Life on my allotment - the beginning

[Suzanne B]

Well, after a year of badgering and cajoling and being told off by a certain member on here ( yes we all know who it is don't we goosey!) I have decided, that the time is now right to start my little allotment blog.
I've had my allotment for 3 years now and am still trying to work out some sort of order in it but as it is the highlight of my life I thought I would share the ups and downs of being a novice allotmenteer on here.
I will start at the beginning when it all began in 2009 and I was allocated this plot at one of our local council run allotments.





As you can see it was a bit of a field so needed a bit of vision (which I sadly have little of ) but we did our best, put a small section of carpet down to kill the weeds, borrowed an industrial strength strimmer and and set to to build a shed.



And here is the shed which was quite a curiosity and adimired by many!


and 3 years on it's still standing, although I can't shut the door on rainy days.

Well that's my first little installment done and dusted and the scene is now set . It only took me two hours to find the photos in amongst all my thousands of irrelevant ones so I shall depart and return later with more scintillating tales.

[Drosera]

It looks wonderful!

[Suzanne B]

Hope you're not being sarcastic there.
It does get better I promise. I'm in the process of finding some nice photos of my progress without members of my family in them looking silly or carrier bags and mounds of 'work to be done' strewn about the place.
Anyway, thank you for your kind words but don't get your hopes up for a RHS garden. (I feel I am building myself up for a great reveal that will actually only disappoint but what can you do when you have great plans and then end up following a butterfly or ladybird round the allotment for hours!!...)

[paul m]

Takes me back to when I had my first allotment.
Looking forward to see how you progress..... I might even get out some pictures of mine ... before they built the road......

[Suzanne B]

How sad that they built a road on it.
Some of the allotments around me (although not too close thankfully ) are works of art and have had so much love and time put into them it would be such a shame if the same fate befell them. We were first allocated an allotment many years before the one we have now, that was next to a man who grew prize winning flowers and everytime we went up ours he used to whizz in and tell us to stop doing things as it would affect his flowers! And god help us if we had a bonfire!! I know he was passionate about it but it got beyond a joke and we used to dread going up as he would always pop up out of nowhere and moan at us.....so we left, and thank goodness we did as luckily we got this one which is much better situated and all our neighbours now are so lovely, helpful and encouraging it's like heaven going up there.
Don't forget to put your photos on Paul, I love seeing other allotments and getting ideas for things we haven't thought of or tried before.

[Suzanne B]

This week has been quite industrious for us, especially with all this lovely hot weather.
We finally bought our very own cordless strimmer!! After 3 years of debating whether cordless ones would be any good for us we have now decided it actually is a god send and enabled us to start trimming all the tufts of grass which have built up around our beds over the winter. It now looks much more respectable and was fun in the process.
We decided to plant some parsnip seeds as they did very well last year. The only downside is the preparation it takes to plant them. We had to dig two deep trenches and sieve all the dirt to make sure there were no stones to hamper the parsnips growth and then put it all back again (should probably have been done earlier but I only get help when the weather turns nice ) anyway this turned out to be a very laborious task indeed hence why there are only 2 rows. We also planted a row of spring onions inbetween them so as to make the most of the space. (Bottom left of the photo...although you can't actually see anything thought it would be nice to know where they were. )



We had a bit of wildlife activity as well, some tawny mining bees and a comma butterfly both making the most of the flowers on the gooseberry bushes.



I have also planted shallots (end of Feb) which have just started to grow shoots and 80 onions (got a bit carried away ) which are still to show signs of life.
So all in all a good end to March and roll on April!

[goosey]

Originally Posted by paul m

Takes me back to when I had my first allotment.
Looking forward to see how you progress..... I might even get out some pictures of mine ... before they built the road......

Thats really awful, were you not offered a replacement, mind you it wouldn't make up for the years of love and toil people had put in.

