From one petrol machine to another.

We hadn’t tried the hand-me-down rotovator since we picked it up last month and weren’t all that eager to pull it out of the shed now. It threatened to be a right arse and the lawn mower had put me into a mood. As it happened, the M1 Gardener started perfectly and by the time we’d dismantled half of it and discarded the air filter, it actually stayed started.

There is only have a tiny patch left to work and it was damn hard to control the machine within the confines. I’m pictured battling with the machine that was intent on ploughing through the neighbours fruit cage and then dragging me six feet under.

I finally got into a rhythm of ever decreasing circles and the effects on the ground were amazing. I was left with a tilth almost fit for sowing. I can’t wait til the end of the season when I get to churn up the whole plot.

Meanwhile, Lynn spent hours weeding the peas. Either the worms had worked the seeds to the surface or I had planted them too shallow because every weed pulled seemed to dislodge a tiny pea plant. Lynn must have transplanted at least half the row as she went along.

We’ve been researching pea support for last few weeks but in the end Lynn managed to forage enough dead wood from behind our plot to create an impressive architectural structure across both rows.

They look amazing and I hope those peas climb because it was a monumental effort.

There had been quite a hard frost at the beginning of the week and every last spud lay wilted and scorched over the earthed up mounds. I earthed them up again but we are at the limit now so I hope it doesn’t freeze again. I think the peach blossom was probably knocked back as well.

I’ve started to reclaim some of the fancy fruit area by sinking Grow Pots into the weed suppressant fabric and bark covering.

I’ve planted a few squash plants and if I can find a supplier of more grow pots I’ll have melons in there as well.

I had a slight hiccup with my squash seeds. I’d run out of plant labels so wrote the name on the polystyrene potting cups with marker pen. All the details floated away with the watering and now I’m left with umpteen unidentified forms of pumpkin and squash. It’s like last year all over again.

While Lynn snuck out of bed to source cups of tea and toast, I churned out image after image of Gripple circuitry. I’d woken with a plan in my head and as an ever ready kind of a Scout, I just happen to keep a pad of grid paper by the bed for this sort of occurrence.

Having failed to find wire tensioners in Homebase last week I was pleased when my internet search uncovered a swanky new gadget for creating trellis constructions. It’s called the Gripple and I promptly ordered myself the starter pack of 4 Gripples, 4 Eye Hooks and a 30m reel of plastic wire.

This is where my puzzling started. Using only the above items, how do I (read: how does Lynn) create a fanned peach supporting wire combo with 4 lengths? We went for the 3rd aesthetically pleasing option and headed down to the plot.

I should perhaps have mentioned that we had chosen the weekend of the Severe Adverse Weather Warnings to partake in the peach transplantation event. It was a struggle removing the tree from the old plot with the famed light soil, a layer of ice had to be cracked away before the fork would gain entry and we ought to have thought about the difficulty of digging in our frozen heavy London clay plot.
But we didn’t.

I was keen to play with the new toys but my hands were freezing and I had to run up and down the plot doing high knee raises and clapping my hands before I could contend with the fiddly bits.

The design of the “tensulator” was very smart and when it work I was very impressed. When it didn’t work, I let myself down rather a lot and had one of those, throw yourself on the floor wailing, kinds of a strop. A bit embarassing.

Here I am, pre-wailing, trying to force the wire to go through the Gripple and out the other end so that I could loop it back. No amount of forcing was going to tease the wire through and the thing is designed not to let me pull the wire back out again and it wouldn’t.

Cue strop.

We had to cut it off in the end and Lynn took it away to the shed to perform some kind of surgery on it (or perhaps she thought if she left me alone I’d stop flouncing).

We managed to get this one on successfully in the end but another Gripple got stuck after looping it around and without wasting loads of wire we couldn’t cut this one off. It was in a locked position but couldn’t be tensioned and so the finished job looked a bit naff but worked in a fashion.

I don’t know why we had trouble with two of the Gripples, if I’d had a pack of spares I wouldn’t have got myself too worried but I needed all 4.

