My Life In Poo

I wonder if I should use this the title for my memoirs or perhaps, Manure for the Memories?

The day started, as what has become the norm for a Saturday, by collecting the poo trailer at 9am. Chris was about today so we had a bit of a chat about nothing in particular. Chatting about nothing in particular is a special bloke skill.

During the week, on a day I finished a bit early, I thought I would spent a few minutes pondering my navel at the lottie. I should know better. I thought I will just move a barrow load of poo from the my bin onto bed 1 just to see how far it would go and check the quality of the manure. I had a rush of blood to head and ended up shifting the whole bin and completing the manuring of bed 1. The next few worth of trailering will be going in my newly emptied poo bin. I can not see the trailer out the rear windscreen so I have no chance of reversing the trailer down the path to my plot. I have to unhook it and walk it. Fortunately it is down hill so I only have to make sure it does not run away with me. I done that before! Then it is just a matter of shovelling the poo into the bin. The bin looked really full with just one trailer load. The thought crossed my mind that if the bin so full with one trailer what I am going to do with a trailer full a week until Christmas. Since I had wellies on I jumped into the bin and stamped the poo down. I reckon I could get ten trailer fulls in the bin with a good stomping on each fill.

I had another appointment for a lesson in pottering so I had to go home after the poo wrangling. After cup of tea and a change of clothes it was off to Ashby for the next installment. However, before tea and clothes and whilst waiting for Miss L to grace us with her presence I had a strong urge to dig. The front garden at home has been under half a ton of manure all winter. It is starting to turn green. I have put off turning it over for a few weeks but I could resist no longer. I got busy with the fork and within twenty minutes it was all dug over. The end near the house is still just sand. Thirty odd years after the house was built and the sub surface is still a builder yard. Later in the day I was able to bring another couple of buckets of manure home from the lottie to bolster the sand pit. Another few bucket fulls are going to be needed to make the area viable as a garden.

Young Miss L needed a lift into town to see her mates and in the spirit of saving the planet one journey at a time H and I went to pottering lessons and L to meet her buddies. L was charged with get something for her Mum's birthday. After major negotiations I was relieved of a quantity of cash and L was sent of with instructions. I managed to slip away to get H a birthday card and a small prezzy. I do not think this was a very successful lesson. I was distracted by the itch to get back to the lottie and barrow manure on to bed 4.

One of the plot holders has access to manure as well. He built a big corral at the back of the car-park at the top of the plot and has been filling it since autumn last year from his four pony source. It is ready to use. We also have a small poo corral at the bottom of the plots. Dave G, "Roundup" as has been affectionately christened, has started filling that bin whilst we empty the top bin. It took fifteen barrow loads to complete bed 4 and a long walk. My plot is as far away from the top poo bin as it is possible to get on our lottie.

I had another result this week. I was on an errand to the post office in Ashby which takes me past Woolies. Woolies had a new lot of plants in boxes. I spotted they had Sauvigon Blanc grape vines and at half price, just £2.49! Four please missus. Don't wrap them, I'll take them with me.
The vines had already started to sprout. As soon as I got home I potted them up. The planting stations are not ready at the lottie. A few weeks growing on on the greenhouse at home will be a great start. I now have all the vines I need for the lottie and at a fraction of the original estimate of £120.

One of L friend's Mum is a primary school teacher. She came round to asked me about seed potatoes. The conversation lead into what they do at school and why they do it. The resources available and the limitations. They have had a series of raised beds made and no one to work them. Whilst I did not volunteer out right I did promise to do her a crib sheet on easy to grow vegetables. Whilst writing up the crib it is amazing how many plants are easy to grow, will stand neglect and yet perform well. I think I might ask if I can set it out. If it is big enough I could do a potager if not, I could use the square metre gardening principle.

Everything is growing in the greenhouse despite the cold snap we have had. Next week I might tackle the back garden. It is probably a days work to prepare the salad bed and weed the fruit beds. then there is the fun of trimming the Willows. I have some prep to do on a new bed and the Sweet Pea screen. More about that when it happens.

It is H birthday on Monday so as a treat tomorrow we are off to Leeds Armoury followed by lunch at Pizza Express. H has got interested in development of weapons and the history of the people who used them in the context of English history. I think this is in part due to my introducing her to the works of Patrick O'Brian. O'Brian wrote a twenty book series on the adventures of Midshipman Jack Aubrey and his rise to Admiral Aubrey of the Blue and his "particular friend" phyiscian & spy Stephen Maturin. The action takes place all over the world during and after the Napoleonic wars. H has always had a strong interest in history but mainly from the Industrial Revolution. H would assert that it is the recent history that shaped us. I lean to the shaping of a people from the development of England as an entity since the Dark ages. I read a very interesting book by Melvyn Bragg called The Adventure of English. It is biography of the English language and therefore about its people.

