Page 46 - ALG Issue 2 2023

North West
Lancashire, Greater Manchester, Merseyside and Cheshire
Welcome to our new members...
Blackleach Allotments Association Cromac Terrace Allotment Society Radcliffe Homer Street
Allotment Association
9 Individuals
St Chads CE Primary School
REPRESENTATIVE
John Irwin
16 Parkdale Ave, Audenshaw, Manchester M34 5LW
0161 3207779 jirwin.nas@gmail.com
DEPUTY REPRESENTATIVE
Vacant
Contact natsoc@nsalg.org.uk if interested in volunteering with the Region
News from the North West Counties: Region Three NAS
The weather has finally begun to improve,
as the days get warmer, and the nights get shorter. I am pleased to say we recently had our first picking of Timperley early rhubarb – a full week earlier than last year. A great saving on having to buy it from the supermarket at £7 for 400g (just four sticks), although that was for an expensive supermarket’s organic brand.
Forcing rhubarb is easy as long as you do not force the same plants year after year, and you feed them with plenty of manure.
Many annual general meetings have been taking place and I am lucky enough to have been invited to some of them, although finding venues in unfamiliar towns has been difficult at times. When you are reading this, I should have visited eight sites, from Liverpool to Lancaster, helping, giving advice and hopefully steering committees into maintaining their national membership.
Here in the North West, we had our AGM late
in the year 2022, and have welcomed new members and old onto the steering committee. In consequence, we have a new chairman and secretary, and our next general meeting will be taking place in Liverpool, at Sefton Community Hub, where we hope to have a good attendance.
I wonder how many sites have been noticing a drop off in early doors attendance. Some plots near me have not been touched properly since the beginning of winter, compost heaps have not been turned or touched in some cases, and the plots have a derelict feel about them; it can be quite depressing. Luckily, we have had an influx of plotholders from Poland and Eastern Europe, who are not afraid of cold weather, but their plots are now beginning to put the rest of us to shame!
Things to look forward to; yes, gardening is the
hobby of faith in the future. That small seed will grow into a record beating sunflower stem at least four metres tall, those early Nantes carrots will germinate and be magnificent, and this year, please, pretty please, parsnips will grow, swell, avoid canker, and last through until late November.
And so, as we approach summer, let us put the winter gardening dreams to bed and go out there, to cultivate by dig or by no dig, mulch, fertilise, manure, hoe and grow the best allotment year we have ever had. And remember, in that soil you are working with, there are other smaller gardeners, working all the time, 24/7 helping that soil be alive. Look out for them, they are there.
John Irwin
rhsmalvern.co.uk
BOOK NOW
BROUGHT TO YOU BY IN ASSOCIATION WITH