Four Foot of Bed

   I woke up this morning to a light dusting of snow across the garden. I had decided that I would spend a hour or so at the lottie today. I wanted to fill up the bird feeders since the weather has turned cold again. I got a spare seed feeder from home and took it with me along with the new stock of bird food. It was no surprise to find I was the only person at the lottie. The wind was bitter and there was snow in the air.

   I filled the feeders and hung up the new one. Almost straight away the birds were on the feeders. Great Tits, Blue Tits, Robin were competing the space on the feeders. The recent warm spell has got the worms going and they are working to make the muck pile into a thin spread of muck across the parking space. I shovelled the muck back onto the pile. That made the plot look tidier. The compo bin was getting dry so a tipped on a couple of gallons of water.

  There was about four foot of Bed1 that was prepared for spuds last year but was not planted. I got the spade a wheelbarrow out and started working along the row. All I had was to pull out the weeds. Docks, Rosebay Willow Herb, were the bulk of the offender with some Bramble, Red deadnettle, Creeping Thistle joining the party. The soil was quite dry but very cold. Down in the trench plying the spade I got very hot even without my coat. I plugged away at the soil and within in an hour I had dug over another four foot of the bed and created another wheelbarrow full of weeds. It was hard work but probably because in not having to dig up spuds I was able to move through the soil a bit quicker.

   Dave P turned up to do a bit on his plot. As usual we had a chat about the plots and our respective plans. I done the tasks I had set myself and was getting hungry so I packed up and went home. 

A Charming Day

   There was a definite feeling of spring in the weather today and yesterday. Bright sunshine although it was a frost overnight. I loaded Degsy with provisions and compost container from home and took my self off the lottie with the intention of lifting the last four rows of spuds. I remembered the tyre pump and the spanners. I was surprised to find I was the only one at the plots. Tyre tracks showed I was the first down on the old plots but not the first to have visited today on the new plots. I parked Degsy up as usual and got the first job out of the way which was dump the contents of the home compost bin in my big compost bin. It surprises my just how fast the compost bin works even in the winter. I will be needing to empty it before too long. Got to do weeding on the beds first. Next up was to check the wheelbarrow tyre. The pumped it up and hoped it would stay up. It did and it was still fine when I went home.

   So digging spuds...Well no. The lottie has been looking untidy and not just the beds. I got a braiser and started a small fire. I have been collecting bits of wood and saving off cuts from jobs but I decided they were making the place untidy and since I had not used the bits for a year they were of no use. I might come to regret saying that. Anyway I chopped the bigger bits down and fed them in to the fire. It was a pity it was not one of those super sharp winter days as the fire got going it was toasty. I laid the wetter pieces of wood on the rim of the braiser. The heat dried them out to where they would burn. Whilst the fire was going I went round to the back of the big muck bin and shovelled the muck that the worms had kicked out through the slats of the bin back onto the top of the heap. I replaced the chicken wire, badly, back in position. The path at the back of the bins got a sprucing up. The rolls of checking wire were stacked as where the planks. I picked any wood or combustible materials and placed them near the fire for feeding into the brasier as required. I took a walk round the plot and picked up any and all dried material including the cutting from the vines. They all took a turn to feed the fire. Over the course of the day the pile of wood disappeared into the brasier. The wind was perfect blowing gently from the south west which blew the smoke straight off the plots and across the open farmland. It also was just right to fan the flames. I took my super sharp pruning saw with me down the hedge line. I trimmed out the branches of the hedge that where encroaching on my plot. They also went on the fire.

    So digging spuds. I could not think of a reason not to so started a brew going whilst I got the tools set out for digging. I had a brew and chocy biscuit whilst I watched the fire. Jonny, one of the plot holders dropped by the contemplate his plot but left after a short chat. Jonny was required for his Sunday lunch. It 12.30 after all. I fed the fire some more of the diminishing pile of timber and went down to make a start on the digging. The digging was easy. The soil was in lovely condition for digging. The soil was really cold to the touch but it did not seem to be holding the Dock back. They were starting to sprout. The barrow was just the job. It was fully by the end of the third row. The spuds had not started to sprout but were small and had quite a out of worm holes in them. No wonder the worms were so fat the juicy. There were loads of worms in every spadeful of soil. A good indicator to the condition of the soil. I just plodded along, weeding and harvesting. I was getting weary but I was determined to get all the spuds up. This was the last of what pitiful harvest I had in the last season. Once the spuds were out I would make quicker progress on the weeding as I would not need to search for spuds or dig so deep. When the barrow was nearly full I put the kettle on the for another brew. I had finished the row and filled the barrow by the time the kettle was boiling.

