Sorry, long rambling...
Any tips anyone?When I visited my lot this morning (to check the lettuce disaster, see previous post) I felt rather despondant. All the other (retired folk, well established) lots were well tilled, tidy rows and mine is...well a bit of a mess.
Paths are carpets for now, weeds are taking over and the plot is badly delimited. I have had it for 3 months only and for now can only work on it during weekends.
I think I will use the advice from forum and use newspaper to smother the b****dy weeds but how can I have nice neat subplots? I don't use rows, I have split it into areas for crop rotation but they are not really cordoned off. If only things were growing it might not be so noticeable ::)
For now I have in: peas, lettuce, garlic, onions and fruit. The rest has not come up through the soil yet (spuds, beets, carrots, parsnip, spinach). Every time I have a sowing or planting, it's ok, I do the digging and weeding in that patch and it looks better. But it is a far cry from the others...
here's what it was like about 6 weeks ago...and it ain't much different now (mmm except the bit nearest which is now all fruit, that's not too bad) :(
(http://i139.photobucket.com/albums/q319/antipodes_photo/DSCN1225_trim.jpg)
I don't have $$$ to spend on wood etc to put around each area but was wondering if I couldn't sow something that would put a sort of border around the plot and make it nice and square looking? Just a couple of inches wide...
As I live in a flat, I don't really have access to all the mulch etc that other talk of (cuttings, leaves etc). Carpet and newspaper is quite effective but not very aesthetic :( I would quite like to have a neater looking plot, that's all. Any ideas??? Or have I just bitten off more than I can chew?
Don't panic, you have only had the plot for 3 months!
The others on site have probably had theirs for years.
It doesn't look in too bad condition at all, you should see ours! ;D
Try concentrating on a bit at a time, and you could always make mounds up with earth along the sides of your beds if you can't get hold of anything else!
Don't give up... its not that bad.
I'm sure someone with a bit more experience will be along shortly to give more advice....
Take care ;D
I don't have my beds edged but I do use my sharp spade and cut a clean edge and push the soil away, so there is an obvious cut. If you do it standing on a piece of board/plank, you can get a nice straight line and that makes a hell of a difference!
What you have to remember is, unless you can get there daily, like the retired folks, or have been working a plot for years so the ground is in great condition and has established permanent plants, it will get like that. It isn't that bad - I have seen ones a trillion times worse! Cover what you don't need to use with cardboard or whatever you can lay your hands on, and then concentrate on one piece at a time...and don't worry about what other people think. We all have to start somewhere, and most of us start with a jungle to clear.
Quote from: coznbobIt doesn't look in too bad condition at all, you should see ours! ;D
Seconded.
Cover the bits you're not working on to reduce weed growth and work on it a bit at a time.
It's not as bad as you think! You've only had it 3 months and as EJ says 1) others have had theirs years 2) there are worse ones out there than yours.
Personally i would be tempted to dig one patch completely over, even if it's a patch 4'x4' it's still a nice earthy patch, you can then edge as EJ says with your spade, or, as we have on our plot, use the random bits of wood lying about (if you have any) to just delineate the edges. Then you can plant it up and feel much better!
I would also advise this book : Practical Allotment Gardening by Caroline Foley. It's fab for beginners, loads of good pics of paths and pond projects and pics of other lotties to get inspiration for your own.
Don't give up - it's early days, it's easy to get despondant , but when things do start growing you'll be raring to go.
by the way - you are even shorter than me! ;)
Hi
I too have had my plot only 3 months and as I work away from home during the week, only have the weekends to potter.
My plot is/was completely grassed over - not been dug for over 2 years.
I have covered a big area with a black polythese sheet that the allotment association has lent to me. It looks tidy. I have then started to do one area at a time.
I now have 2 beds turned over and edged. If you can lay your hands on some pallets, they can be broekn up to make edges. They are usually free, just drive round the local industrial estate on a Sunday morning and put a few in your boot! (Not the blue ones though).
