One Third of one Quarter

About 1/12! That's how much we've managed to clear and dig over so far!

We spent a few hours up there on Sunday clearing away the brambles and creating the mound of waste you can see below. Hoping that we can pile that up and get it composted down somehow!

Kathryn is in China until this weekend so I've been up there tonight and spent a couple of hours digging up the bramble roots, then I managed to dig and turn over a section about 4 metres by 2 metres...it's good old Darlington clay soil but has obviously been well looked after in the past and the clay makes it really fertile. I've pulled out as many bramble roots as possible, but will leave the dug part until the weekend in the hope it'll dry out and settle, meaning I can just give it a light rake and hoe and get a nice tilth!



The pic below shows the part we've cleared - about 4m x 8m! This should be enough space to get some planting in for the rest of the season. We're thinking salads, purple sprouting brocolli, celery, chard. Mainly stuff that we either have ready to transplant or stuff that has a short season.


























About a quarter of the whole allotment is taken up by raspberries. Most of the current fruiting plants are a bit old - I think the previous year's old wood hasn't been cut away. So the crop this year won't be brilliant, but if we're careful with our cutting back this year, we should have loads next year!

First Pics!

As you can see, we've got our work cut out! The patch isn't as bad as it looks in these pics, as a couple of the beds have been covered with plastic, so they will be up and running in a few days... A lot of the raised beds are also still in place, which is useful.

We'll find a use for the old greenhouse - probably stick some netting over it and use it as a fruit cage. We've also been given a greenhouse which we'll put up next to it. Our old shed from the house will also be patched up and put on to the allotment...just as a place to store tools and to go for a cup of tea!

We spent about three hours there last night and cleared about a tenth of the whole area! But also managed to pick a few cabbages, a bag full each of raspberries and blackcurrants. There's also a load of rhubarb and jerusalem artichokes to harvest, and we haven't even planted anything yet!

Rich

The phone call

Don from the allotment called on Thursday evening. Our name had finally come to the top of the list, we had been waiting for a year, but now we had a choice of two plots. I arranged to meet him Friday evening at 6:30.

I could'nt wait to tell Richard when he came in from work, I was sooooo excited!!!


Friday morning the excitement hadn't gone away: I bounced into work and said to my colleagues

"guess what......."

"you're pregnant?"


"No much more exciting than that.....we have got an allotment!!!"

K