Allotments 4 All

I just wanted to say what a great forum this is! I have just spent the last hour looking through the various posts and felt compelled to join and introduce myself!!

I'm 38, married, with a 21 month old daughter and another child on the way. We live just ouitside of Leicester. My father-in law (great guy) has just had a kidney transplant and I am trying to clear his overgrown allotment so that we can potter around together next spring to aid his recovery!

He has a largish plot, around 25' x 125' at a guess, which has become very overgrown with brambles, bindweed and couch grass over the last 3 years. It's higher than me in places!!

I want to prepare enough ground this winter to provide us with a few raised beds to go at in the new season. Any advice on clearing the overgrown ground would be much appreciated. Also any sources of reasonably priced timber for raised beds would be a godsend!!

Thanks,

Tim

Hi there Tim and welcome to A4A.

Hope you enjoy yourself here as much as we all do. :D

Eileen.

Welcome to the site Tim, expect you will become addicted to this activity as we all are!  Good that you are helping your father in law but you will certainly benefit too!

About 4 postings down from yours on this section (Basics) you will see a heading Wood for Raised Beds maybe find some help there?

hello TimJ
from a fellow leicestershire person! let me ask some general questions:what do you want to grow in the raised beds-and- I guess this will shape others' advice-organic or not?
it is nice that you want to take the time to help with what sounds like a big task. :)

Hi Tim  ;) just a quick welcome B4 the rest get here as there’s not much room in this shed when they all start spilling their flask’s of tea everywhere, :o but they are a nice bunch of earthy peeps who like to get dug in. :D I am quite a newbie here and still waiting with bated breath for my plot that was promised this month hmm? ???

Enjoy. 8)

Roy. ;D ;D ;D

Thanks to all for the welcome!!   ;D

Kerry, I will be putting in potatoes, but not in the beds, and I want to try my hand at carrots as in the past my Father-in-law has had problems with fly. I thought raising the beds and using fleece might help. Just the usual, really I guess, Beans, parsnip, salad stuff, swede, turnip etc. Want to grow some pumpkins for the kids next year and would love to grow butternuts as they are delicious and cost a fortune to buy! :)

As for organic, yes. I am too late to use glyphosphate anyhow I think, but I am faced with thigh high grass & head high brambles and bindweed  ??? I guess a slasher and a fire is the best bet, but if anyone has got any experience I would be willing to listen!

Thanks,
Tim  

Tim

Greetings from Coalville.  It sounds like you're in the same state I was last year when I got my plot.   Main piece of advice to you is:

******* TAKE IT STEADY   **********

When i'm down at my plot I take either a flask of tea or bottle of drink depending on the weather.

I set my self a limit of two hours digging each time I went to the plot & have almost got my plot into 34 small(ish) beds.  It makes weeding far, far, far easier and when I was digging them out it gave me a greater sense of achievement.

Good luck

Tim,
Unless you want to be pulling out weed roots all winter and beyond, I would do the following:

1. Hire a brushcutter and strim down all weeds. Chuck into a pile out of the way- it will probably be huge but will rot down in a few years and provides shelter for wildlife.

2. Mark out where you want your beds. General guidance is no wider than 4 foot, and the length is up to you- but too long and you'll be tempted to walk over bed rather than walk around.

3. Dig the bed so that you are cutting slices of 'turf' and just turn them upside down. I personally wouldn't bother digging deeper than this. The soil and turfs will no doubt be full of weeds and weed roots, doesn't matter, as when you've finished turning the turfs over, cover the bed with black plastic with slits cut. If the weeds can't see light, they're not going to be much of a problem.

4. Don't skimp on the width of the paths- I recommend 3 foot. This may seem like a waste of valuable growing space, but you'll be grateful when you can properly kneel down to tend to the beds.

5. Cover paths with old carpet (not rubber backed), grabbed from skips outside carpet shops. This means you can walk on them without slipping and don't have to worry about weeds on your paths

6. Spend rest of winter getting manure from stables and farms, chucking it on the beds under the plastic. Worms will dig it in.

7. Come spring, either cut planting holes through the plastic, or remove the plastic and cover soil with thick sheets of newspaper that have been soaked in wallpaper paste for a few hours. This will harden to a papier mache shell and you can then cut holes or slits in to plant transplants or seeds.

Using this method, you shouldn't have to worry much about weeds- as the only opportunity they have to grow is up through the planting holes. The papier mache shell should last until Autumn, then rot away. If you want to make it a bit more pretty, a covering of straw will help, although watch our for slugs. You won't have the most friable soil for the first year, but growing things like potatoes and sunflowers will help break up the soil, so the following year you should be able to grow things like carrots.

good luck!

Hope you don't mind Ross I copy pasted that for when I get my lottie, many thanks. 8)

Roy. ;D

no problem, Roy. This is what I have done for my new allotment this year. This ideas are courtesy of John Yeoman- I recommend you get his book The Lazy Kitchen Gardener:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0954200608/qid=1097836616/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i1_xgl/202-8934630-2090213

It makes you realise that the old practice of double digging every year is unnecessary to get good crops.

TimJ, just wanted to say hello and welcome  :D