Allotment gardening

I take my two sons down to the allotment for a bit of exercise. With their wellies on they both enjoy running around and Nathan, who is nearly two, even tries a bit of digging - in between tasting clods of earth. I do a bit more digging but as I keep having to go and pick Nathan up off the ground, not too much. I have a chat with Jim, who has a plot near mine. He tells me that a couple who took on a plot just before Christmas and who had made a start on clearing a good bit of it, have just been told by the woman who owns the house that their plot backs on to, that it is actually hers. Jim says the couple took it well and cleared off. I can't believe it - what would I have done? I wouldn't have been best pleased, that's for sure. Apparently most of the plots behind the houses on Elm Road are rented by the householders. Most of them don't work them but just like to have that extra bit of land, so no-one else can do anything on them, I suppose.
After a bit of a chat, me, Matthew and a rather dirty looking Nathan head for home. I'll finish all the digging tomorrow.

I dig for three hours and make some serious in roads into the bit of the plot where I am planning to plant my potatoes. It is the biggest bed - 4.2 metres long by five metres across. I dig until my back hurts and take as much bind weed out as I can. I pack up with only a couple of square metres to go.

Another day off, another 10 metre-square bed dug over. Chopped a worm in half with my spade - felt bad about it. Do they really grow back? Can't imagine so. It was snowing when I started. There is now only a four metre by five metre bed left where I intend to plant my spuds. My strawberries are not looking too healthy in their seed trays. I've brought them in the house because I think it might be too cold for them in the greenhouse. The sooner this cold snap passes and I can pop them in the ground the better.

I dig another two metre by five metre area. There are only three bits to go now. I hoe down a few weeds around the broads beans and peas. The temperature has dropped this week so the strawberries might have to stay in the trays till the forecast steps up a few degrees.

I ask the HDRA for some more advice - on planting strawberries - and they agree with the advice that came with the plants. They should go in the ground asap - providing the earth isn't waterlogged or there is no impending frost. Once I've dug the next bed, the plants are going in, weather permitting.

I've been visiting my parents-in-law in mid-Wales. While there I spotted a pile of wooden planks my father-in-law didn't seem to be using. I asked if I could have them to make walkways between my beds and so we spent a part of one morning, sawing them to fit in the boot of my car. I come back to New Malden and find there is a parcel waiting for collection at the post office. I trot down with my eldest son Matthew - who is hoping it's a present for him - to discover 10 strawberry plants. I come home and put them in a couple of seed trays in the greenhouse. I take the wood down to the allotment and use it mark out the remaining beds. I've got four more to dig but I'm working for the next three days so it will have to wait till next week.

Valentines Day and what better way to celebrate than to go to the allotment and dig over another two metre stretch of my plot. As the HDRA has advised, I am trying to dig all the green manure in before the end of February. The way my spade bites into the earth and then lifts out a big clod of compacted ground is very satisfying - particularly when compared to September when I could not even make the smallest impression on the ground with my spade. An hour-and-a-half of digging is enough to turn over another 10-metre-squared patch. Only four more to do. I am still waiting for the rhubarb I ordered to arrive. But I spot eight of sow healthy plants on a neighbouring plot that is not in use. I have read that rhubarb needs to be divided every five years or so. Would it really be wrong to dig up two or three of these plants, divide them, put three back but then take the three offshoots and plant them on my plot? It is a moral dilemma I will have to toy with.

I go on a bit of a garlic hunt and manage to find some in Homebase. I buy three bulbs, go down to the allotment, put my string up again, get the dibber out and finish planting my row of garlic. Let's hope it looks nice and neat in a few months time.

After three days of dry weather I am hopeful that the ground will be dry enough for me to plant my garlic cloves. I turn the earth over in the bed again and break up the big clods. I then use one of the tools my predecessor left me to try and make the soil into as fine a tilth as I can. Then I stretch out a piece of string and, dibber at the ready, I break the garlic bulbs up into cloves. But, disaster. Because I haven't stored them properly, most of the cloves are rotten. I salvage the best ones and plant about six. I need to get my hands on some more bulbs. To use up a bit more time, I dig over the bed at the back of my plot - which was once covered in carpet. I had put down a layer of manure which I now dig in. The spade goes in easily enough. What a change from when the ground here was like sheet concrete.

I buy a bucket full of chicken manure pellets and head down to the allotment in the afternoon to do some of the tasks recommended by the HDRA.
Using a pair of shears I chop down some of the green manure and leave it lying on the ground. I then measure out the first of my beds - two metres long by five metres wide and begin to turn the earth over. This is where I am planning to grow my garlic but I soon discover the earth is too heavy to plant the cloves today. It sticks in great clods to my spade and my shoes. I keep going till I have turned the whole bed over. But I don't try to break up the clods - I'll try that later in the week if it is dry.
I then turn my attention to top dressing the wintering crops with the chicken manure. When I take the lid off the bucket, the smell almost makes me retch. It is vile. I scoop the pellets out and over the beans, peas and onions. It is not a pleasant job. Hopefully if the next few days are dry, I'll be able to make my first bed a bit more enticing for the garlic cloves and turn over another bed or two.

I am one of the first customers at the Malden and Coombe Horticultural Society's hut today. I buy seven kilos of seed potatoes - three kilos of Maris Bard for my earlies and four kilos of King Edwards for my main crop. I've never seen a seed potato before - they look just look like normal spuds. I also take the chance to have a look at my plot to see if the overnight winds have wrought any damage but am happy to see all my pea netting and canes still standing.
I decided to click on the members' only section of the HDRA website for the first time. I've been a member since October but have never felt the need before now. Wish I had. It has a "What to do in your garden" section and it is much more informative than any other site I've seen. Instead of merely telling me to wash my pots, it said I can plant garlic now if the soil is not too heavy, chop down my green manure before digging it in to allow the leaves to wilt. It also recommends giving the overwintering peas, beans and onions a boost by top-dressing them with chicken manure. It means I've got quite a few jobs to be getting on with. I also place my early seed potatoes in my youngest boy's bedroom in trays to allow them to chit out. I'm sure he won't mind sharing for the next few weeks.

After a couple of days of strong winds, I trot down to the allotment to see if my pea netting has stood up to the buffeting it must have received. A few of the canes have been blown over so I stand them all upright and push them as far down into the ground as I can. Now they should even survive a hurricane. Over the weekend I got a newsletter from the Malden and Coombe Horticultural Society which said seed potatoes were now in stock at the hut at the allotment site. That means on Saturday, I will have to go down a buy my earlies and maincrop and start chitting them out in the kitchen. Do you see how I now know all the lingo? Impressive huh?