Having had a couple of seasons where the peas have not germinated so well on the allotment, I took the other path this year and soaked at home them before planting in peat pots to get a decent root system going. I also kept them at home, bringing them in overnight to ensure that they were not damaged by frost before they were really sturdy. This has given me an excellent number to plant out and some to give away. They are now all planted out and after the rain on Tuesday seemed extremely perky yesterday. So that is a success so far. And more frugal than previous attempts. I’m making my own paper pots for next year to save buying peat pots which will be a saving on dealing with peas and am also on the lookout for good deep seed trays so that I don’t need to prick out but can plant straight from the tray.

Last year I planted up marrow seeds to early (March) in little pots on the allotment and lost them to frost. This year I’ve got marrows and courgettes in pots at home on a sunny window ledge to prevent this happening again. I’ve also planted courgettes in pots this year – the daughter bought a couple of plants last year which were also lost to frost as we were a bit early. I’ve got four healthy plants ready to be hardened off in a couple of weeks before being planted out at the end of May. So that ranks as a success to date and more frugal than last year. The pots were freebies that I’ve collected from here and there so even better.

My first mistake this season is that I pricked out leeks far too early. I now know that you should never move them from the seed tray till they are the thickness of a pencil at which point they are fit to plant out. I also put them outside after a couple of days and it was far too warm so I lost most of them. However I have managed to retrieve about twenty from the first packet of seeds. I have used the second packet and now have about 70 leeks in various stages of growth. They are all staying indoors at present till they are much larger. Even the few that survived my first attempt at growing have picked up after a couple of days inside. It’s a good thing that I had two packets from a special offer that both my daughter and myself sent off for – 10 packets each for £1.99 postage and packaging.

My second mistake has been to sow the entire packet of red cabbage because I didn’t realise that 95% of them will germinate – no one tells you this, you find out. I pricked out about 60 and have managed to kill those by over watering aided and abetted by changing weather with heat, humidity and cold over a couple of very changeable weeks. It didn’t help that I opened the window next to them which compounded the problems. I still have about 10 which seem to have survived but it looks as if these may well go the way of the others.  I have been told that I should have planted about two or three seeds in a number of small pots so that I have only the number I require plus a few spares. Over the weekend I may have to do this. Luckily I am not too late to do a second sowing. Hey ho. I shall keep the remainder of the packet properly sealed in the fridge if I need to do this so that I have some spare for next year.

There are mixed messages with the tomatoes and peppers. Very few of the peppers germinated as I overwatered the soil seed tray when I planted them which also made them very slow. However the 10 that did appear should be enough as those I have planted out seem to be thriving on a sunny window sill.  But the tomato seeds seem to be contented at present and I look to have 14 good plants which will end up down in a sunny place on the allotment in June and about three which may catch up and join in.  But again these are from the 10 packets for £1.99 p&p offer so all that I manage to grow will be inexpensive practice for the future.

I also discovered that I had a packet of Bedfordshire Champion onion seeds left over from a couple of seasons back so put them into some pots with good compost in to see what happened at the end of March. Well they have come up in numbers to my surprise as I’ve heard that onions are hard to germinate! At the moment they just need leaving where they are – lesson from the leeks, these onions are too small to handle (same family and some of the tricks are the same). I don’t hold out much hope of getting a crop of onions from them despite the germination as I think that I left it far too late to sow but it’s certainly interesting experience. I did the same thing with a packet of Red Baron seeds in trays on the allotment. Again there is a fair showing but planted too late. But I might just get a decent supply of salad onions from the pots if nothing else. As I have another packet of the Red Baron ones left in the box (it’s that offer again) I might consider planting in a seed tray at home just after Christmas next year to bring them on for planting out in March. As the onion sets seem to be doing well at present anything that comes from the seeds is really a bonus and excellent experience. 

That’s the thing about gardening – you can’t teach experience, only learn it!

It’s often completely useless to petition the government as they take not the slightest bit of notice of the electorate unless we actually riot on the streets.  But the facility is there and it should be used so that it can become a resource that at least the IT literate can use (a growing band nowadays of course).

However recently I’ve felt strongly enough to sign three: one on the undersupply of allotments, one on the lack of central funding for air ambulances and one to increase the job seekers allowance along with improving the job centre service.

