Allotments 4 All
General => News => Topic started by: cambourne7 on June 09, 2007, 18:23:13
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Hi Gang,
Feeling quilty to have a day off the lotty to go to the cinema and generaly sleep in, relax and do very little. You can imagine my horror when i get an email telling me that the allotments have been broken into and my shed has been hit. My entire bed of cabbage has been pulled out but i guess this is bird rather than vandles as i forgot to put the netting back on.
Headded down to the plot and it looks like dispite i have left my good spade and fork out nothing (fingers crossed) this time have been nicked. In fact it looks like the only damage is a cut peice or twine which was holding the door closed. PHEW!
However my neighbors plot has been quite hard hit, they have taken 2 hammers ( one is a only blacksmiths hammer which has some sentimental value ) and they have taken a new hoe attachments for a wolf set. It looks like they also tried to steal his sythe and the wolf Cultivator attachment but these were found elsewhere on the plot. They also stole a box of cable ties which none of us can figure out!
So i watered my beds, replanted cabbage and have come home to call the police - do i expect them to do anything - well NO.
Is it a co-instance that a couple of 'known idiots' have just had there asbos ended so they can come back into the village, this happens around the same time as this break in and the last lot of break ins happened before the asbos were issues. Odd that.
Cambourne7
Going to cinema, feet up and not going near the allotments now till monday!
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They really pee me off. I just wish I could take the law into my own hands. I would put them in the stocks and smear all my smelly onions round their fizzogs and then to top it all I would pour armillatox over them. It's ok I have just finished treating the soil with same and it really gets up yer nose.
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hehe
Just been drowing our sorrows in the pub over the petty minded ness.
But the problem is that i dont think they would realise why they are wrong!
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>:(Have had the same problem. Vandals have been on our site for two nights on the trot. Took a claw hammer from our shed and used it to break into any shed that was padlocked. Felt really bad about it as we have only had the plot a few weeks. The general consensus was that they were looking for resaleables, but as this a regular occurrence nobody keeps anything of value on site. We were lucky though, none of the plots were vandalized. Lucky, huh, sad reflection on what is acceptable in the society we live in today.
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car boot season we were told ??? :o
so that's where all the cheap tools come from >:(
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I get fed up of this in the summer. The Last 2 nights a group of 16 years olds have come into our allotment and done alot of damage. They have chopped trees, broken into sheds / rolled sheds over and burnt what ever they can before being disturbed.
When disturbed they ran off and LET THEMSELVES OUT WITH A KEY! If they get hold of keys from someone, there really is no hope.
I get so fed up of it. The police really don't want to know as they have no proof....Is there anything that can be done?
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KP,
I do sympathise, they got in this time using pallets on our site.
hold an extordinary meeting and ask all the allotment holders to come with there key and see if anyone has 'lost' one.
Cambourne7
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I have spent a lot of time asking myself why this happens and haven't yet come up with a worhwhile answer. I once asked a kid why he vandalised properties and he told me because he had nothing and was angry,he said it made him feel better.
All my new squash babies are almost ready to go out again and I am very nervous.
Someone went round our lottie a couple of weeks ago stealing £2 watering cans.
The worst one is a very sweet man who keep getting 2 windows broken on his greenhouse, he repairs them and they go again within days and always the same panes,it is like they are watching.
XX Jeannine
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Might be a good idea to suggest that he replaces the glass with perpex, it worked for us.
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He did that, they just roke differnt ones and kicked in the perspex
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>:(It makes me so angry and there doesn't seem to be a solution. I would like to put up an electric fence, but then we become the criminal. It's so unfair.
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i spoke to the parish clerk and it looks like the village went nuts this weekend with lots of issues
- JCB hot wired and drove into a lake
- MUGA ( multi use games area ) was set fire to
- Allotment broken into
- Kids had a late night party in out country park which woke 2 streets up.
PHEW!!
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I have spent a lot of time asking myself why this happens and haven't yet come up with a worhwhile answer.
XX Jeannine
Recipe.
Take.......lack of discipline in schools, and the influence of the so called Human Rights people, combine with no parental interest in what their horrid kids get up to. Most wouldn't even know (or be bothered) if you asked them what their offspring did in the evenings.
Add to that the violence on television (even in Kids programmes)and at the cinema, and in computer games/hand held games systems, and I think you get an idea of where society in general is heading.
