Four hours, contd.

After lunch, I surface-weeded the bit below the row of onions I put in last week, and put in a long row of shallots. They were already growing in the allotment, left over from last year: I simply dug them up, divided them, and re-planted them. They might come to nothing, but if they are successful, I've got a crop of shallots for precisely nothing.

 

 

Below the shallots, I sowed two rows of Boltardy beetroot, and two rows of Perpetual Spinach/Leaf Beet. Then I called it a day. I was very parsimonious with the beetroot and spinach seeds, putting them in singly three inches apart. Each packet only cost 60p, but now I'm beginning to see the logic of Joe's insistance on saving seed and being very mean with it. Each beet "seed" is in fact a cluster of seeds, and will produce several seedlings, and if they grow three inches apart, that gives baby beet for weeding out and eating young, and mature beet for pickling.

In gardening, everything takes twice as long as you think

Today was warm enough to take my jacket off while digging, though I had to put it on again for weeding. I didn't achieve much today, but Vieve's rule of gardening is that everything always takes twice as long as you think it will. First, I brought over some artichoke plants from my old allotment and divided them and planted a row at the bottom of the allotment near the path. Then I transplanted two blackcurrant bushes and one redcurrant bush from the old allotment (between them they only had about 8 berries on last year). I'd brought over the rest of the compost I made last year. It was a bit stalky but better than nowt - no time to source some manure to put in the holes, nor even to clear the weeds around them very much. Lastly, I weeded a strip near the strawberries on my hands and knees using a hand fork, and sowed a row of perpetual spinach in it. The bit between the strawberries and the raspberry canes is the only bit not rotovated, and though it doesn't look too bad it is full of little plantains with fiercely strong root systems that are the devil to get out. This was where I planned to sow all my roots and saladings, but I think I shall have to rethink that plan.

More on exchange

I was digging away quite merrily on the Salvation Army allotment yesterday, when I heard Franco let himself in with an annoyed clang of the chains on the gates. He hates the fact that we are now supposed to lock the gates, and as I'd just locked them for the second time after they'd been left open, when he called me over, I thought he was annoyed with me.

"Young lady, young lady!" he called, "I don't know your name..."

I told him. "Maria?" he said.

I corrected him, for what it was worth - not a lot where my name is concerned - I shall probably be Maria now for the rest of my life with him, but I have been called worse - far worse.

He pointed to a pile of brown twigs on the path. I've got used to our mutual path being littered with planks, plastic bags, tubs full of water, weeds, and recently, even an old car mat.

But he explained that the twigs were the tops of his perpetual spinach plants which he had allowed to flower and set seed and dry out, and he was now offering to let me help myself to whatever I needed for the following year. "Sow them in April," he said, "no earlier."

I thanked him very much, and helped myself, resolving in future to save more of my seeds, like the Italians do. After all, why pay more?