Allotments 4 All

Woo Hoo, the first spears have appeared, it must be Spring. And the bonus is that the endemic oxalis hasn't woken up yet so I've a fighting chance of keeping on top of it!

I put black woven weed suppressing membrane over mine over winter, to give the weeds a hard time. Pulled it back to check the other day and the creeping buttercup was depressingly light-green, rather than dead white ... and brittle, due to lack of light I suppose, so whereas I can normally pull up each clump successfully this time the tops just broke off ... grrrrr ...

I'm going to peg a narrow piece of membrane down the middle of my double-row to keep the weeds off that, and then maybe pile some Barley straw along the canes once harvesting is finished to exclude light altogether for the rest of the season.

Planning to do the same deep straw mulch with my Raspberries this year - unless anyone tells me that either of them is a bad idea?

First spears!!!!?....already!!!???
Not a sign of growth over here....not even weeds have started to sprout yet! It has been rather 'fresh' here for some time and the first signs of spring came to stand still...
Oh well...it will happen eventually...

Yeah - nothing here either ... I'm in a fairly mild part of the country - but the allotment site is very exposed compared to most gardens.  I too have almost no weed growth yet ... just a bit of creeping buttercup, dock and nettles starting to show their heads.

I don't think it's spring yet ... and I don't expect asparagus for a while!

The asparagus plants are 30 years old, they seem to sprout earlier every year....I keep thinking I should start some new ones, but they are doing so well still, Connovers Colossal (I think) grown from seed when we moved here (between Derby and Nottingham)  in 1984. I think I've just struck lucky!