[Yana]

Removed cover on two beds to reveal lovely crumbly soil .. Thank you worms for working so hard over the winter months. Gave a rake over and now ready for putting in onions that I started off in the greenhouse.
Had a hands on tutorial from fellow plot holder in pruning gooseberries. He made it look so easy and I just made a mess 

[devonbarmygardener]

Still haven't touched the plot yet this year

Really hoping for good weather middle of next week when I'm on holiday for a week

[Hampshire Hog]

Just planted my onion sets under fleece to keep them warm. It's nice now but rain and cooler temperatures on the way for Friday and week end here. Amazed by how many I managed to get into the bed I had assigned to them think I will get a few more as they are a staple in our house.

Cheers HH

[teamspotty]

More digging.

Farrier has turned up trumps with some metal I can make into staples for membrane....will be making some later.

[pigguns]

Old George (93 you know, and cycles everywhere) has put his parsnips in  so I rushed home and got my seeds to do the same  ....

[snowdrops]

Cut down the autumn raspberries & took the garden prunings & kitchen waste & added it all to compost bin no.1. Will need my ratchet secateurs to cut through the bigger raspberry stems though

[Yana]

Put in the onion sets that had been in the cold frame. Then someone says 'the weather is getting colder over the next few days'..... Where is the fleece when you need it!!!!

[teamspotty]

Stripped the next patch of ground to dig and covered with carpet.

Put mistletoe seeds in the apple tree.

Created a few staples for weed membrane to see how they pad out.

We have rhubarb...!

[mjg000]

Friday, 13th March
Spent the morning at home and visiting various places trying to get access to a printer that would scan some documents.  Success by about 2pm and then it was such a lovely day that I couldn't stop myself from going to the allotment! 
No big jobs to do but put a bit more covering over one of the paths so that there are no strimming jobs later in the year. 
Checked for carrot germination - NO, and Broad Bean germination - NO. 
Planted out 3 Alpine strawberry plants in the end of the strawberry bed.  Messed up the membrane more than with the others as these 3 are bigger plants.  Watered them in. 
Dug around some of the beds to create a definition between path and bed - I don't so much have raised beds as defining wooden planks around about half of the beds. 
Dug out the wild garlic which is coming up where I failed to harvest the garlic sown last year - lots of little bulbs, I wonder if they would have developed into something edible - but they couldn't stay as they are in the middle of the new raspberry bed. 
Put 2 bottles of slug pellets in the shed in anticipation of the onslaught. 
Listened to school next door to the allotments shouting and playing a football tournament.  ( I know this as 8yr old Grandson is playing in it )  It feels good  .... pity the cold will apparently be back with us next week.

[Offwego]

in a quick hour before tea I turned over the contents of the two compost Daleks and also did some weeding.
funny how the weeds grow quicker than anything !!
Hope to have a busy weekend on the plot and do some raised beds on plot 1, plant some onion sets, and hopefully pull 4 rows ready for my potatoes
Lifted the fleece from over the 2 rows of earlies I planted on March 1st  and the soil under was fleece was lovely and warm so all good there. put the fleece straight back down and weighted it with scaffold boards.

I have also ordered a small shed , nothing special just a 6 x 4 tin shed but somewhere to keep my tools rather than the boot of my car which was getting filthy what with tools and wellies.

fool I am I didn't see the delivery date is not until the 9th April but no problem it will soon be upon us and it will give me a chance to prepare the base.

For the base I have had a  heavy duty pallet from plasterboards which means its 8ft x 4ft not the usual 4 ft square so the shed would sit straight on it, but I have also put some treated 1inch thick boards onto it to add strength and  ballast weight  so that should be fine. I need to level out the area where I am putting it but that will probably be a job for next weekend not this

[Flowertot]

Today I planted the onion sets and covered them with fleece (mainly to stop the pigeons, squirrels and foxes from digging them up).    The soil must be warmer than I think - when I dug over/ weeded last year's potato bed, I found several "volunteers" which had sprouted more than 10cm of growth! Also sowed lettuce, mustard and spring onions in modules in the blowaway.

[Hampshire Hog]

Topped up my onion bed with some shallots yesterday then recovered with fleece. Mended water butt by tightening the tap had to dismantle it and crawl inside - somewhat smelly! Hopefully it won't leak now and I can collect some rainwater from the showers we are promised. After that I removed a few weeds from the asparagus bed and added some specific potato fertiliser to my prepared bed. Finally dug up some of the last leeks. Checked beetroot seedlings in conservatory and broad beans all looking good. Struggling to stop myself sowing outdoor tomatoes I know it's too early!!

Cheers HH

[Yana]

A skip had been ordered for the lottie today so that a site clear up could happen. Skip arrived just around 8am and by 12 it was nearly full!! Managed to get rid of loads of carpet left on vacant plots, a couple of very rusty and disintegrating oil drums that had been used for burning stuff, beer cans a plenty, and the usual rubbish.
It was an amazing sight with around a dozen wheelbarrows or more trundling up and down collecting stuff up. Looks so much nicer now.

[teamspotty]

Want to get my fruit bushes in so spent the day making staples and putting them in and removing bricks (photo's attached). Looks so much better, but didn't get time to put bushes in, but that's the first job for tomorrow.

Pulled up some old rubbishy carpet at the side of the lotty that wasn't doing a lot and started laying some more. Need to strim down before laying some more.

Need to get some more ericaceous compost for repotting a blueberry.

Bumped into a couple of the ol' boys so I've put the message out there for any cast off's. Got some onion sets coming my way....

Oh and discovered that the spotty woofer had consumed my white pumpkin seeds....grrrrr.....

[Offwego]

 PLOT 1
raised beds on plot 1 complete and looking great 
applied lime in mesh tunnel ready for the brassicas
turned over (again) the raised beds and raked level to newly installed timber edging

need to get some bark tomorrow for the paths

PLOT 2
planted a row of broad beans ( direct) and covered with a fleece cloche