Terry Walton is doing a few repairs on the allotment
Path edges need fixing and plant labels need cleaning
I’m grateful for the discovery of winter green manure to cling on to the nutrients in the ground as these heavy downpours leach goodness from the barren earth. The areas that have been manured look a sorry sight lying there sodden and even the earthworms are refusing to come up to the surface to take the manure to the lower reaches.
What did we do before green manure? My recollections are that the winters were much drier and colder and the old tradition of turning over the ground to enable the frost to do its work was the norm.
I find it difficult to understand those gardeners who only use their plot for growing summer vegetables. Yes, you have the luxury of those tasty summer crops but the season seems to only last five months. By making room for winter favourites such as parsnips, leeks, swede and sprouts you can enjoy fresh vegetables in season for over 10 months of the year.
But there you have it, allotment gardening is all about doing your own thing. It would be a boring old place if every plot looked the same. If that were the case there would be none of the excitement of swapping produce and trying vegetables you’ve never thought of growing yourself. That’s what makes this hobby of ours so individual and free.
The few frosts we’ve had were very severe and these put paid to the tops of my oca plants. These are black and messy so it’s time to see if there are any useful tubers under the surface. These plants don’t start producing tubers until hours of daylight are outweighed by hours of darkness. So, fork in hand, it’s time to explore for knobbly, small tubers. They weren’t too bad and the slightly lemony flavours are a chance to taste something new at this time of year. My wife doesn’t like cleaning them but the taste is worth the effort!
At the bottom of the plot it’s time to do some remedial winter work on path edges. These get dislodged and loose when winter digging, and some pieces go rotten. So with the plot more or less cleared, it’s a chance to replace or fix this edging. An edge trimming tool is ideal for this task and, having made a trench and put the wooden edge in place, a tap with the sledgehammer and it’s firmed in before I level the soil back against it.
There are days at this time of year when work of any description can be carried out on the plot. It’s a good time to catch up with jobs under cover in the greenhouse. I write on all my plastic labels with a pencil so the writing can be easily removed but there are dozens of used labels in a pot in the greenhouse. I fill a cup with warm water and a few drops of washing up liquid and, using a pumice stone, this writing is soon removed.