Time to go. We off out tonight with our friends the Peter's to sample the delight of The Chequers

Community Area

"Community Area" it is an unwieldly name for the space where the Patios now live. The community area is an awkward space at the top end of the plots. On the plans it is called the community orchard. Weeds would not grow in that soil, if soil is the right word for the ground. Planting fruit trees was thought to be pointless and probably fruitless. A few years ago we split the "orchard" into two pieces. The bigger area, which is more or less square, we let to a lady who prefers to grow flowers and do garden design. She previously had a quarter plot which was getting a bit small. The plot we devised is bigger than her old plot but smaller than a half plot. I spread out the muck pile that was nearby and dug it over for her. That too was a February but I was doing at night illuminated by my car headlights. I remember it being bitterly cold.


Last Easter I finished the Patios. I had intended them to be round but I broke a borrowed Shtil saw so only one got to be round, the other two had to left be uncut. You will know if you having been following the blog that each weekend an hour is devoted to poo collecting and spreading on the community area. Well I finished that job this weekend too. The flagstones of the patio are two foot square or two foot by three. If you look carefuly you can work out that: the top patio is 14 foot in diameter, The middle one is about 8 x 12 foot and the end one is about 6x10 foot. That leaves us with a a manageable planting area and somewhere to have BBQs etc. The community orchard has been moved. It now runs up the left hand side of the drive away just beyond the car in the picture. I have plans to plant it up in a few months once the muck has had chance the break down.

Glorious Winter Weather

The cold I thought I had shrugged off kicked in again this week. I have been struggling since Wednesday. However the weather continues to be clear by day and by night. That gives sunny days which are not that warm since it is below freezing every night. The sun is still low in the sky during day so it is not that warm.

I finally finished bed 1 that I have been working on this past few weeks. I had a big session yesterday. I figured that if a pressed on I could have the bed ready before the weather breaks as it surely must. The area that I worked was my biggest days digging for a long time. I dug about twelve foot of bed. Given it is sixteen foot wide and I went down a little more than a spit that is some volume of soil moved.

You can see in the picture i now have a nice neat edge to the left side of the bed and path between the green wind netting and the edge of the bed. I finished that off today. I banged in the pegs and fixed the edgeboard to complete the edging. I had already fixed several yards of edge board starting at the bottom of the picture. Once the edge was complete I then dug all the weeds out of what was to become the path, levelled it and laid carpet on top. I was collecting stones in a bucket as I went along. On reaching the cross path, half way down the plot, I came across the drain I put in a few weeks ago. I made a shallow, square box shape in the soil to the depth of the bottom of the drain and dropped in the collected stones. I levelled the area so now it is neat and tidy. I tried my wheelbarrow round the path. I can get it round the whole bed now. The next job is to continue the edging up bed 2 and continue the path. Bed 2 was prepared in late summer so it just requires turning over to dig in the green manure and pull out any weeds.

Half way through the day H turned up. She had been out for a walk. I think she was angling for a lift home or a cup of tea. She is not that fit at the moment and walking is her new "get fit" regime. I made H a brew on the my Trangia and shared some of my chocy bics. We sat on Steve's bench and watched the world go by for a ten minutes. Since the world at the lottie is quite we had to settle for wheeling Buzzards, flitting finches, Tits, Dunnock, Robin and a vast flock of Wood Pigeon settling into the coppice. Refreshed with tea and biccies H walked home. Finishing the bed of meant harvesting the remaining Leeks. Some were starting the go soft so it a timely harvest.

A Beautiful Weekend

I managed to shrug off my cold by Thursday. The weather has been quite benign for the last few days. The wind has been keen but in sunshine and out of the wind it was quite warm. The clear skys let you track the sun. You can see it's track is getting higher overhead and consequently the evenings are drawing out. Sunset was at 17.00 more or less, this weekend and both evening we were treated to a dazzling red end to the day. I was at the lottie on Sunday at sunset and watched the sun dip behind the hedges and light up the wispy clouds.

The high pressure over country has lead to clear skies during the day and frosts at night. We have not had any rain which has allowed the soil to dry out. Now it is just right for digging. I had a three hour session on Saturday and same again on Sunday. I managed to prepare sixteen foot of bed. Only twelve left to go. The last twelve foot will be easy because this is where the root crops lived and as they were harvested over the winter nothing has had a chance to grow into the spaces. On Sunday I bagged the remainder of a row of carrots. It was a motley collection however the good ones are just the right size to go into a stew uncut.

I fed the worms. Fettled the compost bin. Topped up the bird feeders. The birds seem to have discovered the feeders after ignoring them all winter even thought they were full. I had lots of visitors as well. The sun brought out most of the plot holders and they all had to visit my plot at some point. I guess that is my burden as Secretary. I am determined that this will be my last year as Secretary.

Back home I laid out the seed potatoes to chit and filled a couple of trays with compost ready to plant one evening this week. All the seeds in the greenhouse are away despite the frosts. The greenhouse gets the sun early so it soon looses it's chill. It still have to sort out the "spring shelf" for the greenhouse. In the spring I have two extra shelves in the greenhouse for the proliferation of seed trays. The extra shelves come down when the Tomato plants reach the underside of the shelf and by then the seedlings are ready to be planted out. I am just waiting on the delivery of my fruit trees which I hope will be here any day now.

