Sunday 10 June 2012

A Bright n Early Start ...

Today I was on the allotment for 9am, I wanted to get the grass on the surrounding area cut down with the strimmer, the council haven't been into our section at all this year and it was getting ridiculous, every time you went to the water tap you got soaked (after it had rained), you couldn't walk around the area without getting the bottom of your trouser legs wet, and this isn't good when you have to go every morning before work to feed the chickens, as I do.  Getting to the bee hives was a joke, the grass was nearing 3-4 ft tall.  Anyhow, I decided enough was enough and strimmed it down, it took an absolute age, and was back breaking.  The stimmer is a petrol one that is used by the likes of the council, and professional gardeners, it was bought (second hand) using some of the grant money we attained last year.  It cut through the grass like a knife through hot butter.  I only managed to get one side of the area done (the side my plot is on LOL) and will finish off the other side another day as I wanted to get things done on my plot also.

So in between the strimming, I sowed some more carrots, not many of my first batch have come through, I did do them some time ago before the soil had warmed up and then we had all that rain for April and most of May so in reality most of the seeds were either waterlogged or washed away.  I've made myself a 'carrot' template, I took the idea from 'Annie's Granny' of Annie's Kitchen Garden, hope she doesn't mind.  Granny makes seed mats, but to be honest with you I don't have the time or patience to make these so I made my own version.........

 My Carrot Template

 Close Up of Sowing Holes

Carrots from 1st Batch Coming Through

The template measures just under 4ft by 3ft (if I remember rightly) and each of the holes have been drilled so they are 3" apart.  It gives you 165 sowing stations.  All I need do is place it on top of the soil and sprinkle some seeds into each hole, lift up the template and then scatter over some compost and water.  It saves (hopefully) the need to thin them out so much.  I also sowed some more broad beans and another 3 rows of peas, from my 1st lot of peas only 2 germinated, that's 2 peas from about 160, what did I do wrong?????? 

All in all a tiring day, I left just after 4 totally shattered, I've now got my feet up catching up on some blogs, watching Spain v Italy on the Euro's.  About to have some tea, and a nice hot bath.  It's back to work tomorrow, how nice! NOT...

2 comments:

  1. I love this idea! I so hate thinning carrot, beets and etc. I am so going to do this next year. It works pretty good? Any advice? I really like coming here and seeing thing done a different way.

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  2. I can't take all the plaudits for the idea, I suppose Granny had a little part to play in it; albeit small. As for how well it works, I can't say, I'll have to give an analysis at the end of the year.... The 1st batch didn't go so well, but I think that was due to the excess amount of rain we'd had so soon after I sowed the carrots, I think a lot of them were washed away. Only time will tell HP

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