The Hedges Family (No. 388)

On my way home, I saw this family working an allotment at the very far end of the site. They said they originally had three allotments, 388, 389 and 390, but they gave 389 and 390 up because they were too much work. Although I could see three generations of the family at work, I was told there used to be more of them, because the kids all came down as well.

She (Mrs Hedges?) said that the trouble had been that the allotments all around them had been derelict until recently, when they were mown, and they used to spend a lot of time simply controlling the weeds on either side.

They'd had their shed broken into two weeks ago, another reason to be glad the grass all round them had been mown - it was high enough for kids to hide in, and rumour has it that the local delinquents had cut a hole in the Council's new fence and were regularly coming in and out of the site. The Allotment Officer is aware of it though, and when I saw her, said she was planning to do something about it.

The Hedges' allotment was down to raised beds, which for once looked as if they were more than merely ornamental. They had some splendid loganberry (?) bushes on their plot, that were still producing.

A division of the spoil

Meanwhile, the Allotment Officer has been and divided some of the mown ones into smaller plots ready to rent out. But instead of dividing them lengthways, she's done it widthways, making two very thin strips out of one normal sized allotment. I think there'll be ructions when people start arguing as to where theirs ends and their neighbour's begins. So I was bloody lucky to get no. 59 when I did - a week or so later, and I'd have had to settle for a mere furrow.

(I must find out how wide medieval strips were and if the size has been inherited directly into allotments. I guess when the Allotment Act came in, it was all chains and furlongs).

On the New tonight, it said that in Cheltenham, they were getting 2-3 applications for plots per day now, whereas before it had been 2-3 per week.

Chris (Nos. 61 & 63)

I embarrassed poor Chris by asking if I could photograph him today as I was walking home. He has two allotments, nos. 61 and 63, which is separated by one which is overgrown, and apparently has been for three years. Today Chris asked me why the Council hadn't mown this one when they mowed all the other derelict ones, and all I could say was, they had a list, and I guess it wasn't on the list because someone is renting it.

Someone told me that this allotment is a cause of great frustration and annoyance to Chris, who keeps his two very much up together, and must be troubled by weed seeds and slugs from the one in between. Someone else told me that some people, whose gardens back on to the allotments, rent the allotment it backs on to so that they won't be troubled by gardeners.

I find it hard to see how this one can have slipped through the net for three years, but it's not the only one that was left derelict when the tractor came. Some people have got a lot to answer for.

Italian lettuce

I tried one of my Italian lettuces last night. I didn't like it. It's rather tough, and a bit bitter. I had it with French dressing, but even that didn't make it terribly palatable.

I have a whole row of these to get rid of. Perhaps I can interest my Italian class?

Cardoons

I also discovered from that wretched catalogue that what I thought was a globe artichoke is probably a cardoon. The picture I took of one on an Italian allotment in the summer looks identical to the illustration of a cardoon in the Chase catalogue, where it says: "Cardoon is a close relative of the Globe Artichoke with spinier leaves and a non-edible lavender flower head to cut and dry. The stalks are tender and delicious when stripped and cooked." So. There you are. No artichokes next summer after all.

Chase Organics

I did get this seed catalogue through today, though. It's from Chase Organics. I used to get all my seeds, etc. from Chase, back in the late 70s/early 80s when I had my first allotment down by the Unigate Dairy on the Wootton Bassett Road. That was when I worked in Swindon Pulse, and discovered all things that came to be known as "green".

Since then I find that Chase has become very commercial, probably out of necessity, and sells all sorts of rubbish, like Hinged Welly Keepers (for you to hang your wellies on when you come in, only £9.95), and traditional trugs for only £49.95. Who buys this stuff? It's easy to guess. Not the likes of me, that's for sure.

The cover of the catalogue looks as if they've had the same (amateur) artist since the late 70s. Does anyone wear dungarees any more?

When I opened it, I turned straight to the page on Weed Control, having a slight problem with weeds on the Cat Allotment. Only one page out of 108 was devoted to it, and there I was offered a flame gun for £185.95. Nothing I could spray on, of course, even though Lawrence D. Hills, the original organic gardener recommended some substance in the 1970s. No doubt that's fallen foul of health & safety or else ever more fanatical organic gardeners. Ah, well, I could always control my weeds with a root barrier (£16.25), a lawn edge (£13.85 for 10 metres - I'd need about ten), a weed wand (for targeted spot weeding, £26.75 - requires gas canisters), and the ubiquitous black polythene (£99.95 for a 90 metre roll, which is what I would probably need). I refuse to use polythene on the grounds that it doesn't kill weeds, it merely suppresses them, and they spring up the instant you take it off, and it is hideous).

Apart from a few fancy little instruments that would be neither use nor ornament on my couch-riddled plot, that's it. If you want to be organic, you have to suffer. Dig, dig, and dig until your back breaks!

Digging in C minor

Have just got back from the allotment after spending two hours digging, not my new allotment as I should, but the Salvation Army allotment. I should really let it revert to what it was before I took it on, and concentrate on my own, but it's hard to neglect it deliberately. Even more foolhardy, I'm digging a yard-wide strip the other side of the strawberries and putting boards upright in the soil to mark of "my" bit from theirs, and to draw a line between their slug-riddled, weed-infested half and "mine". Would that it were mine! They could even take that half off me should they so please. Donna told me all along, get your own allotment, but it's hard to put any commitment into a plot that's covered in perennial weeds and is rock hard and has clay less than 6" below the surface, when the plot you've been working on for two seasons has black soil that digs like cutting cake.

So I was feeling too despondent on my way home to take any photos, not that there was anybody there hardly. It was sunny and very, very windy, and now I shall have to try and get the knots out of my hair.