Yet another benefit of Remote working - no one can see the soil under your fingernails after a bit of lunchtime weeding.
Testifying to the finding that skin contact with microbes in soil benefits our microbiome/gut-brain axis & boosts mental wellbeing. Dataset of a noisy 1n.
One muntjac and pigeon protected growing space made from reused wood, wire mesh and netting.
This will probably be for growing broad beans and then brassicas.
#GrowYourOwn #Gardening #Allotment #NoDig
Well, was so deep in Rust that dinner has ended up being very late. Managed to get it done before midnight at least.
Thai Green Curry... just using the standard Mae Ploy paste, because it's damn hard to beat really. But we always add extra fresh garlic and ginger, and fish sauce at the end.
This is a real blast of spring with fresh from the #allotment: pak choi, green garlic, coriander...
Plus our own garlic from last year, and frozen aji mango chillies from 2023.
To rid your garden of common mugwort you have to dig it up and remove the long rhizomes from every clump. It took me two years of hard work to eliminate it. Now other gardeners say, "Oh, you're so lucky that your plot doesn't have that weed." #garden #gardening #weeds #mugwort #allotment
At my community garden one can choose to be on the tilled side or the non-tilled side. I chose the latter because I can use it year-round (e.g., I sow peas and fava beans in February). But the photos below provide the other big reason: common mugwort (Artemisia vulgaris). When you have a lawn of this, the very last thing you want to do is plow — every single one of the thousands of rhizome segments will survive and thrive. But that is exactly what will happen this week. I watch in horror every year. #garden #allotment #mugwort #weed #nodig
Today's Flighty's plot blog post is Three of the best
https://flightplot.wordpress.com/2025/03/16/three-of-the-best/
The greenhouse full of soil blocks. It’s sow time. #GrowYourOwn #SeedStarting #SoilBlocks #GreenManures #Gardening #Allotment
Have been dressing all wrong for shovelling manure and wrangling brambles at the #allotment, this guardian article recommends a £110 *WHITE* cardigan, a £195 boilersuit, with a tiny £165 cashmere scarf and £260 shoes https://www.theguardian.com/fashion/gallery/2025/mar/14/what-to-wear-for-spring-gardening
I haven't done front-view plot photos for a while... it's funny actually, I've realised that since I now record videos to document our allotment progress I'm taking fewer photos. I should try and remember to take photos still as they're a better (and more searchable) record.
I took some today and also this "panorama" shot... which makes it look like I'm standing at a corner lol. Really that road left and right is one straight line and the left of the photo is the front of the polytunnel plot and the right is the front of the new plot.
Meanwhile Kat completed the side quest of removing the old buddleia from next to the greenhouse. We were surprised to discover it was actually a labelled bought specimen! The label was buried amongt the root level. I feel a bit mean about yeeting it now... but its just not the right spot for it. Not sure it'd survive being put in somewhere else.
This afternoon's #allotment job was to work on the long raised beds on the polytunnel plot. First trenching along the edges then lining with plastic sheet* before levelling off. Next we will top these with as much compost as we can scrape out of the oldest bay (mainly year+ old horse manure) and then they're ready for planting.
These beds were part of the original design for the plot but for four seasons have just been long mounds as we didn't have timber for sides. The timber is spare from a deadwork building project, we put it in place at the end of last season. I've been wedged on doing fancy metal stability stakes for it for ages but finally just went with screwing it together as we need beds really soon.
Now their usable area will increase from about 50cm to over a meter, should double the productivity! 
* plastic sheet/membrane also left over from deadwork, I wouldn't buy it for the purpose but I'll use it if it's effectively free and surplus.
There’s a lady a couple of plots away from me at the #allotment that puts meat out every afternoon for “the foxes”… but as soon as she leaves it’s like The Birds, the sky goes dark with sea gulls and crows and magpies all fighting over whatever she’s left. It’s noisy chaos atm.
(I should add we haven’t had a fox sighting at the site for a year now to add another layer to the eccentricity)
Having no heater in the greenhouse and the frost having come back means we now have the house full of plants...
@Hesperalis I signed up for the “Revival of The Carlin Pea” trial through Gardening Organic.
I’m expecting seeds from the trial organisers any time now. I have to grow two wigwams of peas for drying: Minerva Carlin Pea and Latvian Pea and keep them updated throughout.
I’ve never grown them before. #GrowYourOwn #Allotment #Gardening
A look at my seed starting set-up. 4 shelves, each with room for 4 trays. Each shelf has it's own 4-bulb, 4 foot light fixture. I use the light fixtures as heat mats for the shelf above & adjust spacing as needed. Photo has bulb details. Most of the first wave of seed starting is done, for now. Got the eggplant (aubergines) started this morning. BeetBear is happy the beetroot has now sprouted. Now back to "outdoor" work... 
#BeetBear
#gardening
#Allotment
#NewEngland
#zone6b
@gardening
…and some snaps from between the showers yesterday
#Allotment
On the #Allotment sitting out a shower in the shed, drinking whisky and feeling rather smug about having got @ReNatureLdn on here at last! Also still aching from yesterday's busyness on #HackneyMarshes so it's all medicinal innit.
#ReNature #ReNatureLdn
Also, the handful of pink fir apple potatoes I dug up the other week and left in the #allotment shed have been comprehensively nicked by rodents 
It’s been a rather-too-eventful week on the family front, but one small upside is that instead of commuting through sleet I was able to pop to the #allotment in between showers and pick another big bag of kalettes. The remaining plants are languishing but the buds are still brilliant.
