bean does I tie them to the supports with plastic coated string but the winds have pushed them hard against the string and broken the stems. A shame really as I've previously had peas till September from them.

A new cucumber for this year is La Diva. This is an F1 all female variety and is producing nicely. I've had five fruits off it so far and it shows no sign of stopping production.

three healthy cucumbers

The cukes are quite small, about six to nine inches long but that suits us as none gets wasted. Another plus is that they have very few seeds and a thin skin.