There are a few allotments just inside our NP, beautiful some of them real works of art. But over the last few years as the leases have ended they have not been renewed leaving just 3 or 4 scattered allotments now, all the old partitian fencing and sign of the old ones gone and nature has taken over and in some cases you wouldn't have known anything was there. They did have to be strong fences, on a couple of occasions the Highland cattle or ponies had broken through and got in to the plots eating the the spoils of labour when I went past.
The allotment holders which were there were given plots a little further up the road, but just outside the NP where access was easier, right little communities and jolly places by the looks of it.

Originally Posted by Suzanne B

How sad that they built a road on it.
Some of the allotments around me (although not too close thankfully ) are works of art and have had so much love and time put into them it would be such a shame if the same fate befell them. We were first allocated an allotment many years before the one we have now, that was next to a man who grew prize winning flowers and everytime we went up ours he used to whizz in and tell us to stop doing things as it would affect his flowers! And god help us if we had a bonfire!! I know he was passionate about it but it got beyond a joke and we used to dread going up as he would always pop up out of nowhere and moan at us.....so we left, and thank goodness we did as luckily we got this one which is much better situated and all our neighbours now are so lovely, helpful and encouraging it's like heaven going up there.
Don't forget to put your photos on Paul, I love seeing other allotments and getting ideas for things we haven't thought of or tried before.

What a cheek! lucky you are out of that and are somewhere wher you are happy and just get on with things.
It must be nice to have a little retreat where you can just go and let the world go by .

An interesting and fun thread Suzanne, I look forward to your next installment .

[Drosera]

Originally Posted by Suzanne B

Hope you're not being sarcastic there.

Nope - serious!

[Suzanne B]

Thank you, I knew you were really but just thought I should check.

[Suzanne B]

Well, it's been a very disappointing week up the allotment this week what with a turn for the worse in the weather..... and this.....



I could say it was an extremely strong gust of wind that caused this but alas no, it was my son who decided to tap the side of the door to see how many woodlice fell out......well the answer was they all did!!
(all of whom were fine and trundled off, if a little dazed, to better place far, far away from us. )

So with our extremely limited skills and resources we had to try and fix it so our prized equipment would not be finding itself at a random carboot sale somewhere, sometime soon. After a lot of head scratching, huffing and puffing, moaning, blaming and resigning ourselves to failure..
Ta da!!


notice no close up. but it does the job.... I hope.



We couldn't get on with much up there due to the rain and wind but I was very relieved to see the blossom was still intact on the pear trees and all the fruit bushes continuing to burst into life. It's looking very hopeful up there at the moment and I can't wait for my next visit!

[goosey]

Originally Posted by Suzanne B

Well, it's been a very disappointing week up the allotment this week what with a turn for the worse in the weather..... and this.....



I could say it was an extremely strong gust of wind that caused this but alas no, it was my son who decided to tap the side of the door to see how many woodlice fell out......well the answer was they all did!!
(all of whom were fine and trundled off, if a little dazed, to better place far, far away from us. )

So with our extremely limited skills and resources we had to try and fix it so our prized equipment would not be finding itself at a random carboot sale somewhere, sometime soon. After a lot of head scratching, huffing and puffing, moaning, blaming and resigning ourselves to failure..
Ta da!!

Actually I am quite relieved to hear it was your son than did this and not vandals or thieves.

I would like to have been a fly on the wall (certainly not a woodlouse ) when all the head scratching, huffing and puffing, moaning, blaming and resigning was going on.

Keep us informed, I am enjoying your life on your allotment .

[paul m]

Here's our London allotment which gave us a lot of food (and exercise) back in the 80s!

[paul m]

Went to a fascinating allotment over the weekend (more a group of smallholdings really) with a lot of chickens, pigeons and rhubarbv.

But also an large number of Euphorbia plants: open day -

[Suzanne B]

Wow, that is really impressive! (I'm assuming the Eurphorbia plants are in the allotments and not his own private garden ). It looks stunning and just shows what can be done with a lot of passion and know-how.
And what a good idea to raise money from it as well. I wonder how they've faired this year with the changeble weather?

