Why should we all use the same methods? rant!

[goodlife]

What's not to like? :)

Indeed..and your shed has its own 'personality' If it 'works' and fit to purpose..why not...

[goodlife]

[antipodes]

Love your shed Nigel B!!!
The sheds are there as part of the plot, what you see is a group of four sheds, back to back, each one is about 3 square metres inside. We get one each but some are empty as there are 2 shed for one plot, in case of sharing, so many contain various bits of equipment, bales of straw etc.

You can't really see all the grass round the edges on my photos!!!! LOL, I would love to have everything in straight lines etc but that will only happen when I retire and can spend every day over there! Only another 20 years to go!

[Digeroo]

If you are not a straight line person, I doubt whether in 20 years this will change, however much time you might thing you will have.   

[clumsy]

I think your plot looks normal for an allotment. I find the people who can't grow are the one's that complain. We always get comments that we plant to close or we plant to much. We just ignore them.

[Mrs Tweedy]

As promised, this is not my allotment, but the one on the end from me, and one at the side.  What do you think about these two lovely allotments.

Heavens surely that is not a cultivated plot?   
Mine does NOT look like that!!!
Last year at same time it looked more or less the same, like this (except I think I had no cardboard down then as the weather was better).


(img]http://i139.photobucket.com/albums/q319/antipodes_photo/garden%202012/top_end_may2012.jpg(/img]
If there wasn't so much blimmin' grass it would be better!!!!

I don't really think that I get more than others but I suppose I do grow different things - loads of raspberries and gooseberries which always look messy somehow, and I let flowers self seed all over the shop and just hack them out if they get in the way of a real crop. Seems better to let the insects have flowers than a bare row... As I didn't get any straw to mulch this year I have been mulching a lot with dried grass or rotten weeds, which admittedly don't always look great (but a big pile of manure doesn't look terrific either!!! and we all love that!).
Thanks for the comments that cheered me up!

I wish you were my plot neighbour. The 2 neighbours we have are worse than Borlotti's pics.
in fact we have several plots around like Borlotti.

We fight with the d**n weeds from 3 sides. I think cardboard is a perfectly sensible thing to use to control weeds.

If the moaner on your plot had ourneighbours he would have something to moan about!!

[antipodes]

It is very odd that in France they seem to be slow to pick up newer methods, especially of organic gardening. I was one of the first on our site to use mulch, and compost my waste, then also the first to use cardboard. I must add that many of the others use a rotovator, and completely empty their plots every February, rotovate the whole lot and start with a completely blank slate. As I have at least 1/4 plot with perennials I cannot do that, also I have it divided into 4 beds so I can rotate the plots. which means I tend to cover 3 beds while I sort out one (onions first), then the spuds and so on.
I hope we can soon borrow a mower or a strimmer, if I had one of those I would be laughing.

[grannyjanny]

We were lucky enough to come across some long handles grass shears from a cheap shop & we also have a little push mower that  was reduced in Argos. The path 112'x6' & then we have behind the plot. Ours is only a half plot so really our path is 56'x3' but OH does it all. It wouldn't get done otherwise.

I wish we could embrace each others ways except a spray for every ill. One of our plot neighbours shows his produce so sprays such a lot. Different methods are certainly a great topic for conversation. We have 2 no diggers, an old lady who tootles around & still gets enough for her needs. She has a blackcurrant tree, & yes I do mean tree. It's at least 10'high but very productive. Next door has at least 1/3 of her plot uncultivated, just a rubbish dump. I wish we were a communal type of site that could muck in & help each other out but it just doesn't seem to happen, in fact I think it's frowned on.

[Digeroo]

We have several who more or less clear their plots once a year.  But I have loads of things which are still there.  I tend to have to evict something when I need a space.   

I do not agree with bare soil.  I simply do not have any.   Every inch is growing something, even weeds can be fed to the compost bin.  I have parsnip plants which are now enormous I like the fact they attract insects. 

Our worst plots are 6 ft high in weeds.   

[grannyjanny]

Sorry but I need to hijack this for a little rant. OH cut the path last week. He moved 9 bags of rubbish that belonged to our neighbour. He's been told to clean up his plot. His growing space gets smaller each year because he doesn't do any weeding. A lot of his plot is covered in ground elder that is now encroaching on his elderly NDN plot. We went up yesterday as OH wants to keep on top of the grass cutting. The idiot , not OH, has moved the bags of rubbish back onto the path. He does have a car but lives at the back of the site. He has a half plot like us but at least 1/3 is under weeds & rubbish. OH says I shouldn't complain to site rep so I'm hoping he will notice & say something anyway.

Sorry rant over

[antipodes]

Maybe it's the old story about one man's trash, another man's treasure? I do have random bits of wood, or big rocks, mainly to anchor things, and I do have one or two black bags full of weeds nicely rotting in the sun. But I wouldn't leave them all over the place or in front of my neighbour's plot!!! I am lucky that the only invasive weed is bindweed and we all have that. No marestail or such.

I am starting to look pensively at ads for strimmers in the hardware shop catalogues... knowing  my luck it would get pinched :-(

[grannyjanny]

His bags of rubbish are bags of grass that he's cut down from his plot, an empty chicken manure tub & his kneeling mat. He's got 5 years worth of raspberry prunings on an 18'x10' bed that he hasn't used in 4 years. We have a 91 year old who doesn't drive so anything that she can't compost she takes home with her.
I've always found allotments fascinating places from being a young child, I remember seeing them from trains & feeling excited. A great place to be even in Winter. We have a show grower & he's always ready to give advice.

