Category: life in general

What better way to spend a sunny Sunday afternoon than demolishing things?  A week ago when I went down to the allotment I discovered that one of the fences had come down in the storms.

Since the whole fence was looking pretty rotten, today I went back down and finished what the storm had started.  As most of the screws that were holding it together were rusted in place, I ended up going for the ‘stamp and yank’ approach to pull apart the planks, and detach them from the chicken wire which was stapled along the whole fence.  At the end I used the chicken wire to form a temporary barrier until I get around to building a replacement fence.

Final job of the day was to put together my new workbench – birthday present from Jen.  Just what I need for fence and raised bed building work.

Beatrix Potter’s Peter Rabbit books form part of my earliest memories, and I always remember thinking that Mr McGregor was very unreasonable in chasing him out of his vegetable garden.  Times have perhaps changed.  Much as I hate to admit it, the signs do seem to point to rabbits as being my leek-eating culprits.

When I went to the allotment today to pick my stunted little leeks, I thought I was going to have a problem finding them, as the whole allotment was covered in a thick blanket of snow.

As it turned out, it was an easier job than I expected, thanks to the fact that someone, almost certain one of the local rabbit residents had been there before me, and scuffed up all the snow around the leeks.  Poor guy, I guess he was disappointed, as all the green bits of the leeks have been eaten already, and it seems that the white part of the leek is just a bit too tasty for a rabbit.

I took pity on him and his friends though, and put out the remaining endive plant for them.  What can I say, I’m a soft touch!  Next year, looks like I need to use some netting though…

It may be turning colder, but things haven’t come to a complete standstill yet at the allotment.  The tomatoes are over, but the leeks are still just about holding their own (despite coming under attack),

and I still have a few surprises, such as these radishes growing in the greenhouse.

The first lot of garlic is also planted for next year, though I’m still slightly dubious as to how it will fare – I used some normal supermarket garlic, which may not be hardy enough to survive our winter, especially given how keen it’s been to grow so far.  Bit worried it’s going to freeze to death over the winter.

I’ve been preparing the first plot for serious vegetable growing next year, and had a go at constructing my first ever raised bed on the weekend.  As befits a test bed, it’s rather small – shipping planks around without a car isn’t entirely practical, so I wanted to test the principle out first.

Once I got the planks first home, and then on a separate tram ride, to the allotment, the actual construction was pretty quick and easy.  I was a little hampered by the crappy job that the boy in the hardware store did of sawing up the planks, so the corners of the final bed reflect the skewedness of the edges.  I’ve since manage to find a smaller hardware store which has a sawing machine that can also be used on timber (and delivers!) so hopefully the next set will go better.  Now I just need to decide on the final layout and clear out the final corner of the bed.

The plan is to house some ‘officially destined for growing over the winter’ garlic here, and some ‘officially destined for growing over the winter’ onions, if there’s some room left over.

As far as the choice goes for using raised beds or not, opinion seems to be decided.  I decided to have a go, since there seem to be more plus than minus points, and one of the main minus points usually cited is the DIY involved, which I didn’t find too off-putting.  Since I’m in the position where I’m trying to clear up existing flower beds, it also seemed a good way to get some of the plot in use, even if the rest wasn’t ready.  And did I already mention that I like wielding a power drill?

Closer to home, I also pruned the rose tree in my back garden within an inch or two of its life a month or so back, and whilst doing so, decided to have a go at taking a cutting from it.  To be honest, I didn’t expect great results, so I was pretty astonished the other day when I took its little housing off to see that it actually seems to be sprouting lots of new leaves.

Looks like I made a rose!