More Digging....

Sunny Saturday and perfect for more digging.  Had to go do boring shopping type things first and ended up in the garden centre AGAIN.... funny how that place is like a magnet at the moment!  Went to look at fertilisers and got completely befuddled with all the science and stuff and instead of getting the wrong thing we thought we would just see how things go with the hop compost and if things are looking a bit sad later in the year we would feed it all up then.  Difficult when you are taking a plot over to know what care was taken over the soil before, but by the size of the dandelion roots and the healthy weeds, the ground appears to be to notch.  So for the first time ever ... we left the garden centre empty handed!  Still in shock now as I type this!  That's unheard of for us, we usually buy SOMETHING!

So arrived at the allotment and got digging again, tackling 'bed 4 & 5' today and these are possibly the most difficult so far.  Bed 5 was plagued by grass and was a bit back breaking.  In reality though it could have been a lot worse, we are lucky that the plot isnt very overgrown at all.

 Lovely to dig in the sunshine though!  Simon was busy the other end of the plot, he raked out Bed 2 and then planted onions - Sturon, Red Barons, Hercules and Centurion spaced 4 inches apart and 10 inches between each row.  Which is what the book said to do..... That should keep us going in onions, especially as we have some growing in the raised beds at home too.  Then he planted a couple of rows of Picasso Shallots and a row of Marco Garlic.  Some space still left for the leeks which are started in module pots at home.  The spacings on the growveg website planner were a little out unfortunately and what Simon planted today took up a bit more space than anticipated when planted the correct space apart so unfortunately it looks like no room in the allium bed for the spring onions, will have to do those in the raised beds at home.

Onions all covered up with recycled bits we kept when we cleared the plot in an attempt to keep the wildlife off.  Looking into getting proper canes and netting but using this for now.  Luckily we managed to get some free canes from Dave who was sorting out a vacant plot today  - long ones though so will keep those for some of the bean supports, not sure how we are going to fit 8ft canes in a Nissan Micra!  At least now we wont need to get so many!  Dug up some strange bulbs as well today, not sure what they are, maybe tulips.... put them in the raised bed to see what they do.  They were dug up along one edge of a bed so likely to be flowers.  Also dug up another plant which remains unidentified..... so that has a new home for now too.

Ran out of steam part way through Bed 5 and decided to call it a day, will come back and finish off tomorrow.  Stopped at B&Q later and picked up a mini greenhouse for at home for Simons chilli plants to go on the patio, and treated myself to a new rhubarb plant for the allotment - Simon will sort out another raised bed tomorrow with the slabs and bits left over and will take over the sack of manure left in the greenhouse at home and plant the rhubarb.  Have rhubarb at home already but felt it was only right to have some on the allotment as well!  You can never have too much rhubarb....   Collapsed now, another busy day but feel like we have achieved a lot again.