Allotments 4 All

I got my allotment three months ago.  A big thank you for the welcome I got when I joined the site.  Would like to share with you how far I have come.

I do not have a before picture it was just brown with straw and ruts.  The first two pictures sum it up.  There was a little bit of this
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and lots of this
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It was rock solid, and has taken weeks of digging.  Hence Digeroo.

But now
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and just look at my courgettes.

That's just amazing (not the pig pee tho!) you must be so chuffed! well done
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They'll love all that manure. What's the pea in one of the pics?

  All credit to you Digeroo,  it looks a treat !  

  You must have worked so hard.

  floss xxx

It has been load of work and my garden is in a mess because of it.  Had little time for flowers.

The pea is Purple Podded.  A great pea.  Grows like a weed, nice as mange tout, good peas.  Easy to save seed, had brilliant germination from own seed.  Only started with 10 from Heritage Seed Library,

Producing a good harvest of mangetout already.  Grows to more than 2m high. 

It is very hardy planted it in March site very windy so acts as a wind break.

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starting an allotment in first year is not easy especially if overgrown be pleased with yourelf.

Well worth all the hard work isn't it. Do you keep pigs? ;D

No the pigs belong to the farmer who owns our site.  They are great - they eat weeds.  The are particularly fond of dandelions.  I brought them some bindweed and keen to ensure this did not got into the soil they ate it so gently out of my fingers.  Had some brocolli stalks, they were soon crunched up.

We are not allowed livestock or sheds.

How nice. I have heard that pigs are quite intelligent animals. We are not allowed livestock on our plots either. It must be so nice to be so close to them.

We are in a lovely position there are ponies and sheep just beyond the pigs.  And we have nature reserves on three sides. 

However there is a down side there is a flock of geese which wander onto the allotments and a swan was busy nibbling someones efforts this morning.  The geese fly away if you chase them but the swan just turns round an hisses.  They are enormous out of water. 

Quoteif overgrown

Did not have this problem as you can see from the pics the pigs do not leave much behind.  I sympathize with those who have had to fight with the weeds.  Have few weeds and no slugs.

Well done Digeroo. You can be very pleased with yourself. I know what you mean about the garden at home ::) ::) ::).
Janet

thanks grannyjanny

That's amazing! Good work!

The pig's were there first?

That must have helped. It occured to me that pig's would do a good job of clearing but on a normal site you wouldn't be allowed.

What a great job Digeroo, glad to see you Didn't make a pigs ear of it.        ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D

Pigs are brilliant at clearing a site.  Think that brambles might be a bit of an issue, but if you removed the thorny bit they would certainly enjoy the roots.  The eat everything.  Dandelions, stinking neetles, slugs.  couch roots.  The problem would be getting a pig onto the site they are a bit touchy about being moved.  I should thought that if you can find a pig then an overgrown site would be cleared in no time at all and fertilized into the bargain.  However they compact the soil with their trotters so it is very difficult to dig afterwards.  The soil goes like concrete.

Here are some more pics

Courgettes
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DIY polytunnel thanks to all for encouraging me to give it a whirl.
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And for Broad bean lovers
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Having seen a few pics of the red beans they are an absolute must for next year! I just love the colour of the flowers  :D

Flowers lovely tend to be a bit erratic, many in the packet are not that colour.  Beans ok, but masterpeice green long pod better beans all round.