A day off!

An enjoyable day digging in the sunshine yesterday. Amazing after several hours just how little I'd managed to achieve though! Still there are now two beautifully prepared beds (dug over - again - limed and then covered with weed fabric) ready for onions and carrots. The beds are about 4.5m long by 1.2m wide, with a 0.5m 'path' between them. I'm not planning on edging the beds at this stage as I'm not convinced they will stay in this format in the long term.



The (late planted) daffodils are beginning to make an appearance, as too are the tulips next to them. The garlic continues to grow well and I now have a loganberry, red currant, gooseberry and hazelnut to plant somewhere - all courtesy of 'allotment school'. The loganberry will be grown along part of the stone wall on the border to act as 'security, not sure yet about the red currant and gooseberry, and no idea at all about the hazelnut! It seemed like a good idea at the time to ask for one...

Birdlife
The birdfeeder was empty (well it had been two weeks!) and there were no signs that the squirrels had raided it, so obviously there is some birdlife on the site. The robin made a brief appearance shortly after lunch, but nothing else was spotted. I filled up the bird feeder and we'll see how it is by the weekend.

A depressing site
A friend came along to have a look for an allotment on the site, complete with map from the allotment office. We had a look at what was available and found very little worth considering. One allotment was relatively clear of trees but was a complete bog, and all of the others had some quite substantial trees in them. Not something anyone wants to take on. Not sure if he is brave/mad enough to take on any of the remaining plots. Another plot holder found some pictures of the site less than 30 years ago and it was completely thiving with what looks like all plots taken, sheds, greenhouses everywhere, and no trees anywhere to be see. It's all very depressing compared to now, if a photo was taken from the same spot it would be very difficult to see it was an allotment site (with about 170 plots) at all. And this is with about 90 of them taken now.

An association
Given the state of the site and apparent enthusiasm amongst new plot holders, and the need to decide how to spend the recent £300 award, I've been making enquires about how to start an association on the site. Currently a few of us have drafted a letter which will eventually be send on to the council to send out to all plot holders to see if there is sufficient interest in forming an association. Have to see how this one develops...