Once edged, the bed looks very tidy. Another tip, as soon as you turn over the soil and give it a goos rake, all the weedy bits can be picked up - it looks much more pleasing. Plant in one bed and move on gradully - you will see things start to grow soon!
Re the paths - the more you start to walk on them, the better they will look.
Good luck! Chin-up!
It's far better than mine was after 3 months; I was still having daily bonfires to get rid of the rubbish I inherited, I had a junk pile six feet high and twenty feet across (I measured it), and I'd barely begun to impact the couch. Yours looks manageable. Dig a bit, black plastic what you cant manage, and stop worrying. It'll get there, in time.
Oh, meant to say try your local Freecycle group (just google it with your town name) for pallets, water butts, bins, buckets, straw, old carpets, whatever. (also stuff on there that normal people would want, but i just go for the tat!
Don't worry about it looking a bit of a mess, it'll get there. Mine is covered in various parts with an old rug out the shed, blue plastic sheeting that blew across the site, black plastic sheeting i pulled out of a skip and some weed suppressant i actually paid for! :o
If you want to feel better, check out the pics of heldis plot!
Quick edit to say : Heldi's allotment - locations and sites. Will definately make you feel a bit better and not so alone!
Well, that has all cheered me up a bit :D
I think the plot was cultivated up till this winter, the plots never stay vacant.
I should take pics of the others so you see why I am demoralized. They all seem to be just neat rows (bit boring I suppose), I dunno how they walk around everything though? But there is nothing lying around, no carpet, or black plastic etc etc I suspect they must use weedkiller or something????
Hadn't thought of pallets, might see what I can find.
To give it credit, where I have had the carpet down, the earth underneath is lovely, no weeds, moist and dark. I wouldn't mind a bit more of it, but dunno where from.
They are not that neat as paths go. I would like to try grass paths but I don't have a mower. I am afraid that stuff like bark chips would end up all over the shop.
I got my compost bin from freecycle (it's not on the piccie), but no wood or plastic or stuff :(
S'pose really I am too influenced by the others, what will they think? Already the old blokes look at my plot and tut tut. They didn't see my hauling the dirt around with a spade in January digging compost trenched where my beans will go!!! Course now, that bit is weedy so the hard work seems to have gone to waste.
I need a crop that will go mad and cover the mess!!! Guess I will just have to wait till summer for that. I will post a few more pics later on. I do have a blog too, at http://roos-and-camembert.blogspot.com/
(http://roos-and-camembert.blogspot.com/) Pushing up the Daisies ha ha that's how I feel after a few hours' digging ;D
And to the wit (emmy) who made the short person comment, that of couse is my DD, Smallest One...errr but to tell the truth I only hit 5'2" meself so I shall refrain from berating ;)
Quote from: antipodes on April 12, 2007, 15:01:03
S'pose really I am too influenced by the others, what will they think? Already the old blokes look at my plot and tut tut.
Poop to them. The nice thing about GYO is that, though we all follow the same planting times, with variations for regions, the rest is kind of individual. That's one of the nice things about a4a, you get to hear about every-ones methods, whether ingenius solutions invented by themselves or handed down knowledge from generations back, like a huge gardening family. :)
Quote from: antipodes on April 12, 2007, 15:01:03
And to the wit (emmy) who made the short person comment, that of couse is my DD, Smallest One...errr but to tell the truth I only hit 5'2" meself so I shall refrain from berating ;)
no, please don't berate me. just being silly. ;)
As the others say just progress one bed at a time, timber round the edges does not make the produce grow any better or make it tastier.
This is my set up;
(http://tinyurl.com/2xoqso)
Look no timber!! (apart from the divisional path between the two plots)
Before you mention that I am retired (which is true) it was always like this even when I worked for a living but it took a few years to get there!!
Patience!!
I've had mine about 6 months and it doesn't look better than yours. :) I did tackle one area at a time, though now I just want to get things planted so can understand why you're working the whole area but not thoroughly. I'm getting a couple palettes from the builders working next door to my flat to do what Kev says - I just want to have some borders to help it look more organised. And hopefully to help keep the couch grass at least a bit at bay (doubtful though). Heck, I don't even have areas as tidy as yours - some horizonal rows down the bottom, a big square patch in the middle with flowers, and a couple vertical rows. I dig rather randomly. ;D
As long as something you planted is growing isn't that what it's about?
