'lotment

I went down to the allotment to do work for the first time yesterday. In the excitement and then tiredness I forgot to actually take photos of my plot. Here is the view across the site, its pretty big. A bit like what I imagine a shanty town to look like but with more green in between the rickety shacks. Some of the sheds are actually quite fancy and definitely pushing the 2 square meter area I was told is allowed. My shed is quite sturdy of frame but falling down in the walls a bit. It's also about 3 inches too low to stand upright in, which is particularly frustrating. It was really full of junk,  alot of which made up from a really rather large pile of soil.
Why was there soil piled up in the shed?
I also had to clear a big collection of sawn off plastic water bottles. From underneath plants and all around. Hmmm.
I also found several lone gardening gloves around, this I disapprove of. No.

I dug up some potatoes that had been left behind, and found two small fennel plants.

I tried to plant my bulbs but underneath the grass in the orchard area was both a layer of carpet and a layer of fabric weed stopper stuff. Under the grass. Rubbish. I couldn't pull it up on my own so no bulbs for me yet.

I need this guy to help me...

Or rather Ralph needs some kind of linen smock and a hat.
He's grafting a fruit tree. I found him whilst trying to understand about how big a cherry tree will grow. As now is a good time to be planting substantial things I had a bit of a trawl to find the things I want.

The plot is pretty much split in half, with one side having been left and one side with beds that have been cultivated. The wild side has the apple trees and and the blackberry hedge. I am going to keep this side for my native plot of edible wild plants. Possibly apart from fruit bushes, but the thought will be there.

Mmmmmm.

I got my tools, I got these....

So I looked around and I saw the Spear and Jackson traditional range and ordered a border spade and border fork. I don't like saying it but I found a good deal on tesco for two for £30. I went to pick them up from the store and the fork handle was broken. "do you want to keep it?" I was asked. Of course not, it is broken.
So I got my refund.
And no more shopping from tesco online.
I hunted some more and found the Joseph Bentley traditional range and found them for good prices at gardencentreonline and a couple of other places. I did my favourite put all the stuff in the basket of several shops and then panic to choose which place to buy from. I got them from gardencentreonline.co.uk and treated myself to next day delivery.
I have never done that before.
The parcel came and I was very excited. It is all great.
Seeing the spear and jackson next to the joseph bentley you can really see the difference. They look pretty much the same in the picture but they are not. The joseph bentley things are very fine. The secateurs are less splendid, I think the handles could have been a little neater but they are still nice to use.

We will see how they all fair as I really start to use them, I've never really had big tools before, I used cutlery in my last garden.

More next time on the actual plants.
I am plotting for my half barrel pond. Crispa, lilies.
Plants for my edible wild area.

Ooh, I also got my wax jacket, for 99p from ebay. Cool. I suppose there will be photos. It is stinky.