[Nigel B]

What's not to like? :)

Indeed..and your shed has its own 'personality' If it 'works' and fit to purpose..why not...

Sadly, it seems to have failed the nosy-test and must be pulled down...... Also my rabbit-proof fencing, using a plastic mesh instead of chicken-wire, has to go.... on the threat of losing the plot in less than a month!
http://www.allotments4all.co.uk/smf/index.php/topic,75202.msg775885.html#msg775885

[lady_bug]

We've only had our plot since Feb and we are struggling to keep it clear, but we are lucky as the neighbours on either side are very understanding. We have a hedge on one side so they can't see over with just a quick glance, but the lady who has it has been there for years and years.. On the other side, the fence has gone (it was only about 18inches high) and the brambles have taken over.. we keep cutting them back and try to keep it tidy so it doesn't go all over our other neighbours plot..

Our plot was left in a pretty shoddy state, the previous tennants didn't even bother removing all of their rubbish.. big plastic kids toys (wendy house, bubble car and plastic crane) as well as not bothering to leave the key for the padlock on the shed.. Until we have the money to hire a skip, we have their rubbish still on our plot.. The shed was literally full of stuff.. old cd player, trainers, old onion sets, and just lots of what could be termed as crap! We had to practically take the shed door off the hinges to put anything in it.. everything got put into bags so we could actually use it for our tools. The rubbish is the most depressing thing on our plot..but we are using it to our advantage now as last night we saw that someone had been over the wall from the adjoining garden (the flattened, dead nettles were a big giveaway).. if the try getting over now, they will be scraping against the old wheelbarrows and stuff.. Not doing it to be mean, I just don't want them on our allotment and I certainly don't want anymore of their cider cans on there either...
They have even attacked our waterbutt :(
]http://www.flickr.com/photos/99520482@N05/9389561629/]
http://www.flickr.com/photos/99520482@N05/9389562779/

Sorry.. just had to rant.. it is getting me down

[antipodes]

It's disgraceful that they were allowed to leave it in that condition! As ours is an association, the person must come back and clear the plot, at least from all of their belongings, and leave the shed empty (unless I guess they wish to leave tools etc for the next person).

[lady_bug]

Ours is an association too, and we were told that they would be contacting them to come and clear it.. but nothing was done. So now we are saving every spare penny we can to hire a skip to get rid of it. If we ever give the plot up (not likely as we're both loving having some outdoor space) we will make sure we leave it in a tidy condition with nothing left for them to have to clear.

[cornykev]

As said it shouldn't be your responsibility to clear the crap, there could be some good wood/branches to there for reuse, I'm not a bonfire person but as a one off you should be able to clear a lot of it and sprinkle the ashes around your plot. If it's anything like where I live, take home the kids toys, a quick wash and leave them out the front and someone will take them, or just stick them on freecycle/freegle. Soil looks OK though, happy digging.   

[lady_bug]

Unfortunately we couldn't do that with the toys as they all had splits in them and with it being that hard, rigid plastic designed for outside. We had to take care when dismantling the house due to some of the jagged edges.
We have done one big bonfire so far, found 2 metal dustbins which we use at the moment for burning the stuff we cut down. We'd rather have a compost heap but until we've cleared the rubbish and flattened the heaps of soil ((which I'm sure is from the dug out pond) behind the bench, we don't have anywhere to start one (only place at the moment would be slap bang in the middle of a potential bed).. I'm sure we will get there............................eventually!

[Digeroo]

I do not think that you should have to deal with all that rubbish.  It is a good case for requiring a deposit, so there is money in the kitty to clear things up.  Though our £25 deposit is just not enough to clean up that sort of a mess.   

I do not think it is fair for someone to leave you to have to pay to clear up their mess.  I think I would contact the council and ask them for advice.

Can you take it a bit at a time to the tip.  (Household recycling centre)

[Mikeakabigman]

We've only had our plot since Feb and we are struggling to keep it clear, but we are lucky as the neighbours on either side are very understanding. We have a hedge on one side so they can't see over with just a quick glance, but the lady who has it has been there for years and years.. On the other side, the fence has gone (it was only about 18inches high) and the brambles have taken over.. we keep cutting them back and try to keep it tidy so it doesn't go all over our other neighbours plot..

Our plot was left in a pretty shoddy state, the previous tennants didn't even bother removing all of their rubbish.. big plastic kids toys (wendy house, bubble car and plastic crane) as well as not bothering to leave the key for the padlock on the shed.. Until we have the money to hire a skip, we have their rubbish still on our plot.. The shed was literally full of stuff.. old cd player, trainers, old onion sets, and just lots of what could be termed as crap! We had to practically take the shed door off the hinges to put anything in it.. everything got put into bags so we could actually use it for our tools. The rubbish is the most depressing thing on our plot..but we are using it to our advantage now as last night we saw that someone had been over the wall from the adjoining garden (the flattened, dead nettles were a big giveaway).. if the try getting over now, they will be scraping against the old wheelbarrows and stuff.. Not doing it to be mean, I just don't want them on our allotment and I certainly don't want anymore of their cider cans on there either...
They have even attacked our waterbutt :(





Sorry.. just had to rant.. it is getting me down

Changed your image code for you, thats an appalling mess to inherit. Good luck with it and your intruders