   When the brew was ready the brasier had burnt everything down of a few inches of cinders. It tipped the ash out onto the patio and set the brasier to one side to cool down. I made a neat pile of the ash. There were plenty of cinders in the ash that had not quite burnt out. I got the deck chair out and with my back to the sun and facing the ash pile a had my brew whilst being toasted from both sides. I shut my eyes, felt the heat on me and just listened to the birds for a while. It was as much rest and peace of mind I have had in an age.

   Brew done it was back to the digging to push on to finish the row. I managed it finally. I just had to rake the soil into the uniform surface. I estimated the depth of the bed is 16inch but it will settle back to 12 or 14 inches.

 I had to be careful whilst digging because this bed is plagued with roots from the trees in the hedge. The champion root today was almost as thick as the handle of my shovel. 



  
 

   Whilst I was having a brew I saw that a couple of Great Tits were busy round the bee hive and I could see one or two bees on unsteady wings buzzing round the doorway of the hive. I took a few minutes to visit the bees and have a look in the hive. This hive has a glass "quilt" on the top so you can look in without exposing yourself to the bees. I could not see any bees so I lifted the candy covering the escape hole in the quilt. There were a couple of bees licking the candy so as of today I have a colony of bees but the winter is not over yet. However it is grounds for optimism.

   The last job was the shovel the cooled ash into the big compo bin.With sun still well above the horizon and main main task completed as well as a bunch of other valuable tasks, still having my back intact and having had a very charming day at the lottie I loaded Degsy up and trundled home.   

Who's Idea Was That?!?

  What a vile day. The rain is relentless. It is not quite cold enough to sleet so the rain is cold and blown on a bitter wind. No allotmenting for today you would think. The manure trailer needs collecting and emptying. Horses don't stop pooping because the weather is rubbish in fact they produce more as they eat more to stay warm. I trundled of in Degsy, window wiper doing their best to keep up with the rain and water thrown up from the deep puddles. When I got to the stables the ponies where standing in the stable block keeping out of the rain. I put them in their loose boxes before opening all the gates to get a trailer hooked up and pulled out into the car park. I secured the gates and let the ponies out. They stayed put. They obviously did not fancy being outside today.

   I trundled up the the lottie. The trailer was made extra heavy by all the water soaked up in the muck. I had been thinking of what to do with the hedge that borders my plot. The hedge is the border tot he allotment site so keeping it growing and full serves several purposes; shelter from the wind, habitat for the birds and beasties and security/privacy for the plot. The Willow we felled last year have grown back from the stool. In coppicing parlance the stool is top of the stump from which the new growth springs. The stools have thrown out dozens of new sprouting leaders. Each one has made 10 feet [3m] of growth. It is impressive in less than a year. The Willow obviously enjoyed the wet conditions during the summer of 2012. I drove Degsy round to the access path on the outside of the hedge boundary. There I dropped the tailgate on the trailer and shovelled the manure onto the base of the hedge. The soil in which the boundary hedge grows is utter rubbish. When the allottments were laid out a good job was made of the fencing and planting of the perimeter however nothing was done to improve the soil into which the hedge was planted. The "soil" was just blue clay from the landscaping of the ex-coal mine the allotment sit on. Over years I have put a mulch of manure under the boundary hedge. Ten years on the hedge is pretty well filled out and has many stout bushes and small trees. The hedge is mainly Hazel, Hawthorne, Willow [who's idea was that?!?], Dog Rose and Field Maple. This called an English mix. The Hazel tassels are out and the Hawthorne is beginning to bud. It was hot work shovelling the heavy wet manure and being dressed up to keep the rain out. H calls it "boil in the bag" work. A trailer load of muck does not go far on the hedge. 

  I skipped through the hedge with seeds to fill the bird feeder. I checked in on the bees. Although there was no movement I could feel the heat and smell the bees when I took the roof off. I saw that they had been at the candy. So room for cautious optimism that the bees have weathered the winter so far.        