Oh and don't forget a liberal sprinkling of " nothing else for the kids to do(when I was young we used to make our own entertainment........cops & robbers, cowboys and indians etc.), and stir well.
A recipe for a disastrous future, where nobody trusts anyone else.
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we have recovered some of the stolen tools which were dumped around the village.
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oh, good news, cambourne :)
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yes this was something that had great sentimental value and is not going back to the site so i am told.
But i think this might just be a reckie for a bigger attack so i will be stripping my plot friday and will bring all my tools back up next week.
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Rather oddly, when our shed got broken into, the only thing the kids took was cable ties. These didn't steal the radio or anything else. No tools left in shed to steal. But the Kids did scratch their initials "GM" and "UR MUM" in the plastic window.
There most black market value on cable ties!!!
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Some shops won't sell cable ties to teenagers as they are used in robberies ti tie folks hands togther.
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thats what i thought they might be used for.
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no parental interest
This is the problem - right there. Having worked in a primary school I have come to the conclusion that lack of parental interest is the killer, socially, academically and personally.
Last night 4 young lads - about 9 or 10 stopped outside my plot ( it's right next to the fence) one looked at my girls and said, "That's not fair, how come they are allowed in" I explained that I was their mum and it was my plot. they looked pretty crestfallen and asked if they could come and help me some day. I said that they would have to bring their mums or dads down to check it was ok and maybe in the summer holidays i could find them some stuff to do. OH looked at me like I was mad but I figure if they are good kids it will out and if not then I take it on the chin. ::) Yes, I'm soft, can't help it. :P
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Our youthclub have a mini allotment that a couple of them look after which i think is sweet.
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If more people thought the way Emmy does I'm sure it would lead to less problems on plots. If the kids are given a chance to grow something they'll certainly not think about wrecking it. Also they'll appreciate the hard work that goes into growing things.
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The two kids that I took to my lottie yesterday from the primary school I work in were fascinated.It was a treat to see them watering etc. I would love to run a community lottie for kids, mostly they like to see things grow.My two were amazed at the simple way a brocolli grew and finding strawberries and rhubarb was like Christmas morning. XX Jeannine
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That's why we have school visits and a schools centre... we have 600+ primary school visits a year... some come two or three times... It's a long term strategy as the boss won't let secondary pupils in... too cheeky!
::)
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best way, saddad, hopefully they'll remember what they were taught when they were little :)
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I'm with you Emms not soft its just that you feel not all kids are hooligans and given the chance they might be interested and maybe one day they might stop someone vandelising an allotment, well I can dream can't I. ;D ;D ;D
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I think the important word in what Manics says is taught, I think kids are eager to learn but they don't take orders so well, there isn't the blind obedience of yesteryears, sadly many of them don't get taught at home they get they are dominated, and they rebel harder and younger then they ever used to.
XX Jeannine
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I get fed up of this in the summer. The Last 2 nights a group of 16 years olds have come into our allotment and done alot of damage. They have chopped trees, broken into sheds / rolled sheds over and burnt what ever they can before being disturbed.
When disturbed they ran off and LET THEMSELVES OUT WITH A KEY! If they get hold of keys from someone, there really is no hope.
I get so fed up of it. The police really don't want to know as they have no proof....Is there anything that can be done?
You have to let yourselves "OUT" with a key.Does the gate lock automatically behind you or do you lock yourselves in?
On our plot the gate is closed but not locked while someone is on the site.It does get left unlocked occasionally but not often and there are times when some of us do get locked in by mistake but apart from that we are very lucky to not have any problems ......yet!.There is a new housing estate(only 17 houses)being built on our doorstep and we may have problems then.
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We have to let ourselves out with a key as well; the gate is locked all the time. People inside the site just aren't visible, and you can't see what's going on.
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We are supposed to lock the gates each time we enter and leave the site...there are the odd few plot holders who just can't be bothered to get out of their vehicles to carry out even this small task.
We are experiencing a spate of what appears to be in-house thieving at the present time...someones whole crop of gooseberries disappeared last saturday night...I will have to check mine are still there as I lost mine overnight last year.
Its silly things being taken such as...
A water tub
Thirty-six eight foot canes
A row cut from a seed tray full of lobelia
A lettuce from a greenhouse
Four dahlia tubers