Tina.
I agree with the others - don't be disheartened, it takes time. However, if you go down the pallet route, a word of warning - I have my fence up and my beds edged BUT- I still find myself slowing down and eyeing up pallets whenever I see them!!!! ;D ;D ;D
Don't forget that the weeds can also be called a green manure!! They are temporarily covering and therefore protecting the soil. ;)
I know it's hard not to look at other plots and compare, but this is YOUR baby, and you're doing the best you can, so ENJOY!!!! ;D ;D
also, if you can get some black plastic, weigh the edges down with bags of weeds, grow things like potatoes, courgettes, squash through it and make the bl**dy weeds feed your crops..
don't panic, as everyone says, we were all there at one time or another and ignore the moaners, it's your bit of land, do it as and when you can :)
Also a good idea when you have dug over areas or planted is to try to spend 10-30 minutes just going round the plots- I do this with the 3 I have removing any weeds at some point during my visit to the plot- this stops them becoming larger and taking over. Good luck it looks a lovely plot.
Have a look out especially over the May day weekend and also the Whitsun weekend for people that are taking up old paving slabs and putting in new ones. Providing you are prepared to transport the things over to the allotment, you can get yourself very cheap permanent paths for no cost.
Great suggestions for my weeds! A friend at work brought me in a massive sack of newspaper today so I will use that, as you say, weighed down with other weeds! I don't really want the grass to take over. And as one of my other posts said, it is hard to know what to pull up and what is actually one of my own seedlings ???
I am hoping to have a week off over the May Day holiday period (loads of bank holidays here in France) and think I will work like a good 'un making it neat and tidy. Yes I should look out for people that seem to be digging up pavers etc, WHAT ABOUT GRAVEL? Anyone used that for paths or edges? or does it move about too much??
I am lucky I guess, the soil is excellent and I did dig a fair bit of it in January so now your boots just sink into it, there is no hard crust - LOADS OF WORMS! Once I get it tidied up I will post some more pics. (None today though, it is raining here!! good for the seedlings).
Thanks for all those ideas, i love this forum!
we have two lotties one not to bad the other well it's alot worse than yours but i know what you mean what to get it sorted ready for planting. our second one hasn't been dug over for about 3 years we've had it a year and we've still done nothing with it, this year a couple from our lotty had got there's ploughed so asked if ours could be ploughed only to find the farmer couldn't get the plugh in not enuff room, so the farmer is going to get his rotavator on it for us, it's only going to cost us a tenner. we have started to dig but it is very hard digging weeds and grass all over and the ground is hard, we are just lucky i suppose. just keep going it will get better ;D
Having spent hours this week riddling gravel out of the soil in our second plot (untouched for ten years before we took it on) I would humbly suggest that a few years down the road, if you decide to change things, it could be a pain in the neck? ::)
I have cleared the perennial weeds from the paths (the few that I've actually finished), hoed them over and then pinned down weed suppressing fabric which I then covered with wood bark. I would have used straw but haven't been able to source any locally yet.
BTW beware of wood bark as a mulch since it apparently robs the soil of nitrogen. I'm hoping mine will be OK since it is on top of fabric.
Your doing fine - bit by bit you will get there in hte end
agree with emmy try freecycle it is a great way to get all sorts of bits and bobs
I have had wooden shelves - used for raised beds
water butt
and now a shed !
best of luck and do keep up the good work
BB ;)
I've had my allotment for exactly a year now and only a couple of weeks ago actually got round to properly measuring and marking out my plots properly -with string and tent pegs!
MMM I guess where I should be ashamed is that I am incapable of properly marking out the plot but my hubby is...a surveyor's technician :( Talk about the cobbler being the worst shod!!!