Hmm, I doubt that the job centre provides a service of use to its clients now any more than it ever did when I used it and that’s not so long ago. It’s merely a place to collect names of those who should be given the miserable JSA pittance rather than to help, encourage and advise serious job seekers.  You want advice on courses, information on how to get to a vacancy by local bus or train? You want up to date lists of jobs that are still available and not filled many weeks ago? You want help and advice on training or apprenticeships that are anything more than basic IT courses for the scared which will not get you a job? Then you need a good network of other people for the job centre will rarely come up with the goods. I know, I know I’m retired but not that long since that I have no memory of the job centre network or the fact that the money does not allow you to travel to interviews.

Most of the petitions are on very local issues and are signed by local people but have local impact – for instance this one - on cycle routes in Cambridge which seems to have done some good. I doubt if people will get rid of the charges for removing their garden waste -  – as this is coming in all over the country for what was a free service until councils saw another way of making money.

I still feel that both lifeboats and air ambulances provide vital public services which are in need of government help rather than being left to completely support themselves. It’s no cheap business raising money for either a life boat or a properly equipped air ambulance. Our local air ambulance was once supported by the local NHS trust which grounded the service every time there was a shortage of funds – which meant that in a vast rural area which many hills full of walkers there was no support in the case of not being able to get the normal road based ambulance anywhere near the scene of the accident. Methinks that the government is far too city minded and has no idea of the needs of areas outside the urban environment.

It’s been the bane of my life having to do housework. It’s not the washing that is the problem – there’s a washing machine. It’s not the ironing that is really the problem – in small doses I can keep pace with it. It’s not the mopping, the dusting and the vacuuming, but the putting everything tidily in it’s place.

For this is a small flat and there are more things than space to stack them in. At the moment there is a pile of newspaper to be made into paper pots for next season’s planting of things like marrows which need to stay indoors till after the last frost. There’s the filing of bank statements, tax information, insurance policies and other vital paper that needs to be kept for the future. At the moment this is a spilled bag of tea lights in one of the cupboards to clear up if I could only reach that far back without taking everything out!

There’s a bookshelf that is being used as an extra food cupboard as the storage space in the kitchen leaves everything to be desired. A major area of the storage space is taken up by an indoor gas meter and associated pipe work. Obviously designed by a bloke at some point in the past and it’s never going to change because the respected social housing landlord doesn’t have the budget to do the required alterations.

I don’t consider that I have unessential items kept in the flat – well I do have some jigsaw puzzles that need to be made but eight puzzles is hardly a large amount of junk in the scheme of things. I suspect the clutter is all the associated gardening items that would normally be in a greenhouse but I’m not prepared to go to the expense of buying and running one of those for the time that I shall realistically keep the allotment going.

There are bags of plant pots waiting for the seedlings to grow large enough to use them. There’s a homeless watering can that is here for use with seedlings that are being hardened off outside in the yard (easy watering rather than using the little house can which takes a tea cup of water and is no use for a couple of hundred pricked out peas!). But it’s far too early to plant out the tomatoes and the sweet corn – another month before these will be fit to go to the allotment! The chilli and pepper seedlings are tiny and growing so slowly – these will probably end up in the yard amongst the plant pots when they decide to grow on from more than two small leaves!

When all the extras and plants go back to the allotment shed in the next month or so and all the seedlings are clear of the house, perhaps the place will be tidy. For a time – and easy to clean. At the moment it’s like living in a potting shed rather than living in a house.

Yesterday was mostly hot and sunny till the cloud cooled things down in the early evening. It seemed a really nice day to go out and finish lots of little jobs on the allotment.

I passed by four large bags of grass from where someone had cut their grass as I turned into the road leading to the allotment. “Ah,” I thought, “best to tell John that the lady has cut her grass and left him the bags for his compost heap.” So that was the first little job done.

Second job was a walk round to dead head all the dandelions on the allotment and to inspect the peas I had so patiently planted out as well as looking for signs of seedlings. The first of the calabrese has put its head above the soil and so have the first few radishes. Very small in both cases but at least a start – the calabrese is in seed trays and will be planted out when large enough. No sign of any beetroot yet though!

Note to self - I do need to have another go with the spraying equipment to catch some more of the dandelions and the last of the buttercups to tidy the place up.

