One day in my lifeI didn’t get into gardening until I finished playing football. A retired neighbour, Harry Kent, kept asking me if I wanted to take on an allotment. At the time I thought it was an old mans game, but later on how wrong could I have been. With the thought of fresh vegetables for the family and no weekend football, I decided to give it a go. On seeing the plot, I thought what have I let myself in for, 10 rod of undergrowth, bushes, weeds and junk. Whilst clearing the site with only a fork, spade and rake, I swear I saw David Livingston one time. Once cleared I cut the top off the site into turf sizes and kept a fire going for days. At least afterwards I could use the potash that was left. Then the digging began. No tiller or cultivator then, didn’t have the money. Working during the day and the allotment in the evenings and at weekends. The words idiot and stupid sprang to mind and worse, on several occasions. With Harry pointing me in the right direction and me watching what he did and how he did it, I was slowly making my way into the wonderful world of growing vegetables. I didn’t know it at the time but he was a firm believer in sowing, planting and working to the phases of the moon. There’s a lot to be said for it, check it out! Father in law Jack was keeping an eye on me, because he was an allotment holder also. So there was someone else for me to look up to. He never watered. Once the plants were up and away, he said they would find water themselves, and I don’t remember many failures either. So at this time I was gleaning quite a bit of knowledge between them. I am a traditional gardener in as much as the same way as my mentors. That is not to say I do not recognise the ‘how shall I say’ the new age of growing. So many more diverse and new varieties. Raised beds were used for onions and leeks, nowadays they are used for most things. Follow a few basic rules and you can grow most things, taking into account the weather and the soil. Feed the soil, feed the plants. In the winter dig deep, in the summer dig shallow. Rotate your crops. Manure for greens, follow with potatoes, followed by root crops. Freshly manured ground makes root crops fork out. Do not plant greens (brassicas) in the same place each year. You can contract club root, which can take many years for the soil to be clean enough for greens again. Successional sowing will get more out of the plot. Early potatoes followed by leeks, over wintered onions by lettuce or spinach. Winter greens with peas or beans. The gardeners best tool is his hoe, used down the sides of root crops it gets rid of weeds, plus air-rating the soil it also brakes up the panning effect on soil by watering, thus giving the crop lighter soil to grow through. Use a water butt instead of straight from the tap. Fluoride and other chemicals are released and the next time you water from the butt the water is at air temperature. Just one or two tips in a huge array of rights and wrongs. Over the seasons you will make some good and some bad decisions. Look and learn and never be afraid to ask questions. At the end of the day, Harry and Jack got their knowledge from somewhere. So, to those of you new to the wonderful world of allotments, I wish you well, it can be hard work at times but so rewarding. So, would I go back to the very first spit I dug on my first plot in the middle of a hot July with hard ground and a fork? You better believe it.
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