Went down yesterday but had a splitting headache so ended up not staying that long. Covered the to-be-beans plot with newspaper, weighing it down with wood and clumps of weeds from other bits of the plot. Got some very odd looks from the others...but no comments. If it kills enough of the grass and weeds off to put the beans in, then that will be enough for me.
There is a old fella on our lots that has a rotovator and will run over the plot for a few beers - I feel I may have to cave in and get him to at least rotovate the part where the toms, courgettes etc will go. Even if it might spread the weeds, I might have had time to mulch and black plastic the crops by then. I put a massive bit of cardboard over some of it, maybe that will kill enough weeds to let me get the tomatoes in??
I also weeded the herb garden, looks much neater now, planted some coriander seeds in it and...planted a row of sunflowers!
Sounds like you're on a roll. :) I've been really stressed at the moment, and lacking energy (it's just too much work), so my theory now is each time I go to the allotment I plant something. It doesn't have to be much, maybe herbs like you said or throw in some flower seeds. So I might have to dig and weed (as best I can) a small area, but I'm not getting too worked up about it. Just do what I can then plant in it. We'll see what happens! Yesterday I got lettuce seeds in.
So little steps... next year we can have well-planned plots and show them off to the new newbies. ;D
Tina.
Yes I agree with that theory, that is why I planted the sunflowers yesterday! I want to plant things that take up space, like the beans and tomatoes! Actually the weather here is so warm, I am tempted to try a row of beans next weekend and see what happens, perhaps they will be able to grow enough to withstand any haphazard weather. I know that courgettes etc take up lots of space but maybe that's a bit optimistic for now.
Then I am theorizing that by digging up crops like spuds, onions, carrots etc, the soil will be turned and I will be able to weed, manure and plant winter crops.
Hubby keeps hinting that what I am doing is not "esthetic" but he doesn't seem to realize the amount of work (and cash!!) involved in having something "landscaped". Might help if he came and measured the plot for me, for a start!!
don't be too hard on yourself.... we have had ours for 2 years and our paths are carpet, I like them as you can kneel down on them to weed (an absolute must for me as I am 6 months pregnant!).
Ours is one of the scuffiest plots on the whole site, especially at this time of year. But we did a walk around the whole site the other evening as we were the only people there and our onions and garlic were better than everyone elses, despite their prefect tilth and weed free plots.... was such a grest feeling of satisfaction.
In a few months time the whole thing will be heaving with veg, once spuds, squashes, pumpkins etc... get going and we will be struggling to shoe horn stuff in.
If only aesthetics were the first thought of an allotmenteer! Saw brill cartoon once about sheds, the allotment one was the one made from doors and bits of corrugated iron! So true.
I loved it when the first bit of earth was dug and straight (i dig in a circle according to OH) that's all the landscaping i need!
Fast growers - rockit and radish both coming up on mine (yay) so bung some of those in. The ground will be well turned by digging up your spuds etc later so thats some of the work done.
Really don't worry. If anyone expects you to have it perfect this year they are mad and I'm sure no-one on the site expects that. I have to say, from your posts they don't sound particularly friendly or helpful!
The weeds won't be killed in such a short space of time but will certainly be weaker and easier to dig up. I have found old carpet to be super effective at this. Totally revolting and about as aesthetic as a boil on your bum, but lordy it works -and works quickly. :)
Have to agree about the carpet....
I have spent the past couple of weeks just digging to try and get ours in a workable condition. I asked the OH what he thought of it the other night and he came back with the immortal words NOT MUCH! He thought that there were too many weeds and too much grass left!
Grrrrrrrrrr, don't look at the bits I haven't done, be impressed with the big bit that I have broken my back doing!
I finally succumbed to the carpet thing yesterday ::)
I'd been adamant that it wasn't environmentally friendly and that I was only going to use cardboard but then I saw loads of carpet that had been dumped in the communal tip (two overgrown plots >:() and I thought b****r it, I'm having that! so I scraped off the dead mouse and wood shavings and dragged it onto my plot. it does look pretty horrid, but it is green so it could be worse!