Third job was to mix up a better compost mix for the tubs that will contain the tomatoes. This was a nice job that could be done sitting in a sunny corner with the wheelbarrow in front of me and the pots to one side. Fourth job was to pick rhubarb for the family who wanted some for crumble. That was easy and the leaves were thrown onto the compost heap that I had uncovered when one of the pigeon keepers bought along some loft clearings that he didn’t need for his compost heap. Fifth job was to unpack the last two or three sacks of compost and add to the bought in heap of compost which will be used to top up the cabbage patch when I clear it of spring cabbage next month – it’s going to be dedicated to sweet corn.

Last job was some serious watering as the fruit trees were suffering badly from the very dry weather – a little watering on Monday had stopped them looking so stressed but more was required. So having emptied the large water butt on tree watering, it was a case of laying out the hose to refill it as no-one else was the tap at the time. While the hose was connected I decided to go full throttle and do a fairly good watering of the whole plot.

Having worked hard on the allotment on Friday in the sun, pricked out a lot of cabbages on Saturday after the visitors left and done two long stints on the plot on Sunday and yesterday, I declared today a holiday. Just for one day of course!

It was pleasant enough but not as hot as the last couple of days so I decided to go for a ride round on the buses with the friendly pass.

I went down into Newcastle and then off across country to see Morpeth. The town is now the home of the unitary council that runs all of Northumberland. It’s other claim to recent fame is of course the floods which hit the town and caused major disruption to the centre and housing by the river last September.  The last three shops in the centre close to the river are still being refitted after they have dried out but most of the street is back to normal and the Morpeth Chantry which houses the bagpipe museum and the tourist information centre is now open again. It’s an old chapel and a lovely building. But added to the chaos caused by the flooding, there has been major upheaval with planned building works around the town centre. A new bus station is now in use and the renovations to the old Sanderson Arcade are progressing. For a long period this was a dark and dismal walk way from the bus station to the main shopping area that did nobody any favours – shoppers, tourists or business people. At present the only part of the arcade in use is the frontage on the main street and very nice it looks.

After lunch I jumped on the bus and continued my travels on up to Alnwick which used to be the major shopping centre for the family when we lived further up county. If you have seen the Harry Potter films then you will have seen Alnwick Castle which really is what everyone expects of a castle. But it’s a grand chocolate box town with plenty of places for a cup of tea and a variety of shops. At the moment there is a lot of painting and decorating of shops fronts ready for the “tourist season” – in other words the town is putting on its best clothes for the summer.

On Sunday I spent most of a sunny afternoon planting out the peas that I had showing well. I’ve put out 115 and there were already some showing that I had popped straight into the ground. These are Twinkle peas that you plant close enough together so that they support themselves. I had some spare when I decided that I needed to keep space on the plot for other crops but giving away 4 trays of peas each containing 20 plants posed no problems – a lot of people have given me offerings for the compost heap over the passed year so I paid them off in peas.

At least with peas you can freeze them if you have a glut and too many to eat at one time. The daughter is quite happy to have her freezer partly filled with frozen peas (but I do have to leave her space for pizzas and ice cream!).

I turned my back to go and fetch the netting to cover up what I had planted out only to find that I was being watched by two blackbirds who were hoping for worms but who were quite happy to try to run away with some small pea plants too! Luckily I chased them off before any damage was done and smartly set to with getting the peas covered by netting firmly pegged down. I’m sorry but there are some crops which are definitely for me and not for the birdies!

I pricked out the leeks when they were far too small and most of them died when I put them out in the warm a few days ago so that I had some space to work. I left those that recovered in their pots, opened the second packet of seeds and put a couple in each of the empty little pots. I’m hoping that the second lot will show through quickly and catch up. This time I shall leave them till they are ever so much larger before I prick them out.

I’ve also been told to open the packet of cabbage seeds next time, put one seed into each pot and then close the packet and keep cool for another year. It seems that cabbages will germinate if kept just moist and in a gentle heat. I’ve taken the sensible advice of those who have done the same silly thing before me and just kept enough red cabbages to share and plant out.

You can tell that I have never started out growing cabbages and leeks from seeds before!

It must be something like beginners luck as I’ve pricked out so many leeks that I’ve cleared the seed trays of the last few ones that are showing – 100 must be enough for one allotment and two households. I’ve never frown leeks before so here is hoping that they actually continue to grow. What with the signs of onion seeds in the pots and trays outside, I think that the drawing I made of where everything is to go on the allotment is going to have to be redone. It’s possible that there will be no runner beans this year if all the seedlings proceed apace and can be planted out to grow. There just won’t be enough space for them.

