Our Allotment

[Minimag]

I thought I'd share (and keep a record) of our progress on our allotments.

We got our allotment in Autumn last year, aand immediatly begain laying mypex (the allotment had been laying fallow for a number of years and were covered in weeds)



I laid a base for a shed



and built a 6x8 basic shed



We started building some raised planters



and planted a crop of Christmas potato's



There has been much other work done on the plot, but not so much recently due to the weather and work, however I intend to get out there more over the coming weeks and will keep this updated. I hope the pics come through ok!

[Ms-T]

looking good.

[Bigmallly]

Hello & welcome to the Jungle, plot looks good.

[NickG]

Hi and welcome. Your plot and pics look fab. Just in the process of moving plot myself, I must say your raised beds look fantastic. How much did each cost you to do, they look just the job for our new plot

[Mr Bones]

Hello and welcome. Your lotty looks good, love the wooden barrel and all-important cuppa bench.

[Cadalot]

Hi and welcome, I love the photos you have worked really hard and it shows.

[Minimag]

Sown some seed

Well, I have managed to get some Pea's sown, and have some time free this weekend so intend to get out on the allotment this weekend.

The aim is to build some more raised beds, and do some tidying up

I have responded to some questions above, but my posts dont appear to be getting through, are they being moderated for some reason, it all gets out of sync if I post a reply and it doesnt appear for some days!, is this normal on this site?

[Greenleaves]

Looks great, well done

The lag in posts showing is not usual, please monitor the situation for a couple days and if the problem persists we will inform admin

[Minimag]

Potato Bed

Dug the bed for the Potatoes today, we have King Edward, Swift, Maris Piper, Charlotte, Pink Fir Apple and Golden Wonder. I have probably overdone the Potato order, cant help myself. I will grow the left overs in bags - I already have 6 bags of Swift I planted last weekend in the greenhouse.



I harvested the Cauliflowers and Brussel Sprouts we planted late Autumn, I didn't expect them to come to anything, so this was a bonus.



Cauliflower Cheese with our roast tomorrow! Tomorrow I will make more of the single layer raised beds and do have a marathon sowing session.

[Minimag]

Sunday

Made 4 more beds


Lifted the mypex that had been down since early winter on 3 others and dug them over



And started filling the triple size raised bed that the onions are going to go in, this is going to take a serious amount of compost



There are a couple of posts that I have made that havent got through, all my posts seem to go through to approval by a mod for some reason, and obviously havent been approved yet, hopefully this one will!

[Bigmallly]

Looking good Mag. I would be tempted to use a shallower bed for your Onions & use the deep one for the likes of Parsnips & Carrots.

[veggiechicken]

There are a couple of posts that I have made that havent got through, all my posts seem to go through to approval by a mod for some reason, and obviously havent been approved yet, hopefully this one will!

I've only seen one "moderated" post #9 - now approved. The first few posts with attachments are automatically checked for spam by the system. It should settle down when you've made a few more posts.

[NickG]

Looking great, your plot sounds as if it was in a similar condition to the one we have just taken over and moved to, we have to e very similar to you in covering and using raised beds.

Love the big raised beds you have done, how did you do them and what did they cost each? Sorry to be nosey, I would like to do a few like that on our plot

[Minimag]

Looking good Mag. I would be tempted to use a shallower bed for your Onions & use the deep one for the likes of Parsnips & Carrots.

Thanks for this Bigmally, it makes sense of course, I will have to replan my croppping anyway as the plot borders had been incorrectly marked, and I have now lost half of what was to be my potato bed!

Nickg, the beds were made using recycled euro pallet wood I acquired from work, so the cost was minimal, decent screws and wood preserver being the main cost. It will cost a lot to fill these up with compost however. Actually, the corner posts in the beds were made using bought 2x2 which cost about £3 per 2.4m length, and each length did 1 and a bit beds.

[Minimag]

Slugs

I didn't know whether to start a new thread on this, or just ask on this one but the bane of our life around here is slugs. In our garden we have tried to be very careful not using pellets because of the impact on wildlife and also we have cats.

Last year, for the first time, we used an environmental control (not sure I can post the commercial name - but it contains nematodes). I don't know if we were just lucky, but what was, in our area, a bad slug year, we had the best year of minimal slug damage we have ever had.

I intend to do the same on our allotment this year, but don't know whether to just water the nematodes into the raised beds, or to do the whole plot, ie watering it over the mypex separating the beds.

Also, given that I am likely to be the only plot using nematodes, am I wasting my time and money as the the slugs may just move across from the other plots?