The Allotted Month - March 2008

March was a very busy month, but now the really heavy work of the allotment year is over and there is now a slightly reduced work pace. So far no crops have been planted out and, apart from the Crimson Clover on section D, the plot has all been dug over and hoed in preparation for crops.

The biggest task of the month was preparing section A for the potatoes. The annual load of farmyard manure arrived at the start of the month. It gets dumped on the roadway so the first job is to barrow it into its bin in the plot. Fortunately the road ends beside the plot so no vehicles get obstructed but the on the day of arrival enough has to be cleared to allow wheelbarrow access for other plot holders.

The dung is still pretty fresh and certainly not "well rotted farmyard manure". However, potatoes don't object to that. Only the potato section gets any kind of fertiliser, the other sections have to make do with what remains in the soil. The procedure that works for me is to double dig with the second spit being forked over. The dung is laid in the resulting trench and covered with the top spit from the next row of digging. The potatoes can easily get their roots down to it. The brassicas which follow next year like firm soil so no digging is done for them and, again, they easily get their roots down to the dung. In the next again year the dung has become well rotted. When the soil is turned over the, by now, "well rotted farmyard manure" mixes easily into the top spit. Carrots come in the fourth year and there is no risk of forking from fresh dung.

Sections B and C are simply turned over, sprinkled with Rockdust and hoed, all ready for planting and sowing.

Section D still has Crimson Clover and it will continue growing until early May when it gets hoed off and into the compost heap. The second application of lime is hoed in. No digging is done since the brassicas like firm soil. Last year, for the first time, I grew only one variety of sprouts - Maximus. In the hope of spreading the cropping the three rows were sown on 23/3, 29/4 and 24/5. The first sowing outperformed the later ones right up to the time that the plants were removed to make way for winter digging. This year there will be two rows of Maximus plus one row of Revenge. All the seeds were sown in the greenhouse on 22/3.

Next month the planting and sowing really gets going. All the potatoes will go in. The shallots and garlic have been started in Rootrainers in the greenhouse and they will be set out. The onion sets get soaked in water for a couple of day before planting. Other direct sowing follow in May with only successional sowings of some brassicas in June. By then, apart from transplanting the leeks to where the "catch crop" of the earliest of the first early potatoes has been lifted, the whole plot will be planted out.

B. A. Plotter.