Grapes Allotments - Before And After

[Happy Horticulturalist]

I thought it was about time I gave an update on my plot. When I got it on 29th January this year it looked like this:



and now it looks like this:



I don't think I have ever dug so much in my entire life

The most persistent problem I have is with brambles popping up all over the place but the plot also suffers from bindweed. You should see the weeds I have dug up over the past six months. One good aspect of that is that it proves what good soil it is! I'm hoping that next year will be even better, now that I have finished all the digging (although I'm planning on taking the adjacent plot on so my digging has probably only just begun...).

[yellow strawberry]

my new plot

here are a couple of our new plot ,,,will put a few more up when we have finished building the beds,,as you can see we where very lucky ,,these are brand new plots that my husband has been campaigning for for the last 3 years ,,this is what they looked like after the council scraped the weeds off and leveled it out a bit ,,it was derelict ground before for years and years ,,soil is rubbish but nothing a couple of loads of manure wont fix

[yellow strawberry]

my first plot

a couple of before and after pictures from our first plot

[Bigmallly]

Just thought I would put a couple of pics up 6 weeks after getting lottie.

[Two_Sheds]

Good job BM

Here's some of this weekend's weeding done. There wasn't any digging to do, apart from levering out a double row of raspberry suckers. It was mostly just chopping back the topgrowth ~ I cut everything twiggy up into 2" bits so as to rot down quicker.

[Bigmallly]

Blimey TS, and I thought I did well in 6 weeks.

[Florence Fennel]

Crikey TS, well done with that!

[aliveggrower]

Getting somewhere now



This is the plot I took on in April 2011. More of a shrubbery than an allotment - hadn't had anything done to it for quite a while.



This is what it looks like now.

I've had quite a successful year and have acheived far more than I thought I would. I've 3 sacks of spuds, Desiree and Pink Fir Apple, in storage and several kilos of tomato sauce -Marmande- and tomato soup, cougette soup and tomato & squash soup, as well as runner beans in the freezer. There are also more jars of courgette chutney and green tomato chutney than I care to think of.

I'm still cropping curly kale - with added white fly protein (need some protection next year). I've got plenty of spring cabbage growing well and have garlic and red onions starting to show. These latter may survive if I find a way of deterring the mole that is running around under my plot - any suggestions will be gratefully received, please.

[horticultural_hobbit]

hobbit lotment

Haven't quite finished yet, a work in progress.
Allotment - Horticulturalhobbit Wiki

[Shortie]

Hello

Here's a before of mine - brand new out of the box as of yesterday for me Please excuse the little one bang in the middle of the photo... no matter what I did he crept back in view, lol

It has a range of trees (there is debate if they are silver birch - why plant silver birch on a lottie??!!) a third of it is covered in run away strawberry plants which I need to suss how to deal with (ie so I can keep some) a pile of well rotted manure in the middle and some globe artichoke just out of view in the front left of the photo.

It seems to have decent, light soil (I was dreading a compacted field like my first one was) a small amount of couch grass on the manure only for some reason, and I trod (and therefore smelt) mint somewhere in the middle too...

I'm hoping to have it dug over by the end of this week, and will post more piccies then if I have

Shortie
xx

[Aberdeenplotter]

Now that's what I call a challenge. It's a real shame that allotments are allowed to get in to that state but as you are an experienced plotter and have reinforcements available as per the young gentleman in the pic I'm sure you will get things back under control before too long. Good luck and do post progress pics as you go

[Shortie]

Thanks Aberdeenplotter I'm not sure what the biggest challenge is - the plot or the little man, he he... But, when he has his own patch to grow bits (including pumpkins in competition with his older brother for the biggest one!) I'm sure it'll be easier. He seemed quite happy finding worms, past-it potatoes and a part rotted pumpkin yesterday! Oh and a marble... he was super chuffed at finding a marble, lol

[hollychap]

my lottie

took mine on at the back end of april 2011 pics show the main plot also have a large greenhouse from where pics were taken

[susieq100]

That looks very organised and productive!

[SarzWix]

I have to say, I really really love this thread