Return of the Greenhouse

I had a greenhouse at our previous house and left it behind when we moved; too difficult to dismantle and remove.

I've missed it since the day we moved, but no more; I've spent the weekend assembling my 60th birthday present to myself - a 6ft x 8ft greenhouse.

It hasn't been the easiest of jobs.

The instructions were clearly written by someone who was completely familiar with the task and all the various complex shaped and almost identical components, which is always a mistake.

I think instructions are best written by (and certainly for) a complete idiot who has never done the job before. I managed to keep the air relatively clean, even though some bits turned out to be assembled in mirror-image format and had to be dismantled & remantled. Some bits turned out to be upside down; not much use when you're trying to hang a door from them. Other bits, which were actually correct, had to be disconnected in order to fit later bits of the assembly. Did the instructions mention that at any point? Not a word.

I'm not usually cack-handed at this sort of thing; I have a Masters in IKEA assembling. And I couldn't have done it without Wilma Wilbury's assistance; just didn't have enough hands. Even with the two of us we didn't have quite enough hands and had to use masking tape to stop things wibbling into the wrong place.

But it went together eventually


and after a spot of heavy lifting it moved off the patio and into it's home in the garden.


Phew!

It's now about two-thirds glazed; need to get on with it because I've got plants queueing up to get into it. And a pigeon has already christened it!!

Pah!!

..... just missed being stranded in the USA for weeks on end. I flew back on Tuesday (upgraded to Club Class; thanks BA, could get used to that) and the volcano blew on Thursday. Just two days it needed to wait but no, I'll have to go back to work tomorrow.

Pah, indeed!!

On this day, in 1825....

.... David Douglas, botanist & plant collector (1799-1834) first set foot in the Pacific NorthWest, at the mouth of the Columbia River. His journal records:

April 8th 1825, I went on shore on Cape Disappointment. Constant heavy rain, cold, thermometer 47deg.

One half of the Wilburys is in Oregon, launching the film "Finding David Douglas" at the World Forestry Centre, Portland. Guess what the weather was like 185 years later. Yep; you got it.

Wilma Wilbury remains at home and, counter-intuitively, has taken the opportunity to remove a Douglas introduction from the garden.


Sitka Spruce are a mainstay of the UK forestry industry but are NBG at all when planted too close to the house by the previous owner and left to grow , and grow, and grow. The garden looks better already, I'm told.

Asparagus

Last year's attempt at Asparagus was so poor (rubbish crowns, poor preparation, done in haste, predictable result) that it warrants another go. So here it is:

Before

During - funny looking things aren't they. The asparagus-eating spider crabs have landed!!

After

And look at this - the first proper "produce" of the season.

I feel a rhubarb crumble coming on. Yeah, I know, waistline. Phooey. What's the point of growing the beggars if ya don't eat 'em? And who can resist a rhubarb crumble.

And finally, doesn't this look neat?

I'm quite chuffed with just how neat & tidy this looks. Mind you, the bit behind me which you can't see tells another story!

Almost a codger

Today is my last Sunday in my fifties. I have a significant birthday imminent and next time I post anything here I'll be 60. I already have my bus pass. Bus Pass!!; Ye Gods, I've got a bus pass. How did that happen? Still, I suppose it'll be useful for going to & from the pub!

But does this involve pipe & slippers and "slowing down a bit"? No it don't. There is a standing instruction in our house that if I am ever heard to utter the sentence "I could really do with a nice pair of slippers", Wilma Wilbury rushes me straight to the canal and a fitting for some concrete wellies. I hate slippers.

Anyway, not only is it my last in my fifties it's also the Vernal Equinox, when the days are now longer than the nights. And about time too. Two key signs of vernal equinox on the plot:

Lovage is back


I always feel better when the Lovage (Maggikraut in Dutch) reappears.

And the garlic, planted on Wilma's birthday at the Autumn Equinox, is doing really well. Just look at these.

What a difference a week makes

Last Sunday

Today

Go, Rhubarb, Go

At last

I've finally got some sowing done. It feels as though I'm miles behind, but then so is everyone else. No point sowing stuff when it's been so cold. But today the season has opened, in a small way, with:

Tomatoes
Monte Carlo, Lilliput (cherry type) & Astro Plum - all F1 hybrids from Seeds of Italy

Cabbage
Stonehead, red Drumhead & Filderkraut (some kind of German shredding cabbage apparently? We'll see!)

And a good dollop of Sweet Peas.

I've put them all in a seed mixture I've not tried before, courtesy of Jane Perrone's Allotment Keeper's Handbook, viz:

2 handfuls of 'normal' potting compost
1 handful of Vermiculite
1 handful of Silver Sand

It looks good & handles well. Fingers crossed; no pressure there then, Jane!

I've also moved the strawberry plants out of the conservatory into the cold frame, resurrected from winter quarters, buried in old crap behind the shed. The conservatory itself is bursting with plug plants I'm growing on:

Geraniums x24
Begonia x20
Impatiens x24
Petunia (ordinary) x20 (and a bit scabby cos I let them dry out)
Petunia (Surfinia) x8
Nepeta x8
Fuchsia (upright) x8

They're all still quite titchy of course but they'll grow; oh lordy, how they'll grow. Wish I had a greenhouse.

Fame!!

Allotment 81 goes mega!!

I'm in The Times today in the Daily Universal Register.

