Up early on Sunday. No chance of staying in bed really as the sun had been beaming in the window for hours. I breakfasted lightly whilst I got the sandwiches and drinks ready for the day of digging. Lemon curd butties. Food of the gods. When I got to the lottie I was beginning to regret the decision to spend the day at the lottie. 9am and the sun was already hot on my bare arms. Luckily I slavered myself with sun screen before I left. Remembering the weeds from yesterday I walked up the lottie path. I set myself up fro digging and with a deep breath began. The Dock and Creeping Thistle can out easily. There was just a lot of it. However it was satisfying to see the wheelbarrow fill up. I plugged away at he weeding and in a couple of hours I had got the half way marker in Bed2. I had decided
I would stop there are start to plant potatoes in the prepared ground of Bed2. So that is what I did. I dropped a scaffolding plank across the bed to act as a straight edge and to stop me sinking into the soil. I pulled out a trench, tossed in some horse manure from my gigantic reserve, set the seed potatoes at he appropriate intervals and pulled the soil back in the trench with the rake. The soil at the bottom of the trench was cool and damp. I expect the spuds will be up in a very few weeks. I did six rows which was all I could get into the prepared area of Bed2.It was a bust day at the allotment as folks came down to do a bit in the beautiful weather. I continued my toil. Following the pea/mouse debacle [Click HERE for a link to the post] Bed1 had been left to its own devices. I had hoed it off a couple of times and more recently completed the weeding.
However the area where the varmint pinched all the peas how had many volunteer potatoes poking through. I went round and dug them out one at a time. I ended up with a barrow load of haulms and tubers. To bring the surface level again and kill off the other surface weedlings and got the hoe busy. It was hot work in the midday sun and my back was beginning to complain about all the bending. The bed did look good when I had finished.
I had bought more Peas and Broad Bean seeds. This time a figured I would overwhelm the varmint so something would be left to grow. I pulled out five pea trenches ten feet long running length ways up the plot. My reasoning for the length ways row instead cross way rows is that the sun will shine down the rows as the peas get taller rather then shading each other. I had bought a pint of peas from Midway Allotments shop a week ago. The pint of peas filled the five rows. When the tramped the peas in and watered the rows a went back to Degsy and got the expensive pea seeds I had bought from the garden centre. I pulled out another five rows. This time I got just one row from each of the first three packets. I sowed Petit Pois, Mange Tout [H's favourite] and Shakeshaft. The packet of main crop peas seeds did the remaining two trenches.....just about. Those trenches were trampled in and watered too.
With last few minutes to five o'clock I figured I could sow some Sweetcorn directly into the soil. A farmer friend of mine had sown 50 acres the week before so I figured it would be safe enough for me. In the top corner of Bed1 dibbed 25 holes in a square pattern and dropped a single corn seed into it each hole and gave the area a through soaking. Just to finish up I through a wheel barrow of well rotted manure over the area to act as a mulch. That was me done for the day; eight hours, two lemon curd butties, a banana, several cups of tea and a couple of litres of water. I was aware that I had been very sweaty all day. The back of my polo shirt told the story.
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