Weeds - are they friends or enemies?

Susan Newcombe talks weeds with allotment holders on Hazel Road

SEEKING ASYLUM on the allotments is a new plot holder on the run from the invasive horse tail.

Weeds may be enjoying a makeover and typically unlikely to go away as the Royal Horticultural Society declares this year the Chelsea flower show is to be all about them but Paul, new to plot two, is only hoping the bamboo – like shoots don’t catch up with him again and terrorise him at Park Farm Allotments.

So far so good.

On the Hazel Road allotments opinion remains divided on the weeds although there remains sympathy with the adage: “a weed is just a plant in the wrong place” quoted by Sheila on plot 16.

Except this year Sheila’s keeping them right where they are and refusing to be cowed by the council into cutting down the red dead nettles, delicious to dine on and dandelions carpeting one end of her plot.

“The pollinators love them and at this time of year they are an early supply of pollen and nectar for the pollinators just coming out,” said Sheila.

Despite the dull overcast weather, the allotment’s edge is fluorescent with bright yellows, whites and reds as the resilient weeds grow on providing an essential source of food for hatching larvae from the roots, seeds and leaves. These insects all play a role in maintaining the delicate ecosystem and are fuel for the birds that in turn keep down the snails and slugs and make for a happy allotment.

The long tap roots of docks and dandelions, so difficult to dig out, create channels breaking down the soil and taking essential nutrients and minerals to the topsoil. Weeds also protect the soil from erosion providing a cover from the elements with this year’s March one of the wettest on record.

But although many are delicious in cooking such as garlic mustard with medicinal uses relied on centuries ago they remain hard to tame and at times frustrating.

Although a source of food for the convolvulus hawk-moth Helen Burgess on plot 14 said she still hates how bindweed strangles her fruit bushes and the rhizomes of couch grass become entangled with the root systems of perennial plants and take over areas of raspberries and other soft fruit.

“It becomes a problem when one species becomes dominant to the detriment of other emerging shoots. Ragwort can be a danger as it’s poisonous,” said Helen.

But change is afoot on the plots as witnessed by the flocks of songbirds and mammals nesting every year in the tangled fringes of brambles now deliberately left to provide habitat much to the chagrin of Charnwood Borough Council allotment officer James Wooley.

Repeat requests to cut Himalayan blackcurrants back are drowned out by the excited chatter of the sparrows and tits.

John Morris on plot one recognises the benefits to ecology from not strimming his patch of bright colourful buds.

“I’ll leave them at this early stage of the season when there are less sources of pollen around,” he said of the nettles, great for butterflies and rich in calcium and protein, clover and forget–me-nots.

“But then they’ll have to go,” he said.