I gotta cowld in mi doze!

Nothing much happened, lottie wise, on the weekend of the 25/26th Jan. I just dropped another trailer of poo on the long border. I was able to have a hour off work during the week to pop over to the timber merchant for some gravel boards. They are part of the continuing job of edging the plot. The weather has been too wet or freezing cold to be able to fit the boards.

Heading up to the Society's AGM is no time to come down with a cold. It kicked in with avengence on Tuesday night. Staff problems at work meant I could not stay off to be poorly in peace. Friday evening was the AGM. Only a third of the plot holders turned up which was very disappointing especially as I was so ill but still made it. I am still the Secretary but we do have a new Chairman and a new Treasurer. I stayed on after the meeting for a little medicinal Guinness. Its good for you, say the old adverts. A couple of pints and a walk home in the in the breezy weather lifted my spirit if not my cold.

We woke up a Saturday to a thin blanket of snow. It is funny the light you get when it has been snowing. I wish I had been feeling better. I had an appointment with the poo trailer at 9am. It was pleasant ride out through the snow covered fields. The long border is "poo'd out. I am on with the community area now. About three trailer fulls should see that right. The weather might dry up enough to let me get back on my plot for spring preparation, essentially more digging. Trailering muck was all I could manage at the lottie. Went I got home Hazel decided that instead of being ill around the house we would go out for my continuing course of lessons in pottering. Apparently people go to town and garden centres and wander about "getting ideas" and picking up the papers. This has is a alien concept to me. In my world if you do not have something, you find out where it can be bought, you go there, buy it and come back. Hazel is trying the teach me "another way". As a stage in my rehabilitaion we went to see the Potatomen of Newhall. I wanted to see if the seed potatos had come in yet but also to buy some potting compost. Following on the from the Potatomen we were to go to Ashby for "the papers" and a look round. Gentley does it. It was with a happy heart that I stepped into the Potatomen shop. As I drove up there were cars were parked up in front of the shop. Double yellow lines mean that parking is only for the collection of heavy things. I spotted Gentlemen of a certain age staggering across the pavement with heavy lumpy sack. It could mean only one thing - the seed spuds are in.

The shop was busy with flat capped and anoraked Gentlemen bustling round with their orders. I had an advantage. I had H with me. It aways gets them going having a lady in their midst. H was offerred the chair by the fire whilst the chaps had their orders totted up admidst more bustling and banter broken by an occasional guffaw. No cheques here, all cash as near as damn it to the calculated bill. Change is almost a foreign concept. Goods are bought up to a round number or forfeit of the change on either side depending on an unspoken understanding of the swings and roundabout of their trading history. Each party understanding what is fair. I took my turn. In the true English fashion everyone knows their place and everyone else's place, in the queue even if the queue is not formal, one knows who is next. I took my place, enquired after yer man's health as the order was collated. The runner was sent for the potato order which was already bagged up and labelled whilst the boss weighed out the onion sets, red into one paper bag, white into another. Shallots were counted and bagged. I wanted some compost, after all that is what I had come for, the seed potatos were a bonus. The trouble was that I did not have enough cash for both. I had decided to take the spuds and sets. In the time honoured tradition they asked me what I really wanted. They too knew the seed spuds were a bonus seeing as how they were in really early this year. I rounded the bill up with seed trays. I declined their offer to take the goods and pay later but they insisted, in fact the runner already had been despatched to put the compost and seed spuds in my car. The bill was part paid and the outstanding sum agreed. On driving back to Ashby and no distance from Newhall I spotted a cash machine. We raided the machine and went back to the potatomen to settle the outstanding debt. Honours served all round.

H does not mind coming with me to the potatomen. Their shop always smells earthy. Not surprising since it filled to the rafters with bags of compost, sand and assorted gardening chemicals both organic and inorganic. It is like the shops we knew as young kids growing up in inner city Manchester and Salford. Un-heated, fit for purpose and unadorned with styling or frippery.

Back in the 21st century wandering down Market Street, Ashby H takes me into the paper shop to collect a paper. I am glad I gave up my paper round. There must have been a choir of paper in the single publication. This is not news to me [no pun intended] but I was surprised at just now many paper of this size were being bought. Whilst strolling back up Market Street I saw Woolies had the stand outside the shop selling bare root plants at "half price NOW!". £3.99 buys you a Black Hamburg Grape Vine. The same thing from a garden centre is £14. So for me it is almost four for the price of one. So I bagged two Hamburgs and two white grape call Aurora. I need four more for my mini vine yard so I will keep an eye on the Woolies bargain bin.

I had to go to a shin dig on Saturday night which went very well. It left me and H a bit jaded on Sunday morning. A little later in the day in made up some of the trays with the compost and planted the first batch of Pea - Feltham First. Five trays at sixteen per tray. I also looked out some big pots and potted up the vines. The roots all showed signs of growing. I will leave them in the greenhouse to give a sheltered start although they are outdoor varieties. It will also give me time to finish the border path which will include the planting stations for the vines. All the seeds I planted last month have germinated in the greenhouse so the year is really underway.