It took one long weekend but for the first year in a long while i'm starting the year feeling like i'm not already chasing my tail.
Debate on the plots around whether it's still too cold for potatoes. I've decided to wait a week or two but the broad beans are in, carrots, parsnips and radishes. I'm not that optimistic about the roots though as i think i planted them too deeply.
I always regard the Easter break as the start of the gardening season which makes sense given the pagan origins of the festival. Yesterday i went to the homebase garden centre and purchased some supplies for the year and today i got down to work. I turned my compost and riddled the finished stuff into one of my raised beds. I planted broad beans, set slug traps and set in sticks to protect from birds. I also finished hacking down a blackcurrant bush and various entangled branches of something with thorns that i don't know what it is. I'm sore and tired now but pleased to have got off to a good start.
Today was sunny and warm. It filled me with enthusiasm for the plot. I spent an hour digging over my raised beds and adding in some chicken manure. I also got on with sawing off branches and cutting back bushes and overgrowing ivy.
We had a visitor from a different allotment site who came to talk about composting. It was quite poorly attended and i didn't learn much that i didn't already know. I always feel good about meeting other plotholders and feeling part of the community so it was still worth while.
Not much blogging this year. There wasn't much growing, at least nothing that the slugs didn't beat me to. There were a few dramas though. The guy who was annoying me and had gone told where to go, the break in when a hut was burned down and the chickens let loose. A fairly miserable year to have an allotment in Queen's Park. Still, ever optimistic for next year, I've raked up the leaves and put them on the raised beds as a mulch so it will be ready for next year and I've ready to go to war with the slugs. Slug inns and oat bran at the ready!
