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Sad Day

PostPosted: Sun Feb 21, 2010 5:36 pm
by saucisson
For the first time in 30 years our Allotment Society got an Honourable Mention in the City Allotment competition. The committee has decided that in order to perform better in future competitions all allotments need to be brought up to/ maintained at 90% cultivation, with twice yearly inspections....

This is not what I wanted an allotment for so I reluctantly handed my key back today before they decide what I should be doing with it for me.

Dave

PostPosted: Sun Feb 21, 2010 5:50 pm
by wheels
Dave

Don't give up - try another Society, most do it to grow fruit/veg - not for trophy hunting!

Phil

PostPosted: Sun Feb 21, 2010 5:57 pm
by saucisson
Thanks Phil, I probably will :D

PostPosted: Sun Feb 21, 2010 6:00 pm
by Ruralidle
Dave

If you weren't so far away I would let you cultivate my veg patch (6 off 6ft x 8ft raised bed kits should arrive tomorrow).

Sorry I can't help.

Richard

PostPosted: Sun Feb 21, 2010 6:02 pm
by saucisson
Thanks for the thought Richard. I took it on to improve it year on year which I have, but I'd need a tractor and a plough to meet committee requirements for this season :lol:

PostPosted: Sun Feb 21, 2010 9:43 pm
by mitchamus
what a load of S**T!!

You make your own dry-cured hams right?....so....you've got a few bags of salt lying around?

...just kidding
:D

PostPosted: Mon Feb 22, 2010 3:47 am
by Chuckwagon
Huh? Wha... Wher.. Whooo... Huh? Did someone say S**t? Would that be as in Bulls**t. WITHOUT CUNSULTING ME?
Best wishes, Chuckwagon

PostPosted: Mon Feb 22, 2010 10:27 am
by beardedwonder5
I outproduce weedfree allotmenteers two to one.

PostPosted: Mon Feb 22, 2010 11:11 am
by NCPaul
It's sad that wanting to grow some of your own food has become a competition. I don't fully understand the allotment system, but, what Chuckwagon said.

PostPosted: Mon Feb 22, 2010 11:47 am
by Ianinfrance
The allotment system is almost self explanatory. You are "allotted" some land on which to grow. Here's an interesting link to their history. http://www.allotment.org.uk/articles/Allotment-History.php

Anyway, as an ex-allotmenteer, I am profoundly shocked by the decisions of Dave's allotment society. In my opinion it's absolutely typical of the invasion of the allotment system by the middle classes. In the "good old days", you got in touch with the local council - or whoever it was who owned the land that had been dedicated to allotments, and asked them of you could rent a "lottie". Depending upon the law of supply and demand, you might get one right away, or go on the list to get one as and when one became available. As far as the council was concerned, what you did with the land was more or less up to you as long as you were using it and not being a nuisance to the others.

Because - in general - people without a lot of spare money were those to whom some land to grow on was most useful, and because - in general, manual labour etc is less well paid than "white collar" work, allotments were most often in the past used by people from the least well-off. They tended to be people who used to "live and let live". and they would have never dreamed of telling others what to do. They might use their "lotties" to grow prize winning begonias, or magnificent leeks or marrows, but the very concept of imposing "90%" cultivation would have been completely foreign to them. Partly because the traditional crop rotation - to which I ALWAYS adhered, puts aside one year in three or four when the land was left fallow or planted with a green manure such as alfalfa or clover.

PostPosted: Mon Feb 22, 2010 1:37 pm
by beardedwonder5
Ahh, but we live in an agro world where "fallow" only refers to deer, and farmers can grow the same crop on a field three, four, five years in a row - thanks to glysophate etc.

So the people in town hall, very few of whom would know chickweed from fat hen, look out of their car windows and see crops contaminated by, maybe, one wild oat per 1000 square meters. What do they see on "normal allotmenteers" plots? Weeds. (If the allotmenteer can't stand the spouse (or vice versa), perfection.)

If the spouse intolerants get control, contests. In my village in a recent "best-kept" contest certain contestanteers were trespassing on other people's gardens to get them up to scratch. Hasn't happened on y allotment site yet.

Ahh, for my own two acres.

PostPosted: Mon Feb 22, 2010 2:46 pm
by saucisson
To be completely fair to them the full letter of the rule was 90% cultivation or prepared for cultivation. So I would have to have it and keep it ready for immediate sowing even if I wasn't planning to actually plant anything in it. Leaving it as cut meadow doesn't count, because that's what most of it still was.

Dave

PostPosted: Mon Feb 22, 2010 9:15 pm
by mitchamus
everything turns into a competition these days....

you could cover you bed in black plastic and then cover the plastic with straw ...

at least then it would look like it was ready to plant out...
...without the hassle of actually having to dig or weed anything!

and then you could get your bag of salt, find the committee members alotment beds and ... ah well..you probably shouldn't.. :lol: :lol:

PostPosted: Sat Mar 06, 2010 1:05 pm
by Snags
This is a recipe for a No-Dig Garden as developed by Sydney gardener Esther Dean in 1970’s

http://www.abc.net.au/gardening/stories/s867068.htm

PostPosted: Sat Mar 06, 2010 1:51 pm
by saucisson
Interesting :) I neglected my "Poly" tunnel last year while taking on the allotment so I'm going to see how much I can cram into that this year.

Dave