I watered a seed tray of red cabbage seeds that was showing some sign of life but which had dried out two days ago – now there are a squillion seedlings that will need to be pricked out next week. I think that we shall only need ten or twelve at the most between the two households who eat off the allotment. Hmm. I’ll be giving away red cabbages then or exchanging them for other things.

The first few of the sweet corn plants are showing signs of life. That’s good – we can manage the produce from 18!

  I have fifteen good tomato seedlings at the moment – that could be three for the “conservatory” at the other house and a dozen on the allotment. It looks as if eventually there will be six or seven sweet pepper plants to grow in a sunny, sheltered corner. At last there are signs of life in the pepper trays after I had almost given up hope of anything germinating at all. 

It will be nice when the seedlings are all on the allotment though as there is little enough room for me at the moment at home.

All in all it looks as if the allotment may well pay for itself again this year. I added up the cost of seeds, compost, seed trays and peat pots (naughty but wasn’t expecting so much germination in the way of seeds) I have bought this season. It looks as if I have spent a little more than planned for the year. But some of the items are going to be usable next year and there will also be some seeds which will be spare. So – swings and roundabouts. Next year there should be an undershoot on costs which will be good.  I hope that the delivery from the garden centre tomorrow will be the last that is needed this year.

Meantime – to save money for next year I am collecting newspaper and shall spend all my spare moments once the rush of the season is over making paper pots to save on costs for next year. I’ll be collecting lots of those free newspapers that you find on buses. No newspaper will go into the recycling bin until I have at least 500 little pots made and saved. Now you know why there are free newspapers on buses – they are for people who want to save on pots for their seedlings!

My first attempt at sowing sunflowers from a packet produced very leggy items. But a friend thinks she may well be able to renovate the disasters so has taken them away to try her luck. Mind you she also received 15 excess tomato seedlings which are very small but which should grow on, 11 courgette seedlings, 15 cucumber seedlings and 4 marrow seedlings all of which were in fine fettle when they left. She has repaid me with a number of handy plastic plant pots. Those items which are not used on the community allotment which the lady helps to run will be sold to help cover costs – they have electricity, hot water, toilets and all mod cons so they do need to raise money to pay their way. And for me it’s cheaper to raise seedlings from a packet and then give away those that I don’t need or can't use.

Anyway after the seedlings had gone to their new home, I sat down and looked at the back of the seed packet and found that I should have planted the sunflowers in individual small pots and kept them at a cooler temperature instead of starting them off in seed trays in the hot sun with the tomatoes. Right then. So I’ve planted a few more as per the instructions and will do what the packet says! Funny but I read the instructions on the seed packets for everything else and have had no problems – all items are doing exactly as the packet says.

So the moral of the story is that you should always read the instructions even if you know what you are doing as you may well have forgotten what you thought you knew. I suppose that works for many things!

A few onion seeds (maybe half a dozen) have dared to appear in the pots where they were sown on the allotment. These are Bedfordshire white ones – not a sign of the Red Baron onion seeds yet. It’s a good thing that the sets are beginning to shoot – there will be onions on the plot this year.

And the first sign of carrots have also appeared – well four seedlings anyway! It must be time for another sowing of carrots then so that we have a continual supply. Maybe over the weekend some of the purple and yellow ones can be added to different pots so that we have some for salads. Yes – you read that right in that I am going to plant purple carrots and yellow carrots.

Last year persuading the peas to chit on the plot was a hit and miss affair. Some did and some didn’t, some drowned, the mice ate some and few enough were planted out. This year a different tack is being tried. I soaked a complete packet of peas before planting some went straight onto the plot in a nicely damp trench. Others have gone into peat pots now that they had sprouted roots. I am intending to plant these out once there are the first signs of growth above the pots so that there are no spaces in the planting regime. I’m using Twinkle for this planting out as they are self supporting if planting in blocks. This should be a saving on canes at least. The pots spent last night outside but the heavy rain this afternoon has made them wetter than I like (lost any number to drowning last year) so maybe they will come inside tonight to dry out in the warmer area of the kitchen – on the lino where the cleaning up will be easier.

Today there was a harvest of herbs, rhubarb and some tiny heads of purple sprouting broccoli – we are going to have to study the ways of the cabbage family as we have not succeeded well so far!

