Well, it’s been a quiet winter on the allotment. We’ve not had a huge amount of time to get down there and the weather has not been kind when we did have time. Just lately we have been able to get a few hours down there and have managed to start getting the plot ready for the year.
[flickr]photo:6786056506[/flickr]
Last week Pilla planted the garlic, this should ideally have been a couple of weeks earlier – it is said to thrive on a cold snap and supposedly relies on a frost to split the cloves properly but our previous attempt at planting found the ground still frozen! We might have missed the cold snap so it’s fingers crossed this year for it. It did give her a chance to use a rather fancy measuring stick we made last year. Bit of old pallet, glossed white and then drawn on with a Sharpie and it’s made a good planting guide for those allotmenters who are challenged when it comes to estimating distances!
[flickr]photo:6786056956[/flickr]
We dug up the old leeks today, the winter had made a bit of a mess of them, so they have gone to bulk out our compost. I had a bit of a tidy of the plots today; you tend to accumulate quite a bit of junk at an allotment when you take one over, from old plastic containers, to rotten wood, to all the bits of glass and rubble you find in the soil – it all adds up. One car full to the brim of the stuff and it’s now all gone and the plots look much better for it. I’ve also picked up quite a lot of 2×3 flags, my plan is to finish the path round the back of the shed and put the bench we have on a little patio area which should stop the weeds from picking through. These flags have been a pain – the plot looks loads better for having a proper path, but they are heavy and you need to shift them quite a long way from the car park to our plot.
[flickr]photo:6786068390[/flickr]
Pilla dug over one side of the big plot today whilst I was loading the car. We added about a tonne and half of compost to the plot in October and a casting of chicken mannure pellets last week and the soil is looking pretty good. Hopefully next week we’ll dig over the other side and this plot will be good to go for the season.
We remembered to bring the seeds back from the shed today along with some compost so we are going to have a look at what needs planting today in the heated propagator. I can’t remember from last year when we started, but we must be close to planting some chillis (and we have remembered we still have a load of chilli seeds from Shelley to plant this year – last year they got forgotten about in the fridge until after we got back from the wedding!).
Recent Comments