Four hours on the Lechlade allotment

I spent four hours on the Lechlade allotment today, in beautiful sunny weather, trying to get as much done as possible. First, I cleared a patch by the wall, and planted some near-dead strawberry plants that I'd rescued from Big John's allotment in Swindon. He'd hacked up a patch of them beside the fence because he wants to extend his lawn across both his allotments. I think it was a terrible waste, but not everybody loves strawberries as much as I do.

 

I then started planting potatoes. I'd brought in that cardboard box about half-full of seed Charlotte potatoes. I planted two rows before giving up. It was terribly hard work. First I had to clear the surface weeds, then I had to hack holes deep enough. I started off by hacking trenches with my Man Hoe (that's what I call it: it's a mattock, or Italian hoe, a zappa). I call it a Man Hoe because it is so big, and I resort to it when all else fails. It is usually "man enough for the job" (NB. irony alert!).

 

This job was done in fairly hot sunshine, and I am aching now and will probably be unable to move tomorrow morning. Nevertheless, I got two long rows in, so nobody is going to go short of new potatoes this summer. I have brought the rest of the Charlottes home and will plant them in my Swindon allotment. I still have a row of Jersey Royals and a row of Desiree to plant at Lechlade.

 

(The basket, by the way, is courtesy of Jim in the shop. He describes them as French, and they may well be. He chucked my two out because they were broken, but they're still good enough for carrying weeds).

 

After that and a long sit down in the shade with a bottle of water, I started on the easier work (the chair is a shop reject as well).

 

 

 

Plants which remind you of people, contd.

Today I planted a long row of raspberry canes at the Lechlade allotment. They may not produce anything this year, but next year there'll be a bumper crop. The ancestors of these canes were given to me by Shirley three years ago in deep November, and I was astonished that they survived having their ankles in soaking wet clay over the winter. The year before last they started producing, and last year they really started to come on song. The jam made with fresh raspberries is incomparable.

I though of Shirley as I was planting them, and of how pleased she would be to hear about it.

I also planted the rhubarb plant at one end of the row of raspberries and an asparagus plant at the other end. The rhubarb plant was given me by the nice Dutch lady who used to keep Indian running ducks and other fowl on her allotment, but was driven away by a combination of the alleged nastiness of Deanna (I think it was Taffy who alleged it, so it probably is fictional) and the thieving that was going on. Oh, no, I remember - (this is what I was told by someone else anyway) (was it even about them?) - apparently, the young lad who used to cycle in to feed the ducks had left them without food or water one day, so Taffy or his son took the fowl and said that if it ever happened again they wouldn't give them back. Oh dear, you can see how confused the story has got in the memory and the re-telling.  Anyway, when she gave up, the Dutch lady gave me that rhubarb plant.

The artichokes will remind me of Joe and Angelo. In the end, they were Joe's plants, which I dug up last year and planted on my old allotment, but which I hadn't yet got a crop from. But it reminded me of a time really early on when I was on the Salvation Army allotment when I must have been talking to Angelo about having some plants, but it was Joe who gave me some (which incidentally didn't survive), and Angelo, coming along later, said, "Oh, are my plants not good enough then?"

At Lechlade, I also established my water butt next to the compost heap, and put some bricks in the bottom to stop it blowing away or being easily stolen. You never know. The last thing I did was plant some tiny marjoram plants that I'd salvaged from my own allotment. They will in time grow massive and provide lots of nectar for the bees. The strawberry plants I put in last week have already picked up and are thriving.

Dom said he had forgotten about rotovating the allotment, because his father-in-law had died and the funeral was next week, but he would bring the rotovator in on Monday and start it off for me and "watch it run away with me" before going off to do something else.

A start at last

Last year was a terrible year because of the rain, and so far, this year hasn't been good because of the cold, but at last yesterday I made a start on one of my new allotments. On Pickards Field, I have moved from plot 59 to a smaller plot, no. 78. This was Old John's plot, but he is now too decrepit to work it, and Big John spent a lot of time last year keeping it up together for Old John. As Big John has two plots of his own, and has had umpteen heart attacks, he didn't want to have to do the same this year, so when he heard that I wanted to move from plot 59, he asked Old John if he'd consider handing the plot on to me. I got to know Old John well when I worked the Salvation Army plot, no. 77, and he knew that I'm a good gardener, so he agreed to let me inherit his plot. He said he would only give it up if I took it on. We went to the Council last year and signed all the papers. Since then, I'd only had time to transplant some raspberry canes and strawberry plants and sow some broad beans before winter set in, but someone rotovated about half of it for me in the autumn, and Nobby rotovated another quarter this week, so I've been able to start planting and sowing now without having to spend hours digging. Yesterday was just about the first nice day of the year, so I was able to put in a double row of spring-sown broad beans (Windsors), a row of Kelvedon Wonder peas (from saved seed), and a row of Jersey Royals (International Kidney) potatoes. I salvaged some compost from my old allotment (which no-one has taken on yet) to put in the potato trench and to put in the compost bin to get it going.

My other new plot is in Lechlade. The owner of the Antiques Centre, where I have a unit, owns the plot. It was cultivated by an old man who gave it up two years ago and died last year. Last year it was cultivated by an antiques dealer, who has since left the shop. It is in a sheltered, sunny spot and the soil is light and well-drained. Another of the antiques dealers has a rotovator and is going to rotovate the plot for me next week, so I'm feeling very lucky. His son helped me plant some strawberry plants on Friday, and I also transplanted a near-dead sage plant from my old allotment.