Allotments 4 All

Just been down the lot and things dont look too good.

Courgette is next to a new pond. Half of strawberries which I strawed up a week ago are now submariner strawberries.

The path between me and the net plot is under 6" of water half me spuds now have water upto the top of me ridges!

they said that the plot next door got a bit watery over the winter but this is a bit silly. I think that the winter might be slightly wet on my plot.

Is my best bet to try and build up some large raised beds?

The guy next door has rows of submerged peas, letuce, carrots etc!!

L.

I know the feeling, there's nothing so disheartening as being flooded. Are you next to a stream? If not, is it a case of groundwater moving from somewhere loads of water ended up, and raising the water table till it appeared above ground? I've seen plots flooded both ways.

Hi L, Don't  lose heart.  We had terrible flooding a few Sundays ago.  Our plot was  virtually under water and looked like a rice field. I despaired when I first saw it but the next day it had all drained away.  It washed away my tagetes which I had just planted but on the whole things have survived very well  and my veggie crop seems none the worse.  We have got four raised beds in what used to be a particularly difficult area, and they were fine.  If you have a vulnerable area that would be the way to go. Hope when next you go to your plot  the situation is looks better.  :) busy_lizzie 

At least it drains away. My plot slopes away from the stream, which is an old mill leat; I'm between it and the natural bed. So if it floods it forms a temporary lake which takes 3-4 days to clear. Happened four times my first year on the plot.

Well there just seems to be a slight dip between me and nextdoor, no streams or nout near.

It rained really bad on Tuesday night and thats where its all from I think.

Definately need me wellies next time!

And will start sourcing raised bed materials.

L>

That's down to a raised water table. We used to get a lot of runoff from the playing fields nearby flooding into the botanical gardens' wasteland across the lane and flooding that. a day later the water level would rise and one of my neighbours, whose plot is at a slightly lower level, was always flooded. We managed to divert it into the original stream bed in the end, and it doesn't happen any more.

Lots of the plots on our site get flooded, several people have dug "moats" around their plots which seems to work for them, I have gone the raised bed approach!

Well I was on the farm last night and the waters have receded. Justa a matter of time now to see what the effects were. I guess the courgette and runners likes it.

L.

We have the opposite - the soil is so dry it is hard to dig.

Same here west sussex, not a lot of flooding occuring here this year! I just dug some tatties and the ground is as dry as the Sahara :-\ 

With the drought conditions the water companies keep telling us about, short-term flooding's going to become a problem in all sorts of places, and not necessarily where it would be xpected.

Any sort of clay based soil goes as hard as nails when it dries, so that when a heavy shower or worse hits it it cannot absorb the volume straightaway.

Then what we get is a pond for a bit or flash flooding down and away from the impact zone. Boscastle was a typical example last year. You might want to consider trenching away from the danger areas on the plot.

Your plants should survive ok, as Nature has built in loads of survival tricks to its and your veggies and stuff.

My plot was under water from October through to March when my ditches finally did thier job. No water now though, and the spuds I dug up over the weekend were in (improved) dust with solid lumps attached!

This is why even after a period of heavy rain, water companies will complain it was not the right sort.  Too much rain runs off the land straight into the riversas the surface become saturated and cannot take any more.  This means that little rain gets to the water table where it matters.  It also carries pollutants off the land into the rivers.  Quality rain is rain that is not too hard but is persistant.  It is a similat problem that is causing these flash floods in Boscastle and Helmsley.  Deforestation and sheep overgrazing exacerbates the problem.

But hey, according to the tabloids, the wrong sort of rain is a lame excuse, just like wrong leaves on the line (we could be like the Euros and cut all the trees down withing certain distance of railway lines) but we all know what the tabloids say is truth.

There was a time when we had lots of marshy land which soaked it up, then released it gradually, like a vast sponge. Then we drained it, straightened the rivers, so that the water could get to the sea faster, and what do you expect?