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You are here: Home / Activities / Post Covid Allotment Story

Post Covid Allotment Story

May 20, 2021 By Co-ordin8 team Leave a Comment

Post lockdown our return visit to the Co-ordin8 Allotment was one of dread to be honest. Being away from our pristine and bountiful plot for over a year had resulted in Mother Nature doing her thing big time!

We could barely see where our veg plots started and our pathways ended. The weeds that had rapidly moved in were only common, so simply had to go… pronto, before they had chance to flower and seed yet again, this year. After an assessment and a bit of job planning over a cuppa at our allotment shed, Jeanette and Stephen got to work on the weeds right away.

Mark Alexander on our allotment the summer prior to lockdown 2019
April 2021.

We lost the plot.

It was almost impossible to tell where the veg plots ended and the paths started! (The veg plot is on the left.)

Wildlife had not abandoned the site. In fact it was all around. The sun peeped through and a bee landed on one of our wildlife beds to say hello. A welcome sign and hopefully a good omen.

Stephen set to work pruning back dead wood. Here he is tending to Purple Leaved Elder, which we will use to make elderflower cordial later in the summer.
Some of our herbs had survived in our nursery bed.
Dead wood is collected up in a pile
Jeanette found endless bindweed as we started to dig… the roots went in a plastic bucket to be dried out as they must not go in the compost bin where they will regrow and spread!
The veg beds begin to be cultivated once more.
The veg beds begin to be cultivated once more.
Jeanette says ‘Cardboard can go in the compost bin. Not plastic or bindweed roots!’
Job done on the weeds, and the digging!

Next it’s time to increase fertility to the soil. In a way the weeds were like ‘green manure’ and leaving the beds fallow for last year also helped to improve the soil’s nutritional content, and beneficial insect populations. So really, more was gained than lost.

The following week we recieved a big donation from a group of supporters in Newton Abbot…

It’s been an odd sort of spring! Dought to start with, endless frosts and low temperatures and then wind and rain, rain, rain. After Stephen had been weeding and digging the plots over, Jeanette collects well rotten chicken manure and takes it to the site. 

Jeanette loaded up bags of well rotted chicken manure. She kept her mask and gloves on to avoid dust and spread the bags out on site.
The manure was spread out on site and raked in.

After that second early potatoes ‘Charlotte’ were planted and gladioli corms to provide cut flower for the Co-ordin8 Arts and Crafts students to draw and paint.

Jeanette waters corms in.
Many hands make light work !
Jeanette plants seed potatoes after working out the spacings
Meanwhile back in the balmy climate of a polytunnel in Newton Abbot our joint project work with the Probation Service has resulted in a range of young plants, ready to go into our allotment in the next few weeks as weather improves.

Watch this space for our next update!

Filed Under: Activities, Gardening Tagged With: allotment, digging, veg

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