The working ones were very neat and it proved easy to build up the tension. Our posts now look decidedly wonky as the incremental tensioning pulled them into an apex.

I would like to have a handful of these in the shed for odd jobs but I’ll still remain concerned about their reliability.

My Dad left me his half tonne mattock after his last visit and a few swings of that saw my back in traction but also cracked the clay.

A robin swooped in to feast on some of the worms I’d just uncovered and reminded me how lovely it is to spend time down on the plot. With the feathering of snow also comes a peaceful calm that I rarely notice anywhere else. It’s a beautiful site.

The recent wet weather has made a huge difference to the clay, it’s incredibly heavy but you can at least force your tools through the surface. We got the peach in and it looked relatively cosy against its snowy backdrop.

Back at home we got to play with the connectable outdoor Christmas lights that Dobbies sent me to try out. We’ve never had outdoor lights before and the new acquisition left me rather popular.

My first attempt at laying them out was snubbed by all though.

I’d trailed them through the letterbox, creating quite a draft and a trip hazard combined, and the lights ran out before they reached the tree base but in my defense it was cold out there and I thought the twinkling effect set the recycling bin off very nicely.

We headed back to Homebase to research outdoor electric options and came back with an enclosed extension lead that we could position at the base of the tree and feed through a specially drilled hole in the window frame.

Our neighbours have kindly planted a leylandii which forms the perfect support for our lights. The kids were able to scrabble up and position the cabling while we stayed at the bottom prepared to catch them.

These Christmas Tree lights were very good quality piece of kit, the cabling is very solid and formed of 3 twined cables with generously spaced bulbs. There is a waterproof connector so that you can join multiple sets without leaving gaps in the lighting. We are quite tempted to go nuts and light up the whole house.

A shed related edginess cast it’s shadow over our corner of the site as a slight “tension” emerged between the lazy starter-leaver (me) and the task focused completer-finisher (Lynn). I was of the view that without a hammer, a ladder, the time, the inclination or the right clothes, we should put the soon to be rotten shed roof to the back of our minds and continue with Plan A, returning to the shed problem next week.

Lynn isn’t built out of the same “sit down and ponder over a cup of tea” mould as me and it was clear that we were going to have to get this job done pronto or suffer the consequences.

Plans were hastily rearranged and after a quick retreat for tools (and a flask of tea) we were back and ready for action.

I tucked myself well away from the stressy end of the plot and dealt with the rubbish pile while Lynn got up close and personal with the shed.

The rubbish pile was the main reason for our planned quick visit, most of it had already gone – thanks to the committee ladies who had been helping us to dispose of all the crud. All that remained was for me to bag up the few remaining bits of polythene and carpet and evict a few squatters. Seven mice and a toad ran clear of the carpet (at least the mice ran, the toad just looked aghast and covered up his private parts).

We’ll have to add “Build Wildlife Haven” to our construction to do list now.

We left the plot with a new air of satisfied calm – the shed roof was repaired before the rains returned and the shed interior began to take shape as the “Room of One’s Own Mug” returns to it’s rightful centre stage spot in the prized construction.

We decided to show mercy to our remaining forks by building raised beds in the concrete zone and filling them with the soft crumbly mound of compost piled high in the Clampett’s yard section of the plot.

Lynn spent the best part of two days trying to clear this area of unmentionable cruddiness. Hundreds of decaying carrier bags billowed up like a detritus confetti shower when the grim piles of stained carpet were hauled away.

The strawberries were collected from around the plot, pretty much the only surviving plants from the previous tenant. They are temporarily in situ, awaiting arrival of the fruit trees and weed suppressant fabric when they will go back in for good.

The whole nasty little job brightened our lives somewhat when the second depressing mound was cleared to reveal this stash of treats. We’ve got Victorian edging stones and classy looking paving slabs just waiting to transform our plot into something very special. What a find!

I’ve already gone mad with my seed catalogues and can see my completely frivolous purchase of three assorted crowns of rhubarb sitting quite at home in a geometric bed of terracotta tiles.

