by Neil Wilkinson | Mar 19, 2010 | Allotment
I’ve been meaning to get this post done all week, but just had one of those weeks. We couldn’t really spend any time at the allotment for a few reasons, one of them being a huge pile of work for Pilla, so it was just me this week. The only jobs I could do/had to do were planting the new raspberry canes and blackcurrant bush. We both love raspberries and the ones we got from the allotment last year were so tasty we’ve decided to double up this year and get some more canes. We’ve gone for a variety that fruit off this years canes (the other ones we have grow on last year’s wood, so you have to chop down this years growth, and separate the new stuff. It’s not a massive pain, but it is more work). The new variety you just chop all the canes down at the end of the year and they all grow back the following spring. This should hopefully mean we get early fruit from one set and late fruit from another – in theory we could have fruit from May until November.
The blackcurrant bush is looking a little sorry for itself – I’m not sure if there was a problem with the delivery but the one we got looked like it had been in the post a while. I’m not hugely convinced it is going to thrive. Elsewhere, I was desperately looking for signs of growth (I know there will be more this week because I had a sneaky mid-week-post-work visit) and found a couple. No signs of growth from the garlic or shallots disappointingly.
I’ve been looking at the pictures from last year and I think we must be at least three weeks behind spring last year.
by Neil Wilkinson | Mar 7, 2010 | Allotment
Ok, well maybe it hasn’t quite, but it definitely felt like it today. We spent all day at the allotment, there was the monthly meeting this morning, followed by a bit of noseying about the place and signing some new people up. By the time we got to plot 97 the morning frost had disappeared and we got to work. List of things we did:
1. Pilla planted a full bed of two types of garlic (I think this is about three times as much space as last year.
2. Pilla planted a full bed of two types of shallot (about twice as much as last year)
3. I broke down a lot of pallets to finish the fence
4. I finished the raspberry support I started last week
5. We emptied the old compost pots from the greenhouse and filled up some of the beds with it.
This last job is particularly satisfying as the dark compost gives the plot a kind of instant make over – masking the weeds and just making everything look ready for planting in.
Sorry for the quality of the pictures, I was quite looking forward to taking some but the camera batteries were dead.
by Neil Wilkinson | Feb 23, 2010 | Allotment
Once again we could do no work at the allotment this weekend due to the snow. There was maybe 2″ – 3″ and well, digging would not have been fun in that. Our hardy little rhubarb was almost the only thing poking through the snow, every week it tries to grow only to knocked back by some severe cold. It’s almost a little sad that once it does finally grow it’s destined to be eaten!
Despite the snow on Sunday, it was a really bright spring day on Saturday. This sent our chickens into overdrive and our nine birds produced seven eggs, including one white one from the new Campines. We also had a quick chat to Bob D and it seems we might be getting a few more of the little Campines soon.
The cold weather means we’ve been getting to see a lot of Tommy/Smudgie (we’re not really sure) in our greenhouse. She’s a cute podgy little thing with a very grumpy face!
by Neil Wilkinson | Feb 17, 2010 | Allotment
We finally ticked a long term job off this weekend. We haven’t really made a lot of progress on the list of ‘things we must get done this winter’, for a variety of reasons but this week replaced the fence at one side of plot 97. Our plot neighbour had put up a fence of pallets when she got her plot, which did the job, but lots of weeds seemed to enjoy growing up the middle of the pallets which made it pretty hard to clear.
With the help of Bob we managed to take down the old fence, move a tons of bricks and stone, clear the weeds, hammer in the stakes and attach the rails. Not bad for a days work – all we have left to do to finish it (we could leave it like it is now, but it wouldn’t match the fence we so painstakingly built when we first got the plot, can’t have that!) is break up some pallet to create the vertical pickets and then paint on some preservative.
Whilst we were doing this we were accompanied by two very friendly little robins who seemed to enjoy eating the bugs and things we were turning over in the soil.
Elsewhere on the plot, things are slowly, very slowly coming back to life. We saw the first signs of growth on the blackberry bush and a couple of the snow drops are starting to flower. It’s still too cold to say it feels like spring, but you can sense its just around the corner.
by Neil Wilkinson | Jan 24, 2010 | Allotment
Well it’s been a while. What with the pre-christmas snow, christmas, being poorly before new years eve, the holiday (and proposal!) and the big freeze in January we haven’t been able to do anything for what seems like months. We popped down today with Leona but didn’t really get into any heavy work, apart from checking a few parsnips.
The allotment seems to have survived the cold pretty well, there have been a few burst pipes around the site but even they provided some pretty ice sculptures! Even the chickens have coped pretty well thanks to some left over straw from the christmas show. I felt most sorry for the rhubarb – it had launched back into life following the warm autumn, obviously thinking it was spring, before being clobbered by 6 inches of snow. It has now definitely gone back into it’s proper winter mode.
Today we realised we still have quite a lot to get done before the spring comes around and we are probably not able to spend much time there for the next two weeks. We need to build a new fence on both the old and new plots, sort the old shed out, sort the raspberry beds out and generally get everything ready for the madness of April. Still, there are hints that spring is not that far away – today we noticed our first growth of the year along the front border, we think it’s some of the snow drops we planted in september poking through.
We also heard some sad news from Bob – Tammy, our favourite little friendly allotment cat who had been taken in by Vicky after going blind, died last week – she fell asleep on a pillow and never woke up. Bless.
by Neil Wilkinson | Jan 16, 2010 | Allotment
We’ll try and do a more detailed update tomorrow but in the meantime we’ve got some new chickens to show off. Bob has got some Campines from the farm next door and converted a bit of the shed to a new coop. We have three new hens and two very loud cockerels!
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