Allotment Wars

Sunny_Donny

hi
Had my allotment for 10 months. Have had nothing but help and advice from other allotment holders. Have been offered plants for free, or to purchase (depending on person).
one of the allotment holders is retired and has been helping me on the plot when he has a spare hour and has helped reduce the weeds (plot had been unoccupied for 2 years so there were lots of weeds!!!
I think the people on the show are a minority. Mind you, my allotment is council owned and run and we never see the manager, just get letters from him. At the moment, someone is giving up their plot and we have bought a shed from them to use on our plot. The allotment holders are helping us to dismantle it, clean it and move it to our plot. If it doesn't snow this weekend then we should have a nice cosy shed on our plot. I love going to the allotment, nice and peaceful, been offered cups of tea from others with sheds and gas

1940sGal

I wanted an allotment until we dug our garden over. My mum's friend has one and I enjoy visiting and helping, and pretty much everybody there is friendly and nice, except the 'supervisor' type bloke who is 'in charge'. Doesn't work, is on the dole and loves to tell people what they should grow, and he would actually tell people off if they had too much grass where he claims veg should be growing.

That was until my mum's friend got hers and told him exactly where he could stick his bossy nature. Which incidentally showed him to be the coward that he is, and he hasn't tried bossing anyone around since

I will add there is one lovely old lady who gave us some rhubarb when we went for the first time. She'd never met us before! I thought it was a really nice thing for her to do, which I think to be fair is a reflection on the vast majority of allotment holders.

floss2

Own_My_Own wrote: »

There are 8 posters on this thread. 4(or half) of them have or have had plots. Of those 4, 3 have said that they have had problems.

Not sure what you owning 2/3 of the site has to do with it.
Or maybe it has everything to do with it.

As I said, more posters would give a more balanced thread, which has now happened.

Oh, and my having 2/3 of a plot would mean little to someone who doesn't have an allotment, but those who DO, or would like to, will understand why I mentioned because it will be of interest when visualising a poster's plot.

Own_My_Own

floss2 wrote: »

As I said, more posters would give a more balanced thread, which has now happened.

Oh, and my having 2/3 of a plot would mean little to someone who doesn't have an allotment, but those who DO, or would like to, will understand why I mentioned because it will be of interest when visualising a poster's plot.

Your 2/3 plot STILL HAS NO CONNECTION TO THE POST. And I MAY NOT HAVE AN ALLOTMENT BUT I KNOW WHAT 2/3 OF SOMETHING LOOKS LIKE THANK YOU VERY MUCH.

Or are allotment holders now more intelligent than non holders.

PS- They are still quite a few people on here who agree with me.

Yorkie1

Own_My_Own wrote: »

Your 2/3 plot STILL HAS NO CONNECTION TO THE POST. And I MAY NOT HAVE AN ALLOTMENT BUT I KNOW WHAT 2/3 OF SOMETHING LOOKS LIKE THANK YOU VERY MUCH.

Or are allotment holders now more intelligent than non holders.

PS- They are still quite a few people on here who agree with me.

There's really no need to shout or be rude.

Own_My_Own

floss2 wrote: »

As I said, more posters would give a more balanced thread, which has now happened.

Oh, and my having 2/3 of a plot would mean little to someone who doesn't have an allotment, but those who DO, or would like to, will understand why I mentioned because it will be of interest when visualising a poster's plot.

Own_My_Own wrote: »

Your 2/3 plot STILL HAS NO CONNECTION TO THE POST. And I MAY NOT HAVE AN ALLOTMENT BUT I KNOW WHAT 2/3 OF SOMETHING LOOKS LIKE THANK YOU VERY MUCH.

Or are allotment holders now more intelligent than non holders.

PS- They are still quite a few people on here who agree with me.

Yorkie1 wrote: »

There's really no need to shout or be rude.

Sorry I thought capitals where the call of the day.

or as I DO NOT have an allotment plot can I not use them.

EpsomOldie

I watched the programme on iPlayer after seeing it mentioned here – what a bunch! I’ve had my Council-run allotment for about 4 years and I love going there – time seems to slow down. The people have always been friendly and helpful.

I suppose a programme about choosing seeds; planning where they’ll go; getting excited about the seedlings’ noses pushing through the earth; the ripple of excitement around the plot when free stable manure or leaf mould is delivered; noseying at other people’s plots and admiring their ingenious structures; finding an ants nest and carefully placing the eggs where the robin can snaffle them; being aware that you’ve been watched for the last hour by a fox dozing under a tree; hearing woodpeckers alternately yaffle and bash their beaks against timber; watching a mum unzip a peapod for a baby; and spotting a sparrowhawk...wouldn’t make "good telly”.

Though I must say I’d enjoy watching that kind of thing. I suppose I’m the wrong sort of viewer

Uther

wrote:

PS- They are still quite a few people on here who agree with me.

I've had plots on 2 sites and have never seen this sort of behavior from other plot holders. Majority of people are friendly and helpful, but of course on a site with 200 plots there are bound to be one or two exceptions.
Most of the problems come from outsiders, breaking into sheds to steal tools, vandalizing or stealing produce.

Contrary to what the program says, I find the allotment relaxing rather than stressful. Additionally you get exercise and eat healthier, but I guess this would not make as interesting a documentary as conflict does.

bluemeadow

Right I'm off to watch this programme on iplayer so I can see what has inspired this heated debate!
Talking from my own experiance my allotment is my favourite place to be, I have it for four years and went from never having grown anything to growing things ive never eaten just to try them.
While there are a lot of very friendly plot holders on the site there also a few that it has taken this long to actualy start talking to me but i can see why as there is an awful lot of people who take an allotment without realising the time and effort it can take to mantain it, they turn up a couple of times and then leave it to grow over which can be annoying when all the weed seeds etc are growing over your allotment, and you never see them again.
I realy hope this programme doesnt put people off getting allotment because as EpsomOldie has said a programme about someone having a lovely quiet time watching their seeds grow and weeding wouldnt be very interesting!

Mollymoonlight

Started watching this on the iplayer on the way into work this morning, and although I have no experience of allotments, its obvious that the bbc have chosen "colourful" characters in order to make the program entertaining. Lets face it, if a program was made that showed how every allotment grower was civil to their neighbour and kept themselves to themselves it wouldn't be too interesting. Its very easy for a film crew to make things appear to be so much worse than they actually are. I don't doubt for one minute that some allotment sites are a nightmare, just like some (very nice to look at) housing estates are also a nightmare. You will find a*******s in every walk of life, and reality TV likes to make stars of them, which is why it should be taken with a large pinch of salt. If they made a show about the !!!!!ing and backstabbing that went on in stable yards, I'm sure everyone thinking about getting a horse wouldn't bother, or think about keeping it in their garden! Yes, these things happen, but they are part of a bigger picture that I feel these times of shows don't portray.