I’ve started digging in the second bed and it was considerably easier than expected. It was clumpy clay soil but at least I could get my fork in and out without requiring a trip to Homebase with my receipt.

Two rows of garlic have gone in and maybe the broad beans will join them next week.

The results of 3 weekends labouring are mapped out on the images below, top row showing the view from the bottom of the plot and the bottom row shows the top down view:

It was our first weekend on the plot.

As I arrived I plunged my fork into the ground, Scott of the Antarctic stylee. It twanged as it hit the surface, bounced back 2 metres and propagated an agonising wave up my arm. I started hopping around, whining about stress fractures and the general impossibleness of our situation.

Fortunately Lynn is less easily broken. As I was banished to the bottom of the plot, swoe in hand, Lynn started on the concrete zone. Less than 20 mins later she came towards me looking rather sheepish, holding two bits of my favourite fork in her hands.

Play was suspended for the morning.

Having revitalised ourselves with a chip butty and the purchase of another fork (this time with a 10 year guarantee) we returned and laboured hard into the afternoon.

Day 2 saw us back on the plot bright and early, trying to catch the attention of the committee members. With a growing pile of debris and a no bombfire rule, we needed insider assistance on the best route to dispose of it all. Thankfully after yesterdays hard labour we had both received gold stars and were welcomed back by the site bigwigs. Once a year they host a mammoth sitewide fire and our plot could provide the bulk of the fuel.

A little more digging around the bramble roots put paid to fork number 2. I’ll be having a battle at Homebase tomorrow as I try to claim on that 10 year guarantee.

Digging with bent tines is quite unsatisfactory. I imagine it’s like eating an apple with only one front tooth, a wobbly one at that.

We’re going to try a spade next weekend, in the hope that it will cope with the solid conditions better than the fork, we just can’t continue to go through tools at this rate.

Overall the results were quite satisfying for one weekends work. Most of the clearance has been superficial as we haven’t been able to breach below the 1 cm layer. Hopefully it will rain soon and we may be able to start proper digging.

It’s only two years ago that I took over the plot at North Sheen. That plot was in a fair old state but the wonderfully light soil conditions meant that I was able to make impressive improvements day by day. This new plot is based on heavy clay soil so no doubt our rewards will be considerably slower.

It’s quite an exciting time, daunting but full of promise. The fresh start is an ideal time to have a complete re-plan. I’ve listed all the veg that the kids are prepared to eat, added a few of our favourites and armed with a spreadsheet and a measuring tape, I ought to be able to make a highly productive strip. Planning isn’t one of my strong points though, within the space of 5 minutes I managed to order the same seed from two different catalogues – I’ll have to extend the leek bed.

Here are the initial photos from our first visit, it’s a long thin plot of 5 rods. We can’t actually start work before the 1st October, which effectively means that D-Day is set for Saturday. I better book the massage session now.

I’ve never managed to impress my mother with my tidy standards, and by that I mean that dust has been known to settle in my flat, so it is no real surprise that my plot has begun to look a little run down with the neglect. Baler twine and discarded fleece has built up in piles next to multiple hacked apart plastic bottles and although I’m sure they will all be vitally important one day it is actually beginning to drag down the general ambience.

Fortunately I had the foresight to drag Lynn down on the plot on Saturday, her vaguely OCD tendancies resulted in a whirlwind cleaning session, in which plastic and mucky stuff could not be saved. Old compost bags were stuffed with debris and then I introduced her to the hoe…… these are fabulous tools for lovers of all things tidy. While I can get easily fed up and leave a bed only half weeded, Lynn refused to allow us to leave the plot until the entire area had been weeded and had passed “certain standards”.

All that took more than 4 hours and my back was breaking at the end of it, but then the results were rather pleasing.

I like tidy people, they are very welcome on my plot.

We couldn’t walk so well for the next few days but I slept well til yesterday when I started to panic again. Surely to goodness I should have had my leeks in by now? And what about the PSB?
I took an emergency day off work and managed to squeeze the grand total of 30 minutes on the plot. It was quite a successful 30 mins though.

