alottment clearing

[MURFE 18]

have just took over the lottie next to mine, they are private lotties belonging to the Cadbury family, [chocolate] well i plan to cover patches for the year with black poly then start to uncover and dig next year, would the ground be clear by then of the long grass, weeds, etc,, and if i muck it at the same time would that be ok. I will probly grow spuds on it, first year then progress, with other normal stuff what do you think.

[pukka.tukka]

Hi

Your area, Bourneville was on the news last night with regards to Tesco.

I would think that after a year the grass/weeds would have died down as it will not have seen any light and if you muck it will be great for spuds.

I have recently seen potatoes planted through the plastic covering grass/weedy areas and they grow fine.

[rustylady]

Great idea if you can wait that long to grow something. Personally what I did was hack down the brambles and docks, cover what I couldn't dig at the time, and what I could dig I planted with crops asap. It's an enormous encouragement to be able to harvest fairly soon, even if it's only quick growers like salad stuff. Potatoes are also quite good for clearing ground - yes you have to dig and weed but the foliage crowds out the weeds, and the roots break up the soil

[NOG]

You need a top dressing of Diesel then light it.

Burn it off, it will clear it and improve the ground.

Then potatoes...

If you cant be assed to dig it do the old two spade square and a spade deep. then fill it with compost and plant into it.

[ian]

allotment clearing

Hi murf, I have an allotment in Kings Norton, I took it on last year. Basically there is only one way of clearing an allotment and that involves hard work. My advice would be to dig out manageable sized beds.4ft by 6ft say. Cut out the top two three inches and bag it. Turn everything over and scrupilously pick out weed roots. Slowly but surely you will get there. You can wait a year but to my mind you will just be putting off the hard work from this year to the next. My neighbours, rotavated their whole plot, left it two months, came back and found the weeds worse than before , carpeted their plot with polythene the weeds pushed the polythene up, the wind started to lift and shift the polyhene and the weeds came through again. Oh and by the way it is nonsense that spuds loosen up the soil. Before you plant spuds you dig a great big trench, when you harvest them you dig up another great big trench. Its your spade that does all the work not the spud!

[nick the grief]

have just took over the lottie next to mine, they are private lotties belonging to the Cadbury family, [chocolate] well i plan to cover patches for the year with black poly then start to uncover and dig next year, would the ground be clear by then of the long grass, weeds, etc,, and if i muck it at the same time would that be ok. I will probly grow spuds on it, first year then progress, with other normal stuff what do you think.

Hi Murfe,

PT's right.

Cut everything down with a strimmer cover in cardboard then a good layer of muck the the plastic. The cardboard will rot down & the worms will incorporate it and the muck into the soil for you, the black plastic will help suppress them.

If you wanted to you could plant spuds thru the plastic this year and get a crop of it. If you don't wan t to look at just plastin buy some tubs from the pound shop & grow flowers in them & use these to weight the plastic down

[NOG]

. Oh and by the way it is nonsense that spuds loosen up the soil. Before you plant spuds you dig a great big trench, when you harvest them you dig up another great big trench. Its your spade that does all the work not the spud!

True...but you are not digging you are planting and harvesting....that way it is ok.

[MURFE 18]

hi, thanks for all the tips iv,e strimmerd the plot and covered with cardboard,well most of it then put black plastic ,in autum will start to roll back sheet and dig ,maybe before if i find i have the time. i have got my other plot next door to grow the veg , many thanks once again to you all

[Eternal Sunshine]

Hi murf, I have an allotment in Kings Norton, I took it on last year. Basically there is only one way of clearing an allotment and that involves hard work. My advice would be to dig out manageable sized beds.4ft by 6ft say. Cut out the top two three inches and bag it. Turn everything over and scrupilously pick out weed roots. Slowly but surely you will get there. You can wait a year but to my mind you will just be putting off the hard work from this year to the next. My neighbours, rotavated their whole plot, left it two months, came back and found the weeds worse than before , carpeted their plot with polythene the weeds pushed the polythene up, the wind started to lift and shift the polyhene and the weeds came through again. Oh and by the way it is nonsense that spuds loosen up the soil. Before you plant spuds you dig a great big trench, when you harvest them you dig up another great big trench. Its your spade that does all the work not the spud!

I like this advice Ian - think this is what I'll be doing. Can you save the top layer of weeds that you bag, and reuse in a year or 2? Seems an awful lot of waste...

[nick the grief]

Hi ES,

It depends on the weeds. If they are annual weeds & the aren't seeding you can compost them but things like bindweed, dock & the like you won't be able to reach a high enough temperature to kill them, far better to take them home & stick them in the green re-cycle bin & let the council deal with them.