Having spent time yesterday pricking out seedlings in the greenhouse otherwise known as the sunny kitchen it has come to me that maybe I have gone the wrong way about doing this job economically.

Had I bought peat pots or the equivalent early on in the season I could have planted cucumber, marrow, courgette and sunflower straight into the appropriate pot. This would have allowed me to only plant once, not to have to prick out from seed trays, would have saved on compost and would have left the seed trays for the very fine seeds (tomato, pepper, leek).

I dislike using the insert trays as I seem to have endless problems removing the seedlings and things that I am bringing on at home will need to be a size larger than will grow in these. Also I shall have a number of spares which will go to a plant sale locally at the end of May. To bring marrow, courgette and sunflower to be large enough to plant out at this date requires a different size of root to what will grow in these.

So it’s back to the shopping to obtain more peat pots and a lesson well learned for next year. However the seed trays are excellent for stacking groups of small pots together for moving so the expense is not wasted. It’s all a matter of learning. Last year I planted out early and lost a certain amount of seedlings due to late frosts, a strange Easter and what the garden centres decided to stock – all added to the sum total of experience I suppose. This year I am not keen on that happening again so am bringing on a lot of stock at home till it is large enough and sturdy enough and the late frosts are supposed to have passed (late May I suppose is realistic). Oh and I want to try outdoor tomatoes and cucumbers so there is a certain amount of fiddling around with stuff that needs to be started indoors.

But the seed trays will be reusable for seasons to come, the demand for small pots lessened so requiring less expenditure long term and also less compost will be required next year. Now if there is a way to control the weather so that it suits my allotment that would really be useful but it seems that you can’t buy suitable weather in any shop.

I only went out for the afternoon because the housework was done and I felt I needed a small treat. So I went off to look round some shops, including a visit to the nearest ASDA to top on on their bread mixes which work a treat out of the packet for baking by hand.

When I came back I looked at the seed trays in the kitchen and see that three cucumber seedlings have just peeped through the soil along with two or three marrows and two courgettes.

It’s so exciting to see that reducing the kitchen work surfaces to accommodate these seed trays in the sunny areas is so productive. The tomato seedlings seem to be happy in the sunny space but are not yet ready to be potted on. So far the peppers have shown no sign of sprouting but there is time yet. The chilli seeds have only just gone into the container so there is time a plenty for these to catch up.

However the sunflowers are taking over the world so I will have to go and hunt some pots out of the cold frame in order to move them on this evening. The daughter has been told to get her tubs against the house wall ready over the next couple of months in preparation for a couple of these seedlings. I only want three of four down on the allotment. We have a lot more than six coming along at the moment. But swapping and bartering will no doubt have an effect so long as there are no disasters.

I seem to have volunteered myself to see how self sufficient I can be in regard to food and even write a blog about it elsewhere.

“The challenge will be for 30 days this year you have to only eat food that either you have produced yourself or that has been given to you by a friend/allotment neighbour/family member whatever. So the onus will be on you to find out who is growing what then sharing the harvest. Alternatively you could just grow your own stuff if you don't really know anyone in the area.”

For people in an urban environment it may be that it’s not possible to find a complete diet for the period so there’s been a discussion about having different levels. Everyone lives in a different situation and may only be able to achieve a small step towards self sufficiency. It’s a challenge to move towards an ideal. You may be able to provide live out of your store cupboard for a week or a fortnight, to provide all your own herbs from a window box or sunny windowsill. It’s more about making the effort to see what you can achieve than managing to go all the way.

I will admit that I have traded a lot of home made cake for a bag of compost needed to pot on the seedlings growing in the sunny kitchen area. Not a direct swap of food for food but a swap of food against future production of food. I’ve also received six bags of pigeon manure for my compost heap in return for donations to others last season and clearing up along someone’s allotment hedge. So not all swaps are exactly edible at the time but go towards future production.

In my case swapping some vegetables or pickles for 6 eggs (a possible swap) would be no use as I am virtually vegan and eggs certainly haven’t been on the menu for long years. If nothing else though it will be interesting to ponder, trade, barter, provide, make out of what the allotment produces.

I grew up in a gardening family and eventually as a farmer’s daughter who was not allowed to follow in the farming footsteps but sent out to work elsewhere. On the farm, we were pretty self-sufficient food wise. We grew our own fruit and vegetables, bottled, preserved, made jam, had a cow for the house to provide milk from which we often made our own butter. Most of our meat came from our own stock or from various wildlife sources on the farm (rabbit till that disease arrived, hare, pigeon, partridge, pheasant). The only thing that we did not produce was our own ground flour for bread and cheese. The cheese was as much due to lack of time to make it as anything. So the idea of being self-sufficient in food is nothing new to me.

it should be interesting to say the least.

