Unofficial retrobike allotment thread....

Karl, highly impressed with your buzzard close encounter – what a sight, what a privilege. I've spotted these birds circling way high up on the thermals, Spring/Summer, outside of London into Hertfordshire.
Occasionally had trips out into the Cotswolds or beyond into Malverns or Mid-Wales and seen Kites as we go along. In the past, have been on the roads through the MOD land high in the mountains above Builth Wells, with Kites circling below us. Round where we live, I'm waiting to catch a glimpse of the owls we hear hooting around the Close, no luck so far.

Bagpuss, sounds like you have it bad. I like the links Karl posted. I've also read that vinegar can be effective with Mare's Tail and other weeds too. However, this would raise the acidity of the soil, so you would have to lime the area some time after this treatment, then at a later stage pile on the nutrients to balance the Ph out again. Unfortunately, we're up against long term problems and solutions. The stuffs been around 60 million years or so.

H

Hmmm.
60 million ...dinosaurs :!: did they eat it... :idea: now were did it leave my DNA kit.....

Maybe something about keeping animals on the plot in our regs.....

Gotta get goats – they'll destroy most things!
The plus side being a supply of cheese, milk, butter

Pigs would do it....and the odd triceratops may help!

We have planted :shock:

Stuff went in last week and the plantee was the good lady. She hails from N1 and until moving to the 'Grim North', i.e the West Midlands, was unaware of the existence of soil, so it was fitting it should be her. According to other plot holders these are the first things to go in on this plot for 10 years, which goes a long way to explaining why digging is taking so long and we are pulling out vast root systems :facepalm:

Because of this we have rough dug 1/5 of the plot, with 1/2 of this finished, sifted, root free and now full of stuff!! The sheer amount of roots coming out and plants appearing has led us to weedkill the remainder of the plot. We are going to wait a week and then spray again, wait another week and then rotovate, otherwise i'm going to be a very, very old man when it's finished!

Another barn raising today, and a whole day on the plot bathed in beautiful sunshine. PLus another full day tomorrow. I hope i have the same motivation as my dad when im his age

A nice picture for Bagpuss here, plus some 'old skool' non-pc but supervised saw tuition for Grumpy jnr :facepalm:

More piccies....

Nice photos Grumpy. Looks like you got a fair bit done, 'Two sheds!'. The 2nd barn raising looks likes there's a nice bit of decking going on too. Looks like you've got some good land and good sunny aspect there.

Fab day. Got stuff done in the back garden – sorted through my JA tubers and replanted the best into pots. Repotted some apples, red/white currents, bilberries, blueberries and strawberries, making a mini orchid at home. The chickens love the red currents – stripped em bare last time. Gave em some grapes today to distract them. Sown some salads.

Got some days off work next week which will mostly be spent digging the allotment, creating some raised beds and finally getting the spuds in – will get some pics taken hopefully.

There's a phase that springs to mind regarding young Grumpy's fettling technique... see photo...

I managed a few hours, today, spuds in, grass cut, plenty of watering done, a few seeds sown, for cut flowers sowed veg last week, probably do more veg next week. Need to sort out some Dahlia tubers, and get these sorted soon.

I haven't got one yet, I'm that close, I'm currently waiting for the lovely retired gent who deals with our allotments to get back to me and say I can indeed take over two plots of knee high wasteland, knowing my luck he'll give them to someone else after I've been trying to get through to the right area/person waiting list for a year

Spike3, good luck with getting the allotment – hope you do get the plots you're after.
Sounds like they'll be hard work, but I think it's tougher getting hold of the plots in the first place.

good luck,
H

Picture of Mares tttttttttttt........................AAAARRRRGGGHHHHHHH. :evil: :facepalm: