Hi I don't know whether this is the right place for this request but if not if any one can point me in the right direction I would be grateful.
We have had loads of problems this year with the onion/leeks and then of course the blight! and my question is how do other sites get tenants to remove from site any nasties that can be detrimental to other plot holders?
Should we include something in the Agreement, a quiet word does not do the trick as people are convinced that by bunging everthing on the compost heap or leaving on the side, it will break down and all will be well!
Have I got it wrong? would be grateful foe any thoughts.
I think you would have trouble legislating about what goes in a compost bin but if you have the power to make a ruling against dumping unwanted produce willy nilly then I think it is for the good of all.
You want to start evicting people if their potatoes get blight?
No not at all, but surely theres such a thing as 'good plot hygiene' perhaps it's just me. I just thought if I had any disease that would wipe out a neighbours plot I would do all That I could to eradicate it without delay.
i take any diseased plants to the tip weather it be blighted pots or toms or anything like that but my neighbors dont seem bother but it makes me feel better that im not spreading any ailment round the lottie :P
Quote from: Susiebelle on August 09, 2009, 16:35:53
No not at all, but surely theres such a thing as 'good plot hygiene' perhaps it's just me. I just thought if I had any disease that would wipe out a neighbours plot I would do all That I could to eradicate it without delay.
There aren't may diseases that will 'wipe out a neighbour's plot', certainly not those you mentioned. Do you have something in particular in mind?
Getting rid of blight-infected foliage could help, as it continues to produce spores till it dies. But it would be far more useful to eradicate volunteers next spring! We need to hit diseases when they're weak if we can, not when they're strong.
Robert, you're talking about good practice, but Susiebelle is suggesting that it be made a Rule - so sprouting potato peelings in the compost bin can get you evicted. I'm very uncomfortable with the whole idea.
Maybe info about blight etc and advice about indentification/prevention/control/ disposal given to plot holders or on information boards dotted around the site could be a start.
Quote from: Unwashed on August 09, 2009, 19:44:03
Robert, you're talking about good practice, but Susiebelle is suggesting that it be made a Rule - so sprouting potato peelings in the compost bin can get you evicted. I'm very uncomfortable with the whole idea.
So am I. I was suggesting that her rules were a little misguided! As for making information available, I'm wondering about that myself. I get a lot of people telling me that they'd assumed that the blight on their spuds was rot due to the flood we had in June.
Robert I agree with you information is the key, you cannot assume that everyone knows the best thing to do I know I don't but I wander about asking the "old guys" who have often experienced this stuff over the years, I balance this with info on the net and then access this forum. Somewhere in the middle is where I'm at ::)
I would just like to say the 'old blokes' or as I prefer the experienced guys on my site are experiencing a lot of these things for the first time, or perhaps they have, as suggested just misdiagnosed them previously/
I am not suggesting evicting any one, just asking people to be a little more considerate, whether it be cutting down/removing their badly blighted tomatoes or doing their best to remove seed heads from their weeds, the weeds are bad enough but we had badly blighted tomatoes 5 weeks ago and I feel if these had been removed from site that just perhaps people trying to give their main crop pots may just have got another few weeks before they had to cut them down, perhaps I,m wrong, I am certainly no expert.
I'm thinking of producing a leaflet covering transmission of blight, pics of the symptoms, advice on how to cope with it, and a list of resistant varieties.
Last year our committee went round the plots explaining to those that had blight that it would be in their own interests, as well as other allotmenteers, if they removed the blighted foliage and warning those thus far unaffected what to look out for. It turned out a lot of them didn't know what blight was and were grateful for the advice.
Quote from: Barnowl on August 10, 2009, 15:49:57
Last year our committee went round the plots explaining to those that had blight that it would be in their own interests, as well as other allotmenteers, if they removed the blighted foliage and warning those thus far unaffected what to look out for. It turned out a lot of them didn't know what blight was and were grateful for the advice.
Yep I think this is a good idea. I am going to bring this up at our next committee meeting as many people are not removing blighted foliage on our site too. Am going to suggest we put a notice up on the main entrance asking people to be vigilant with some pictures.
Funnily enough I have just got an email from a fellow committee member on the same issue.
We are going to put up notices with pics about blight and we are asking plotholders to remove any affected plants. However it has been suggested that if the plotholder does not remove them then a committee member may do so to stop the spread of infection.
Is it reasonable to get a couple of members together to remove blighted toms from plots without the holders consent?
this makes me mad my neighbour has only started to compost them i spotted some potato haulms on his heap as well as toms burried under some other top grwoth as if no one else had noticed no wonder we have such problems year after year but unless we have the industrial farmers keeping potato heaps for the crop not concidered good enough for the supermarket chains we will all have an on going problem . :(
Quote from: BarriedaleNick on August 10, 2009, 17:18:09
Is it reasonable to get a couple of members together to remove blighted toms from plots without the holders consent?
Nope, you can't on someone else's plot without their permission, no matter how annoying the situation may be.
Quote from: Sparkly on August 10, 2009, 17:54:33
Nope, you can't on someone else's plot without their permission, no matter how annoying the situation may be.
where did you get that from?
our site / management committee are allowed to enter upon all plots if they deem it neccessary, for the benefit of all members. (It's in our association rules / tenancy agreements)
and ours... :-X
Wow really? You can't on ours...
The committee might be able to go on any plot but where does it say you can remove things without the plot holders permission?
That sounds like dictatorship not democracy to me. You know rightly or wrongly you cannot tell people what to do and how to do it.
Wouldn't dream of removing them... but we can go on to "see" :)
I do too, but you can only give advice. Some listen some don't and that's how allotments are.
Would love to see the leaflet if you do one Robert.
It's normal to allow the committee to 'enter' the plot, but there's a difference between that and interfering with crops, even if they are diseased.
Simple answer: it's totally unacceptable for anyone - committee included - to set foot on a plot without the allotmenteer's permission, and everything on the plot - diseased material included - belongs to the allotmenteer and no one has a right to mess with it. If the allotmenteer is doing something that breaks a condition of the tenancy agreement then the landlord's only option is to warn the tenant, and ultimately evict her.
Complicated answer: No one has a right to mess with the allotmenteer's stuff, though in practice there's little the tenant could do if her diseased tomatoes had been removed. Technically I'd guess it was either theft or criminal damage but I very much doubt the police would be interested, and she could only sue for actual loss, and in reality she hasn't suffered any. It might be different if the interfering was repeated and could be seen as intimidatory because then the police might look at it as harassment.
Whether anyone else has a right to enter your plot depends on whether you have a lease or licence, and that's a notoriously difficult thing for the courts to decide, but generally you have exclusive posession of your plot, and that makes it a lease. Exclusive posession means that the tenant controls the whole of her plot and no one else can come and plant stuff on it and make use of it in some other way. Contrast that with the Landshare arrangements where people let gardeners come and work a bit of their garden - the whole of the garden is still free to be enjoyed by the homeowner, but the gardener is granted a licence to use part of the garden as well.
Whether you have a lease or a licence is a question of fact, but Councils that let their allotments under the allotments acts only have the power to lease the plots, so a council letting plots under licence would be acting ultra vires and could be challenged. Mostly though plots will be leased, and a term of the tenancy agreement that grants the landlord unlimited access is just unenforceable because exclusive posession is a fundamental feature of a lease. Take it to Trading Standards, they'll sort the landlord out. The landlord is entitled to reasonable access for maintenance, but she still needs to ask for permission and that certainly doesn't include going onto the tenant's plot to mess about with her stuff just because the landlord doesn't like what she sees.
So in short: there are committees out there - no, there are people out there who get themselves onto committees - who need to show a bit more respect for their tenants.