The daughter was visiting the local garden centre in her car and asked if there was anything required. Why yes said I – could you drop off a large bag of compost so that eventually I can pot on all these seedlings for the allotment please. It would have been far too large to bring home on the bus so it was nice of her to ask.

However no gift goes unpaid for even there is a refusal for the money. This week she has taken the first rhubarb of the year from the allotment for a crumble, two half shares of different cakes, a generous sample of the home made bread (and she doesn’t really like bread you know) as well as a selection of herbs from the allotment. Methinks that we are about equal.

She has also booked two of the sunflower seedlings that I am bringing on for her front garden – out of eighteen I daresay that we can spare one or two! Someone else says that she’ll have some for her plant sale at the end of May too. That’s about the time they should be ready to plant out. I only want three for a corner of the allotment.

The real cause for going out this afternoon was apparently that daughter and husband are going to renovate the kitchen in their house instead of selling the whole place. Selling up is a bit drastic if you only want a new kitchen surely?

Retirement may allow time for many things but it certainly reduces the income considerably. I notice that more and more local pensioners are looking for outings and occupations that cost little or nothing. No one can say that an allotment can be run at no cost at all despite the time that it takes up which is certainly not time that you have to pay to fill.

To start out on an allotment requires tools at least in the form of spade, fork, hoe, shovel, trowel and secateurs, maybe hedge cutting equipment. Composting equipment such as the plastic dalek, water butts and hose pipes may be available free if you search around – but there again they may not. Your local council may have composters on special offer at some points in the season as these do reduce the amount of refuse that they have to handle. If you ask nicely you may receive goodies as presents for birthday or Christmas mind you - as I did with the nice shovel that works so hard for me now. I thought that I could manage without a wheelbarrow but surprisingly I found out that this was not so!

Collecting canes, seed trays, plant pots, netting, twine and other items that come to be regarded as essential can be a case of using free sources. You’d be amazed how many hidden, free collections of plant pots and tubs are available for the asking when people clear out in the spring or decide to move on or stop gardening. 

If you are lucky and ask nicely you can acquire strawberry runners and raspberry cane runners free. You may also be given cuttings of useful plants or roots of rhubarb. However you may well have to pay for your herbs at the garden centre or local plant sales. Many groups sell off plants and excess produce to raise money for equipment so it is worth keeping an eye on local church and village notice boards for up and coming events over the spring and summer.  These plants are often most suitable for the local climate as they are locally grown and will often be a little cheaper than at your local garden centre.  Likewise, most gardeners have a grapevine that tells you who has good offers on seeds or plants in your area and where there are seed swaps available.

But the main ingredient of any good plot is the soil. If your soil is not fed regularly then you will not grow enough produce to cover the time invested and rent paid. The compost heap is a prized possession and composting is a skill that gardener needs to learn so that there is food available for the soil every year.

Other sources of goodies to improve and nurture your soil can include visits to  the local farm or stables to see if you can obtain manure and have the transport, or talking to the local chicken keeper or pigeon fancier for items to add to your compost heap as both chicken and pigeon manure are valuable sources of nutrients if composted properly. If you are like me, you will take compostable material from other people who have no space or inclination for compost heaps. 

Green manuring is another way of improving your soil because the right choice of crop is a very effective way of adding nutrients to the soil. However if you need to add bulk because you have very little topsoil or you need to improve the drainage then green manuring is not be the way to go. Likewise if you leave crops in place over the winter you may be unable to add in a green manure to some spaces during what is the quiet growing period.

I have a space which at one time was probably a pigeon loft and which seems to be depressingly hard, if not almost impossible to dig. But it makes for a lovely area for a compost heap and with the sun on it, this heap grows marrows and courgettes most profitably before being used to turn into the clay soil as soil improver for drainage purposes if nothing else. Now that is making use of a difficult space in more ways that one at a profit.

