January 2017. MUD!

January 16, 2017 by Plotdaze 2 Comments

So much rain! We wouldn’t mind some frost, would love it actually, but the heavens seemed to have opened over the Christmas and not stopped. The paths are so thick with mud that we have begun to walk on planks. There’s a delivery of wood chip coming soon so we’ll definitely be first in the queue with our wheelbarrow !

We have been fixing some of the beds as best we can. The wood had rotted on a lot of them and a trough that had been leaning against the old bbq area finally bit the dust. We’ve turned the ground into a small bed for our Lychnis,a favourite flower that never disappoints, thrives all season with lots of deadheading, but more importantly is a magnet for the bees.

We’ll have to leave a gap by the brick … another job!

Hopefully in a few months the Lychnis will be like this,

The ramshackle bed in the left hand corner is going to be our new strawberry bed. It’s just screwed together old bits of laminate. The strawberry bed on the old plot was filled with all kinds of compost, manure and coffee grinds to deter the slugs. We even threw in some rotted seaweed. Hopefully we’ll get the same yield from this one. It looks a mess at the moment though. We have to keep reminding ourselves that it’ll be different come the spring!

There was a huge over grown tree, brambles and weeds around the back of the shed. After much wrangling we liberated the water butts. The connections need fixing … another job.

Freedom!!!

So, after a warming Chicken cuppa soup, we decided to get some seeds on the go. We started some Aubergines, which were a huge success last year, and some chillies; the usual Cayenne, Hotscotch, Rosso and the Sweet Peppers of course. were also growing some Sweet Boneta which we grew after receiving them as a freebie from a gardening mag. They were lovely and hopefully they’ll be as good this year.

They’re all warm in the heated propagator now…

The annual meeting went off without any hitches which is always a bonus and lots of nice new people have arrived at the allotments, so it should be a good year. Happy plotting folks!