by Philippa | Apr 20, 2014 | Allotment
The long weekend started off uncharacteristically sunny and Neil managed a full afternoon down at the plots on Friday. He had a plan to do some DIY and build a new gate for the back of plot 118, as our ‘temporary’ one has been in use for about two years! He finished the gate in record time but didn’t quite manage a full coat of woodstain as it takes longer than you think to do a good job of it.
We both returned on Saturday. Lots of signs of Spring, blossom open on all the fruit trees which looks beautiful. Also, the tulips at the front have opened and added some colour. The daffodils that we unceremoniously shoved in far too late after we found them starting to sprout in the shed have even made an attempt at flowering! Very full blooms but only about 3 inches tall!
However, it is that time of year where it seems all you need do is turn your back for a moment and the weeds are abound. It gives you itchy fingers to just get blitzing everywhere and so for the first hour or so that is what we did. I weeded all of plot 97 and down the outside of the fence by the path as there were a lot of flowering dandelions that will soon be sending their seed out so heavily it looks like it is snowing! Neil cleared all along the back of plot 118 and I then cleared in front of the greenhouse where the weeds were coming through the membrane. After a bit of hard work it looked much neater all round.
Neil completed painting the new gate which I am very impressed with! He then started to dig over the front left side of the plot ready for planting the chitted potatoes sometime later over the weekend. As soon as you start digging, the robin who hangs around our side of the site pays a visit. He is so tame it’s almost like having a pet, he will come right up to you while you work and you sometimes catch him with a worm in his mouth! It’s easy pickings when you’re turning up hundreds of them at a time!
While Neil was digging I did some planting as I had a bit of a panic when I realised it seemed like we were a bit behind with sowing. I’m sure it’s all in your head at this time of year, all it takes is a couple of sunny days and it suddenly feels like you are running out of time to get things done! So I planted cauliflower (snowball), cabbage (candissa), broad beans (masterpiece green longpod), Brussel sprouts (hastings and Evesham special) and Spring onions (white Lisbon and lillia). So we felt quite smug on leaving on Saturday with how much we had achieved and there looked to be quite a difference between when we arrived and when we left!
by Neil Wilkinson | May 2, 2010 | Allotment
A mammoth couple of visits over Saturday and Sunday meant that we have ticked quite a few jobs off the ‘things to do’ list. While we didn’t have much sunshine (not totally unexpected for a British bank holiday weekend!) it was great weather for getting lots done and plot 118 was our focus. On Saturday, Neil planted out the last of our chitted potatoes, Charlotte this time, whilst I weeded the onion bed. The weather last week has been the perfect combination of warm and wet so there were weeds absolutely everywhere you looked. It’s difficult to know where to start but the priority had to be those beds with produce in them. So next for a blitz was the raspberry bed. They really need to be weed free as they are so shallow rooted so to try and keep on top of it we covered the cleared bed with a few sheets of dampened newspaper and then plenty of hops to form a barrier, which will hopefully last a couple of months. In a lucky twist of timing, Simon was wanting rid of several heavy sheets of tarpaulin so we relieved him of them to lay at the back of the plot where weeds and grass carpet the area. They should provide enough coverage to prevent further growth until we clear that fully, which might not be until next year.
On Sunday we planted out some flowers and evergreen plants that we had bought from the garden centre on Friday, after some more weeding of course! We have some echinops, lupins, tulips, iris and a lovely rhododendron (had to check the spelling on that one!) and Bob very kindly gave us some plants he had grown extra of which should give us plenty of coverage throughout more than just the summer months. Neil completed the front fence in almost record breaking time, but sod’s law meant that as soon as he took the lid off the woodstain to finish the job we had our first shower of rain.
To complete the general tidying up, Neil worked wonders with the area just behind the fence where there were a fair few neglected strawberry plants hidden amongst a mass of weeds. We know from experience that they are hardy little blighters so as he cleared the weeds he replanted the strawberries into their own raised rows. Fingers crossed that they take to their new location as it will mean many more strawbs this year than we first thought!
I managed to get out of any more weeding and set to planting out those seeds that can go straight outside at this time of year. So we now have neat (although not as neat as Bob’s) rows of parsnips (Countess and Imperial Crown), a half row of turnips (Purple Top) which will be successionally sown again later on and three rows of beetroot (Bolthardy, Chioggia and Golden). Lines of string mark them out until we can differentiate the seedlings from the ever appearing weeds. On plot 97 I also planted some 60 day broccoli (Raab) and two types of spinach (Medania and Perpetual).
Having seen everyone elses broad beans popping up outside over the last few weeks it was time to move ours from the coldframe to a bed on plot 118. I planted them out in a block but also included a further block of seeds which should mean a longer crop and greater chance of many more delicious broad beans than last year! Just seen the weather report after the news and there is a risk of frost tonight but hopefully this will be another example of them getting the forecast wrong otherwise some of our good jobs today may be scuppered!
Recent Comments