Filed under: my allotment | Tags: aching, bindweed, cultivator, frog, garlic, international kidney, jersey royal, onion, potato
Well, the weather held out for us today, and after lunch we trundled back to our plots. Despite some weather reports indicating an earlier start to the stormy weather and high winds, we had plenty of sunshine interspersed with small patches of rain and only mild gusts of wind.
We split our attentions again today. I remained on the rectangular plot and my husband continued to use the brush cutter on the fruit plot. I started doing some digging over, and removing what turned out to be a whole network of bindweed roots. This plot is not going to be as easy as I first thought! However, it’d be boring I suppose if it was easy.
After digging the width of the plot (measured today as 7.2 metres - the length is 14 metres), I started back along, discovering a tiny frog along the way. He was bright red, and very fascinating to my daughter who wanted to hold him. I gently moved him to a sheltered place further up the plot. I’d like him to stay because I’m hoping he’ll feed on any errant slugs!
My husband convinced me that there was little point continuing with the digging and that we’ll do what we can with the cultivator next weekend. However, he did dig over a corner section of approximately 3.5 metres by 2 metres so that I could plant some of my sets and seed potatoes. We laid down some weed suppressing membrane and weighted it down with bricks (for the predicted wind). I managed two 3.5 metre rows of brown onions, and two 3.5 metre rows of red onions. I also did a row of garlic, and, I planted my seed potatoes (12 potato seeds in all - Jersey Royals also known as International Kidney).
On the fruit plot I helped trim down more of the bramble that has been slowly strangulating the currant and gooseberry bushes. My arms are now cut to ribbons, so my tip of the day would be to wear long-armed gloves when cutting back brambles!
There is still lots to do. We need to pull all the waste stuff into the centre of one of the plots and burn it to dispose of it, but today, because of the threat of high winds and having to be mindful of the neighbouring houses and flats we decided against it.
Onwards and upwards though! We’ll get the cultivator this coming Friday and see how much we get done with that. This should give my husband and I plenty of time to recover from our aching backs and muscles!