This area also had a number of pavings still in place which allowed someone to treat me to a new shed. Mind you, I have to return the shed to them when I leave the plot as they say they will be able to use it elsewhere.  So it’s a shed on hire and the rent paid is in produce. Likewise there is an inherited wooden cold frame which is valuable storage and the water butts were also in this area when I moved in. This space also allows for large tubs (acquired free in the main) for produce such as carrots and parsnips. Of course this leads on to the question of what do you put in your tubs as regards soil?

This is where I factor in buying compost in bulk knowing that it will act as a soil improver for drainage and a layer of brown if the compost heap is very full of green offerings. (Ah yes - the basic skills, terminology and art of compost making can be learned but experience is required as well.) Against the costs of running the allotment last year, two households ate for 7 months off the produce with no resort to the shops for vegetables and there are still pickles as well as the last two frozen packets of runner beans in the family freezer. 

My savings on food last year were banked knowing that I would require a particularly large import of compost as the soil on half the double plot needed raising by a couple of inches to return it to the height of the surrounding walkways. It looks as if this part of the plot had been well used and the nutrients had been provided by adding more fertilisers such as Growmore during the season over many years. This is of course one perfectly normal method of growing and it succeeds in the fact that crops are produced. But the time comes when other ways of working are needed. And this spring I have dug in a positive Hadrian’s Wall of compost at quite some price. There are savings of course which come in the fact that I shall not need to buy general fertilisers this season. Yes I could have done the same thing free if I had the ability to drive, a car and trailer and the knowledge of where to obtain farmyard manure. But it would not have been free because there would have been the cost of car and trailer to factor in. So six of one and half a dozen of the other then.

The other side of the question of whether or not an allotment pays for itself lies in the time and investment in preserving the glut of things for the future. You have to take into account the cost of gas and electricity in blanching, the containers needed for storing, whether you would run the freezer if you didn’t have an allotment, the investment in jars for making preserves and the time spent over the cooker. All I can say on that score is that my pickled red cabbage, pickled beetroot and marrow chutney is still considerably cheaper than if I bought it off the shelf in the supermarket.

And the large pans and jars I bought and acquired will be used again this year for preserving.  So it has been an investment for the future.

But does an allotment pay for itself? That depends on your point of view and many factors. If you buy good tools, acquire pots, hosepipes, water butts and composters free where possible, use seed swaps, free and cheap offers, buy what you will grown and not more than you will grow, keep an eye on skips and ask for free wood to make your raised beds, compost effectively, grow things that you like that might otherwise be expensive, cost in the time that you invest and keep the plot for a number of years – well I would say that you split even. Certainly if you regard fruit and vegetables as a major part of your diet, then an allotment will be profitable for you. If however, you are the person who knows when the supermarket will be selling off vegetables and fruit reduced because they are at or passed the sell by date and spend your time scouring the “oops” shelves for bargains almost daily, if you don’t like fruit and vegetables (yes there are lots of such people!!), don’t like gardening or physical labour, don’t expect to put in a fair amount of hard sweat, don’t have interest or time, then no an allotment will not be cost effective for you.

Added to the tomato and pepper seeds on the kitchen window sills, I’ve added trays of courgette seeds, sunflower seeds, marrow seeds and even cucumber seeds. These have spread off the window sill onto the work tops where the sun reaches.

Last year a late frost decimated the marrows and courgettes planted outside in pots and required starting again. So this year, precautions are being taken. Especially as I have never grown tomatoes, peppers or cucumbers before.

However – having put a lot of preparation into the allotment it seems to be a good idea to get the maximum return in produce.  There is a lot of fun in working on an allotment, it fills up a lot of free time at no cost and produce is extra. However money has to be considered and if a hobby will help to extend the budget then all to the good.

Another season starts – the first rhubarb came off the plot yesterday and went off for a crumble as a reward for deeds done for the allotment.

It looks as if the heavy frost last week has dealt with the first sowing of carrot seeds as nothing is yet showing. Perhaps another sowing in different pots is required.

There’s a bumble bee around the plot but not much flowering other than the tulips and the three polyanthus at present. The blackbird has been rearranging the compost heap in the hunt for worms and the thrush has demolished the snail population – many a shell everywhere.

The chives are suddenly showing themselves to be in the growing mood and little clumps are becoming larger. The mint has reappeared from what looked liked a dead root and is beginning to spread all over the bed – as mint does.

The first weeds have appeared – well other than the dandelions and buttercups which have been thriving for some weeks!

But is there more frost in the offing? and could we have some rain please – just a couple of days of gentle spring rain rather than torrential downpours of short duration?