Life Beyond the Winter and Weeds

   The weather has been very benign this past week, even spring like. I had business to take care of in Birmingham on Saturday morning so resolved to go the the lottie in the afternoon. I figured the few extra hours of sun and wind to dry off the soil would do no harm. It got the lottie about 14.30. The sun was heading for the horizon and I knew I had until about 17.00 before it was dusk. I filled the bird feeders and replaced the fat balls. I got the wheelbarrow out and thought it heavy to push even thought it was empty. It only took a second to confirm the tyre was punctured. There is another job to do. I did not have tools to take the wheel off so I had to work without the barrow.

   I had only one task on my mind and that was to dig up more spuds. I got the spade and the basket for the spuds from Degsy. As usual got got distracted. This time by some Dock sprouts pushing through the soil that I had dug over in Bed1 back end of last year. I spot weeded them and found they where just sprigs of root that had been left behind. Even through this cold snap the weeds are growing. It is depressing. I went back to main task in hand having restored the tilled Bed1 to it's weed free glory. I stepped into the potato trench where I left off last time. I started carefully digging and immediately cut a few spuds in half. Not a good start. Having gauged where the spuds where I continued easing the soil apart and dropping the spuds in to the basket and making a pile out of the weeds. The basket and weed pile where about neck and neck. Although the spuds I was harvesting were my main crop, Cara, the tubers where the size of my earlies, about Hen's eggs size. There were not many of them either. Cara usually crop well. However all the time these spuds were growing last year it was raining. I was pleased not to find any blight in the crop. I plodded up and down the rows. The main crop rows are set further apart than the rows for the earlies and with the reduced crop there was a lots of empty soil to move. Well...empty except for the Dock, although it was not too bad. The Robins must have been hungry. They usually sit on the grape vines and wait until I leave to get into the freshly turned soil. This time they were in and around my feet whenever I stopped to collect a stray spuds that missed the basket or just for a rest. I have no idea what they see to eat but they nearly always find something almost instantly. The wind was very keen but there was a hedge between me and it and I was bent over in the trench digging so I did not feel it's effects. The Sun, though low and weak, had warmed the soil and despite all the wet weather we have had the soil was not waterlogged even at the bottom of the trenches. I managed a couple of rows before the sun got too low and took the temperature down with it. I raked the spoil out to create a seed bed.

   I have only a few rows of spuds to lift. The next visit will clear them then I will be into straight forward digging of weeds. With a bit of luck the weather and time gods will be kind and I should have Bed1 dug over. When the puncture is fixed a should then be able cover the bed with the manure that has been maturing  in the big bin. Even through the worst of the snow the top of the muck bin was snow free.

  I noticed that some of the Rhubarb crowns are starting to bud. So there is life beyond the winter and weeds!     

A Bit Peckish

    Finally the weather has got to the round posts that hold up the netting over the middle of the plot. The two end pole seem fine which is a bit odd. The five pole along the centre line have rotted off just below ground level. It might be something to do with folk leaning on them whilst they chat to me but is alot to do with them sitting in sodden ground all last year. The improvement of the soil since I started the plot has raised the surface level with the effect the netting is closer to my head. I find that I have to stoop when walking round the plot. That is a bit rubbish so the replacement poles are going to be taller, not a lot taller but definitely taller.

   I put a little money by and have purchase steel fence post spikes and the posts to go with them. Since the poles where rotted out it was no trouble to remove them.

I dropped a spike in a short distance from the original pole and used my post rammer as a hammer. The rammer is a steel tube with handles on the side. One end is closed with a two inch [50mm] steel cap. I just turned it upside down using the cap end as the hammer. With soil being deeply cultivated and quite wet the spike which are two feet [600mm] long where fairly easy to hammer in and they went in vertically. I have dug out many, many stones over the years. The tip of the spike did not hit any stones so did not get deflected. after the spike ramming it was just a case of putting the post into the holder at the top of the spike. I had to use the rammer to tap the post into the holder. The holder has flukes which grip the post. The rammer almost meant I did not have to be higher than the post to tap it home. "Tap" suggests the posts just needed slight persuasion but it took a good couple of whacks. The last job was the put the ridge wire over the top of the post and secure it with a galvanised staple. I was worried that there might not be enough slack in the wire to allow the wire to fit over the post heads without creating a lot of tension. My worries were unfounded.

   The final, final job was to fill up the bird feeders and fit the holders on to the ridge wire. I put up a few fat balls as well. Even as I gathered my tools the Robin's were on the fat balls. It had been snowing the previous few days so they must have been a bit peckish