I've no idea who suggested it but many thanks to whoever you are. Now I need to work harder at keeping you all up to date.

Selfless, or what?

This bare and unprepossessing stick is a Cherry tree, freshly planted this afternoon.



So what? So what's selfless about that, you cry.

I don't like cherries!

But Mrs Wilbury does.

Coppicing

A new pruning saw made short work of coppicing the Hazel bush.

Before

After

And look at all this blue sky. It was blooming cold but it's so much more bearable in sunshine!


And I've finally got around to harvesting the runner bean seeds which I'd semi-intentionally allowed to dry off on the plants over winter. Do you think this will be enough?!!!

Proper Work

At last. Snow has gone, pretty much, and I've managed the first visit to the allotment this year. Happy 2010, Allotment.

And in a packed morning I've:

• paid my subs to the Hut (£2)
• picked some leeks
• pruned the Autumn Bliss raspberries (you see - Proper Work!), and
• started to coppice the Hazel bush.

Crikey. And now the sun is beginning to shine and the days are noticeably beginning to, perhaps lighten is putting too strong, but get less dark so early is definitely happening. Sunshine; love it.

International Kidney?

No, not some dubious overseas transplant scam. It turns out this is the 'proper' name for Jersey Royals.

Errm, why?

I suspect the people of Jersey have trademarked Jersey Royals, leading to this truly intuitive alternative name.

Oh, and I've bought some! Chitting ahoy!!!

Don't Look Down

Says it all really, but this is from Austria in September. If I'd come off that ladder it was a long way down. Strange how cheerful I look. But I WAS concentrating hard!

'Tis the season.....

...... to wish you all a very Merry Xmas, and here's looking forward to a great 2010 in the allotment!

Enjoy, eat, drink, be merry. Fa la la la La, fa la la laaah.

Woody

This is how to treat Garlic

It likes a good cold snap over winter.

Good job really

Take a Leek

The things I do to get vegetables

Earth lay hard as iron......

....on Houndkirk Moor.

Houndkirk road was built in 1758 as a turnpike road and was never surfaced with modern materials. So it looks pretty much now as it did then but is being badly damaged in places by off-road vehicles and motorbikes. Selfish pursuit of narrow pleasure, I think it's called.

Looks like a bit like the Blasted Heath today, and felt like it too.

Shortest day in two days time. Got your garlic in?

Where do I come from?

No, that's not the question which usually ends in "Mummy?". I worked that one out a long time ago.

Rather, it's about where do I feel I belong. If I were a sheep, which bit of hill do I feel hefted to? If I were French, where is my terroir? And the truth of the matter is that I don't really feel I know, any more.

Crikey, matey, I hear you say; what's brought on this bout of introspection (and why is it in a blog about allotments, for goodness sake; keep yer pretentious tosh for somewhere else!).

It's because today I've been to a funeral, of my friend Billy. I find funerals difficult & I was quite upset by this one, in a manly sort of way. I confess I had to pull over on the way home because I couldn't see to drive. The stiff upper lip has had a definite quiver today.

Billy was a well travelled man but unmistakably rooted in the Northeast. We are of a similar vintage and come from small towns only 20 miles apart. I was born and raised in the south-west Durham coalfield, but feel no attachment to it. I left the Northeast at age 18 and never really went back.

I've lived in Sheffield for over 40 years but ask me whether I'm a Sheffielder and I think the answer is No. I wasn't born here and don't have that inbuilt identity. And if you ask me whether I'm a Yorkshireman the answer is emphatically No. I recoil from that slightly synthetic, slightly jingoistic, assertion of [it seems to me] slightly false identity. I do feel a pull towards the Durham Dales (Weardale & Teesdale) but not sufficiently to want to live there.

So which hill am I hefted to? Well, that's partly about the pull of the allotment. If you ask me why I have an allotment it's only partly about growing things, outdoor exercise, fresh food etc, although all of those are important. A lot of it is about land; it's my land. Subject to only fairly light touch regulation I can do what I like on my small patch of land. My inner peasant isn't far from the surface.

So if you ask me about my identity, what I am, where I come from - what do I say? Quite often I say I'm a European. I do feel something of a supra-national identity, although I've never lived in any other country than the UK and am now unlikely to ever do so. I don't think of myself as English, although I am, but quite like the inherent diversity of British. Driving down the motorway today I coined the identity of a Modern Briton but aren't quite sure what it means. If that were an exam question it would be followed by "Discuss".

To get you started here is a plaque you can find close by the Rockefeller Centre, New York.



Discuss.

The last raspberries?

Almost certainly. I'm just pleased I'm still picking the little blighters, on November 22nd.

Today was the first 'working' visit to the plot for a month and in a packed programme Woodsworth managed to:

• Pick the last raspberries
• Prune the blackberries
• Tie in the new blackberries (if you thought this year was bumper, there is nearly twice as much fruiting stem available for next year!)
• Chopped out the old blowsy Mallow, shortly to be buried by a manure heap
• Cut more of the hedge, and
• Got wet
• Said "Phew", and
  
• Came home in the dark

The onions I put in a month or so ago are showing reasonably well and the garlic is beginning to show signs of life. I'm always a bit dubious about autumn onions but other people seem to do well with them so it's worth a try.

Bugger!

I seem to have done it myself!!

I'll have to set my own challenge now.