Rediscovering a lost passion

The ram-shackle 'shed' will have to go at some point...

Although not completely new to this, it has been a while since we grew any amount fruit and vegetables. Thankfully YouTube is around now, and, although I am not a great fan of 'video-research' I must admit it can be useful at times. I must say that if I had been a complete novice, I think I would have been confused by the conflicting information out there. Luckily, I had plenty of experience with the trusty Felco's (look-alikes in my case and genuine No.8s of my father-in-law's), a few decades ago helping my late father-in-law prune  several acres of apple trees on the family farm. I was also living next door to a very special man in my life. His name was John Caskey and was a plants-man and gardener of the highest degree. He had trained at Kew Gardens and went on to be head gardener at the Chelsea Physic Gardens. When I first met him in 1979, he was running the greenhouses and looking after the grounds of Kings Collage Department of Plant Science, in South East London. At the time, I was in my early twenties and keen to learn. With a farther-in-law who was a agriculturist and with a next-door neighbour a botanist/horticulturist, I spent the next couple of decades discovering the wonderful world of propagation and growing. Sadly, by the time I was in my mid forties, my father-in-law had passed away and John had moved to a remote part of North West Scotland. Although we kept in touch with John and visited a couple of times before he too passed away, my apprenticeship was over.

For the following couple of decades, work. life and other things took over my life and those days of digging around in the earth and watering the greenhouse took a back seat. Now, in my mid sixties, I can return to doing the stuff I enjoyed for the early part of my adult and married life. I have now inherited those Felco No.8 secateurs, that belonged to my farther-in-law, and I still have a galvanised, long-reach Haws watering can, modified by and then passed on to me by John. Both items are in daily use.

As you can see, I am no stranger to the world of growing, just a bit rusty, as are some of my gardening tools. Like my gardening tools, it will not take me too long to wear through the rust and become bright and shiny once more. In the meantime, I will be spending a few hours shouting at the screen, protesting at the miss-information and ill-informed comments that seem to be prevalent in the world of armature growers, making videos of their exploits. I must get our library of books out of storage and have a sort out. All the classic gardening books we both love are stashed away in boxes awaiting the day when I can bring them down here to or new abode and nestle on the shelves of the new bookshelves, still an the 'design' stage. 

Off we go! 

A second visit to the shop for a bit of a stock up furnished us with, among other things, a bag of seed potatoes. These we could get in to the first strip of cleared ground in about a month or so when the weather warms up. Sue is chief-in-charge of chitting, making use of the existing facilities.

Sue making a start with the potatoes

The plot itself was fairy empty, apart from some rhubarb, a selection of rather neglected soft fruit, and a good sprinkling of weeds. There were also some of last year's neglected celery plants as well as a really good covering of chives,slowly taking over. I made my first job the pruning of the gooseberry bushes. these had not been touched for a while and required some serious reshaping. This will mean a much reduced crop this year, gooseberrys fruit on last-years wood. However it needs to be done as the tangled mess we have inherited will just look a mess and will probably only produce lots of small fruits. It may seem a bit drastic, but opening up the bush to a goblet shape, removing any dead wood and crossing branches will pay off in the long-run. 

Its not the warmest of weather, but one glove and a my sharp pair of classic Felco secateurs, soon sorted out the plants 

Ralph.

Day One...

Standing at the bottom of the plot - lots to do!

Today we officially became tenants of our allotment, complete with rent book! Went paid, in advance, deposit for the gate key given and association membership paid, it is time to explore what we have guardianship over, for the foreseeable future.

Our plot extends from the back of my neighbour's greenhouse and water butts, to the rear fence of the garden behind our 'shed' and greenhouse. There is not much in the ground other than some chives and some abandoned celery plants. From the posts onwards there is a selection of neglected soft fruit. The rest of the plot needs digging over and weeding. 

This plum will need a bit of a chop in a month or so...

I can see the good old secateurs will be in high demand. the soft fruit has not been touched in a while and as for that plum tree, well it is going to be in for a shock come April. There is a lot of tyding up to do over the next few weeks.

Ralph. 

Today we got the call...

We moved to Herne Bay at the end of June last year (2019) and the first thing we did was to wonder over to the local allotment association and enquire about plot availability. As we expected, there was a waiting list, so we joined as associate members and put our name on the list. Today our name came to the top of said list, and we were offered a plot.

Without having to be asked twice, we arranged to meet one of the officials there today to view a couple of plots that had become vacant. There was no contest between them. One had a shed, greenhouse and some soft fruit along with rhubarb and some other stuff coming up, while the other was overgrown and devoid of any advantages apart from a shed. We opted for the better plot, and we are now the prospective new guardians of plot 7B. All we have to do is present ourselves to the office on Saturday, pay our rent and key deposit, and we will be off.

On Saturday we will take some photographs of the plot, as it is now, and take a closer look at what is there... Now, where did I put my secateurs? 

Ralph