[paul m]

Originally Posted by Suzanne B

Wow, that is really impressive! (I'm assuming the Eurphorbia plants are in the allotments and not his own private garden ). It looks stunning and just shows what can be done with a lot of passion and know-how.
And what a good idea to raise money from it as well. I wonder how they've faired this year with the changeble weather?

Yes that's the allotment. I think they did very well this year; unusually, it was sunny at the time and there were lots of people while we were there (including a coachload and some folk from afar as Birmingham )

We shall see them again next weekend because they'll be at aa plant sale organised by the Hardy Plant Society in Sheffield.

[Suzanne B]

Here's a little 'gardening' (used in its loosest form) joke to keep you going while I sort out my next allotment post.


A man went into his local shop and asked the assistant “Do you sell potato clocks”?
“Potato clocks sir? I’m not sure what you mean,” replied the assistant.
“Well” came the explanation “I’m always late for work, and my boss said I would get there before nine if I got a potato clock.


(apologies if you were hoping for an enlightening post on my exciting life, but rest assured I have been warned and I shall endeavour to do a proper post pronto! )

[paul m]

I think I saw a horticultural joke yesterday. The plant Limnanthes douglasii is said to atract hoverflies so is often planted by organic gardeners. The flowers are white with a yellow centre so it is commonly called the 'poached egg plant'. This cultivar doesn't have any yellow so they have called it 'Meringue' ....

[paul m]

... did you see my invention for the one-armed gardener?

[Suzanne B]

I hope you've patented your inspirational invention, this time next year you could be a millionaire!!!

[paul m]

I miss having an allotment. I only have a small plot in the back garden now - keeps us in beans and green leaf most years - but going very badly this year.

[Suzanne B]

That looks totally idyllic to me, I would love to have a garden and what could be better than a vegetable patch at the end! ....and a shed!
Fingers crossed the weather will improve and you will reap the rewards of your labours from now on.

[Suzanne B]

Going on from Pauls post it has been a bit disappointing in my allotment so far this year as well. The weather hasn't helped with that lovely sunny period in March and then torrential rain and cold in April. My pear trees, which I planted last year, came out in the most glorious blossom in March and I was very hopeful that I may have had a handful of pears in the summer, unfortunately the extremely cold snap it took its toll and the blossom ended up black and falling off.

Very disappointing, I have noticed there are 2 blossoms that are still green so I have my fingers crossed they won't succomb to the general concensus and drop off!

Anyway back to more positives.
We planted our potatoes at the beginning of April. We usually have Maris Piper but last year they didn't do too well, they seemed to stop growing half way through and never got bigger than new potato size, so we have decided to try King Edwards this time.



The shallots are doing very nicely too, they already look nearly ready but apparently you don't pick them till late July/August so I shall see how they go.

(I have weeded them now, amazing how a bit of rain and sun brings them on so well! )

The onions, on the other hand , aren't doing so well. They seemed to have got battered down in the rain and now it looks like we had planted them too far down. Very annoying as there were 80 of them and I don't know if there is much hope for them or not.

And here is the first picking of the rhubarb. Very short but very tasty.
I've got 5 rhubarbs plants but they are all growing at different rates for some reason, so I am only able to pick about 4 or 5 sticks at a time.


And last but not least, here are a some of shots of the allotment taken a couple of weeks apart.

1st April 2012 7th April 2012 20th April 2012

To be continued.......

[Suzanne B]

Just a quick update as I'm up to my ears in Jubilee here!

Well it's been a bit trying here again with the weather being so hot one moment and then constant rain and then the cold.

During the heatwave phase we thought we'd better get ourselves a hosepipe before they were banned as heaving watering cans all about was getting a bit of a task. So, we decided that we should get a nice long hosepipe to reach the end of our allotment and after looking around found a nice looking 50 metre one. All well and good, attachments on, fixed to the tap, all going great and then.....kink after kink after kink! We hardly even moved it before it had tied itself in a knot! (well it wasn't actually me but my over enthusiastic other half, I just gave the appropriate look but really I knew it was his fault. )
We did get it watered and it really was a massive help but then we had to coil it back up again. 20 minutes later and after lots of raised eyebrows, red faces, dirty looks and words I have never heard before, it is now in a sort of coilish shape and residing in the wheelbarrow in our shed.....kinks and all!

