Page 59 - ALG Issue 2 2018 html

South West
A measurement of success
Welcome to our new members...
Quinta/windsor Road Allotment Association Winkleigh Growers
East Devon Local Food Project
Lostwithiel Town Council
7 Individual Members
What a terrible year it has been for growing; well, at least the weeds have grown! Everyone around me has been saying how it has been a fantastic year, but I can’t tell them how terrible it has actually been for me!
From where I left off in my last report there have been a few changes. We decided
that we needed another plot. One thing we wanted from a second plot was a decent fruit tree - preferably plums - and Kristy wanted a cooking apple. Our secretary took us to look at a plot on offer that had both! The plums were a bit rickety but you could see they had fruited, and the Bramley still had a few apples left on it. The plot was fairly tidy, with plenty of barrels and a decent compost heap, so we had no hesitation in taking this one on.
We didn’t have to do a lot; a little rotavating on the area where we would put our root crops and I started reading up on pruning to address the trees. I learnt about
a ‘3 step cut’ on tree branches, and with
a basic pruning saw and a pruning knife I produced a cut that I was amazed with. It was so simple but quite enjoyable as it was almost an art form. Kristy has a love for climbing trees; she went up the Bramley and gave some of the upper branches a trim,
and I took a branch or two off the plums. Now, as I got into this pruning lark more, I found out that stone fruit (plums, cherries, apricots etc.) should only be summer pruned due to disease! Hopefully, knocking off a bit of the dead stuff wouldn’t affect it. Kristy also found a tangled mess of gooseberries and painstakingly (pain being the apt word for these spiky bushes) trimmed and aired them back into three manageable bushes.
In October, I was elected to go on to our
over on the old plot, but there was nothing really that we could do. We did start sowing at home, such as broad beans, onion seed and kale - we ended up with just a few kale seedlings. So, we tried another compost, and what a difference! I think that was proof of the old adage: buy cheap, buy twice! We also tried some small heated propagators and these were miracle workers! Seeds were bursting into life in just a couple of days! It helped mitigate our earlier poor sowings.
allotment committee. With the history I had at Turners, Allan thought it was good to elect me onto it. Some people seemed to agree as I was young!
I think that was proof of the old adage: buy cheap, buy twice!
In early March, I arranged a social coffee morning at our main hut where I have several stoves. The big surprise was when, over the two hours, we had over 40
Just before Christmas,
we received our seed order, so with a
little time off work, I set about putting in some garlic and onion sets. Two bulbs of Solent Wight broke down into 49 cloves, and following them were 140 onion sets!
It seemed quite laborious really as I was working on planks to try and not compress the ground too much, but it was a big crop and we were looking forward to harvesting early.
January and February seemed to be very quiet. There were some brassicas taking
plotholders attend; what a success. A couple of weeks after, we had a
community tidy day, which went well; just
a couple of hours trimming, gathering
hedge cuttings and filling pot holes, all to be rewarded with tea and Patsy’s famous lemon crunch cake.
March produced something quite special: rhubarb. A huge crown burst into life, and it was nice to have something so early in the year. I’m not really a summer person but it was a sign of hope.
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