I got in a row of leeks, purple sprouting broccoli, mixed lettuce and some early nantes carrots. We’d also had the lawnmower out for the first time this year and I was able to apply a layer of hot steamy grass clippings to my potato ridges.

I would have layered my trenches with the grassy mulch had they been available last week but I’m pretty sure they’ll work just as effectively from above. My Dad’s neighbouring plot holder grows the most enormous vegetables and his secret seems to be the application of copious amounts of grass.

I rounded the corner whistling away to a tune on the iPod and came face to face with this scene of blunt trauma nastiness.

Blasted vandals.

Not worth getting upset about it though and as my trangia and ‘room of one’s own’ mug were still intact, I managed to start the whistling again.

I ignored the DIY implications of the damage and got on with the digging. I had spud planting on my mind and didn’t want to put it off while the clouds were threatening to turn soggy.

I’m pretty pleased by the results, I’ve pulled my hamstrings and twisted my back but there isn’t much that surpasses the satisfaction of a freshly turned plot and a neatly stacked heap of hot horse manure.

While still ignoring the shed I thought I’d whizz around and complete many an outstanding task.

My second double row of Broad Beans went in, Bunyards Exhibition next to autumns sowing of Aquadulce. I’m pretty sure that I was close to cropping my beans this time last year but I suppose it has been a harsher winter.

I got a load shallots through the post yesterday, another forgotton and impulsive purchase from last year.

I noticed on the invoice that I have another two bags of onion sets due to arrive in the near future as well. Having only just got over the planting of the 5000 I’m not exactly looking forward to this delivery. I need to be a little more sedate with my purchases, at this rate I’ll only be cropping onions and spuds.

It seems like google haven’t updated their satellite images since around November 07 as the shed wasn’t included but a fair amount of weed clearance is noticeable.

The other point of interest is that someone or something saw fit to relocate the Angel of the North slap bang in the middle of the plot just while the satellite flew over and said cheese. How strange.

The weekend forecast is pretty dismal again so when I woke this morning to glorious sunshine I thought it was too good to waste and quickly swapped my annual leave arrangements. By 9am I was out on the riverbank, squeezing in another neglected pastime by running to the plot.

Typically, when I arrived the sunshine had disappeared behind a grey cloud but although it was pelting it down about 10 yards to the left of me, I seemed to be able to get on with my digging untouched. Commuters were huddled under brollies on the station platform and probably thought I was nuts not to take shelter but even as the rain cloud moved over and started its symphony on the pond surface, I was left in a little dry patch. Then the sun came out again and I had to strip down to a t-shirt it was so glorious.

I’ve been trying to get onto the plot for days now and in fact the whole month of March has been pretty much a wash out. As a result I was like a wound up spring suddenly released to cause productive mayhem.

All the spuds are in now and I finished off by laying the paving slabs I acquired from freecycle.

The site skip is almost always overflowing with junk but just to make this day extra perfect it was empty – at least it was when I arrived. Skip space is a highly valued commodity and keen not to miss out I finished my morning jog with an interval session. For non-runners this effectively means sprints followed by slow recovery runs. I ran too and fro my plot grabbing the filled sacks of bindweed roots, it was like a rather muddy supermarket sweep. So now the sacks have gone and the huge mountain of perennial weeds sitting slap bang in the middle of my courgette spot have been disposed of.

In the end I didn’t go and kidnap any frogs from the local ponds. I read on an amphibian wildlife site that frogs are currently under threat from a virus that is spreading across the country – red leg virus, and the sharing of spawn is only exacerbating the spread. I just have to sit tight and hope that news of the delightful residence spreads fast. I did however, transfer some wildlife from the water butt adjacent to the pond. It was absolutely teeming with tiny water boatman and I thought they’d be much safer in the pond – less risk of them being tipped onto my tomatoes to dry out slowly in the sun.

I’m happy again now and can go back to work replenished if a little shattered.