If it's old carpet then it's performing a final service before it's truly ready for the dreaded landfill. If you have problems with the way it looks and have plenty of dosh you could always call Carpet World and ask them to come and measure up the plot. ;D ;D ;D ;D
I can totally relate to this problem, I got my plot a month ago today, and it seems so disheartening to see everyone else's looking so smooth and weed free! I caved in and rotorvated mine since 1/4 of it was rubbish heap anyway, but if I had more time before planting time, I would have preferred to dig and weed by hand. The one I did that way looks better! Its way too expensive to buy all the stuff to pretty it up, so my paths are also just grass waiting to creep into my veg :( will deal with that problem when it arrives :) would put on a picture but haven't figured out how yet...
The carpet is actually great. Yeah I heard too that is is not eco-friendly but i would only have dumped it... Underneath it is smooth and moist and lots of buggy things!! OK, no doubt some I don't want but also ladybirds and beetles. Which to me are the sign of healthy earth!
I don't know about my fellow allotmenteers, I was kind of put out when the "supervisor" came and said things (I suppose politely) to the tune of "you're doing it all wrong and it's a mess" while gaily adding "but if you don't know, don't be ashamed to ask". Err right, but how do you know when you don't know? To me, it's when your crop has been crappy and full of pests and diseases. And really, I am not going to ask my fellow gardeners to dig up my weeds for me, am I? His comment was quite absurd I thought. I mean, they say hello etc but I am the only person under 60 on the whole lot which is a joke when you think that they are called "Family allotments" here! And I am a girl, doing it by herself, they obviously think I have delusions of grandeur.
I will have to think about what I want as paths, just straw is even sounding like a good option at the moment! But where the heck do I get all this stuff from? I haven't even managed to get my hands on any black plastic yet...
To post a pic, you need to use the little picture icon from the "Add BBC tags" section. You can either upload it if it is small or give the URL that goes to it if you have it on a web image site, like photobucket. I took some pics today I will get them off my camera and onto my blog. Then everyone can help me identify my b***y weeds!
try ebay for your plastic, we got some weed suppressant and it wasn't a bad price :)
Shame on your neighbours. You are in France though and they probably are a little taken aback by this girl appearing in their space. My grandparents have a house in Normandy and they are a little grumpyfied around there. It is only a case though of earning your stripes. When they see your plot coming on and all the work you've done i bet they soften up.
You could always butter them up a bit by asking lots of advice and questions, you don't have to use it, but they will like it that they can show off their knowledge and you pre-empt all the 'oooh, you don't want to do that' business. 8)
Yeah, luckily the immediate neighbour on the lots is quite kind and she (one of the rare women down there) tends to say nice things like, ooh look you've got some potato leaves coming up there, or wow that's a nice big compost bin you got. She seemed to find my newspaper antics quite amusing. I just get this feeling that the others are having a look when I am gone and thinking, blimey she's not getting very far with THAT!
It's an association so they keep an eye on what is going on, if you don't grow enough or tend the plot sufficiently, they will chuck you out. There are no young families or couples, it's quite a shame really, as it could be a mixed crowd, but maybe young people think they don't have time...
At 9 am this morning (mid-week) there were a few of them already at it, digging up patches, weeding etc, I mean I have to get to work! I don't have the luxury of being able to tend the garden every day for 3 hours! Actually I don't really like to ask things because I find it a bit embarrassing, perhaps I should offer round a few spare gherkin plants or something to improve my image. Oh and they must wonder what the heck I am doing when I am photographing weeds for my blog!!! LOL crouching down taking pics of teh goseberries, they must think I am barmy. girl+foreigner+newbie, cripes I've got it all going for me! ;D
I think your plot looks great. If you want to see something demoralising you should see my plot! The weeds are knee high, lots of sow thistle except where I have black plastic or carpet. It's 45ft by 68 ft and I've been away on holiday for 2 weeks before I went the soil was too wet and resembled wet cement now it's too dry and like concrete so my potatoes are still waiting to go in. I managed to dig it over yesterday but there are rock like clumps to break up still.