Next day it rained! and hasn't really stopped yet.
Still, it has brought everything on nicely. Runner beans have shot up out of nowhere, I went on them Monday and there was nothing there and on the Wednesday they were 3 inches high. The fruit is doing well although not as well as last year.
Blackcurrant and Raspberry

What I have noticed this year is an abundance of ladybird larva. They are absolutely everywhere. I was going to strim as the grass has grown so fast but now I wouldn't know where to start so I shall have to wait or do it a little bit at a time.


This is the allotment as from 1st June 2012


And this is the path down to the other allotments, one who spends so much time there he has decided to dedicate it to the Jubilee. And it looks lovely.

[Suzanne B]

Well the Jubilee has come and gone, we've gone out of the Euro's, Wimbledon is upon us, the Tour de France is just about to begin......and yes..... it's still raining!
It's getting rather hard to spend much quality time up the allotment at the moment. We've had so much rain lately I'm thinking of growing rice next year!
Still at least the weeds and grass have taken advantage of my absence and grown as tall as an elephants eye.
But still all is well and things are still growing despite it all.

I found my first raspberry today on canes I planted earlier this year.

Looking a little stunted perhaps but welcomed nevertheless.

I had a rather painful time picking gooseberries earlier this week, I'm not sure why I planted them as I don't even eat them, but they have done well so that is why I love them.

and then I spent another painful 20 minutes picking off the gooseberry sawfly larva, not good.

Whilst looking round in search of ladybird larva (there have been so many this year and I'm still finding them now) I found one on a buttercup


rather precarious I thought but this was is today and it was still stuck fast.

Well apart from the gooseberries I had another painful experience up there today. As the stinging nettles and dock plants had grown so much and were producing seeds, I decided to cut them down with my secateurs. Now they were in a rather awkward place behind the pear trees and inbetween the flowers so I had to reach, I was merrily going along when a huge stinging nettle swung back right in my face! ouch....then, not to be put off by the tingling sensation all over my face, I was happily cutting them down again when I came across a tough one, so I pressed extra hard and realised it was tough because it was my THUMB!!!! Double ouch!! ( No photos you'll be pleased to know.) It doesn't half hurt but got me out of the washing up so all was not lost.

Anyway, I did managed to get a photo of the allotment as is today, full of grass and clover and a few veggies here and there!
Love it!!

[goosey]

Originally Posted by Suzanne B

Whilst looking round in search of ladybird larva (there have been so many this year and I'm still finding them now) I found one on a buttercup


rather precarious I thought but this was is today and it was still stuck fast.

Well apart from the gooseberries I had another painful experience up there today. As the stinging nettles and dock plants had grown so much and were producing seeds, I decided to cut them down with my secateurs. Now they were in a rather awkward place behind the pear trees and inbetween the flowers so I had to reach, I was merrily going along when a huge stinging nettle swung back right in my face! ouch....then, not to be put off by the tingling sensation all over my face, I was happily cutting them down again when I came across a tough one, so I pressed extra hard and realised it was tough because it was my THUMB!!!! Double ouch!! ( No photos you'll be pleased to know.) It doesn't half hurt but got me out of the washing up so all was not lost.

Anyway, I did managed to get a photo of the allotment as is today, full of grass and clover and a few veggies here and there!

The allotment is looking good and I am enjoying reading all about it what you are harvesting (I do like gooseberry and rhubarb crumble's and raspberries are my favourite fruit) poor you and your stung face - luckily you have your typing finger left, hows the thumb? Lucky you didn't do a lot of damage!

That larve was very sensible and must have known what it was doing to pupate there instead of the petal .

Nice update - keep it up .