OS gardening/allotmenteering - traditions, money saving and savvy ideas

fuddle

I'm just back from my plot, sat down with my cuppa and thought about picking up my wool bag to start knitting. Then it came to me - knitted hanging basket liners. I know what my yarn ends will be made into come the spring.

Some other things I've done today was continue putting my rabbit bedding/manure on bed 1.

Used fence posts that used to line a sloped bed but are now defunked as a retainer for the new mini fruit growing area behind my greenhouse.

Emptied all the saved toilet roll inners from the bathroom holding drawer and added them to the compost bin.

Took over used wood ash for gradual adding to the compost bin.

We have a worm bin. I use the compost DH uses the worms as fishing bait. DH gathers worms from the field out the back of our house in dampdark conditions with his head torch.

I'm hoping to share and read what others share, about how they're reusing, adding goodness to their soils and fertilising their plants. I would love to know more about OS ways, what the Land Girls got up to and how we could cope growing our own in a crisis.

I spent too much money on my plot last year setting it up but equally my shed is part salvaged shed from my sisters rotten shed and part renewed with pallet wood. It wasn't watertight so it's now wrapped in tarpaulin. My raised beds are condemned scaffold planks. My paths are wood chips but they are soon rotting so come the spring will be added to the compost and I'll sow grass paths.

I also have a front garden. It's a very slow process bringing it up to scratch and that's because I lack the knowledge needed. It's west facing in a Victorian row of houses up a hill. I would love to learn how the gardens were used when they were first built. It's quite small so I wonder if a kitchen garden would have been there?

I'm hoping I'll find some OS gardeners willing to share what they do in their gardens that fit the OS way of living.

[Deleted User]

Well, when we first got our new allotment and were just clearing the grass and weeds to see what we'd got I saw some glass propped beside the broken compost bin and thought I'd better get that away. I pulled the end, and pulled, and pulled some more and out came a reinforced glass panel from a shower cubicle!!! not what you expect BUT it's going to be the top lid of a home made cold frame so nothing wasted. We've dug out old and past it fruit bushes, two enormous roots of rhubarb, a stand globe artichokes and some very woody sage plants more like bushes. The rhubarb will give us a few new roots to start again and the rest will go in the garden waste bin. What we've not had time to dig is covered with weed suppressant black membrane and there is a small area left to sort and some old raspberry canes to dig out. We have a plum and a damson tree on the plot that need a good haircut and training into the right shape and we've made a start pruning the grape that climbs up the side of the shed. Today we got some new roof felt for the shed, got a couple of holes in the felt there already and needs re-doing. We hope we can rescue the asparagus that is there already but it's covered in couch grass so we may just have to dig out the whole lot. Not bad for the few weeks we've had the plot is it?

fuddle

I forgot you were starting all over again! Perfect cold frame lid though. It is a bit like 'one man trash another man' s treasure' isn't it? I inherited a blackberry bush and a lemon balm. I have loved lemon balm tea this year. I hadn't ever had it. Actually I think it was you who I'd it for me. It's now in it own position and split to give my sister a plant too.

And then there's the raspberries you gave me when I moved down south. I only have two left. They didn't do very well up here but I had put them in ground that hadn't been worked and the soil dried to big cracks over the summer. I've dug the two that have signs of green growth underneath and put them in pots. I will mother them this year and hope to revive them back to life. They've been all over the country haha.

Thinking back to what I have in the ground for next season I've my own garlic bulbs. The rest are in the kitchen. I've got more in the ground this year so I'm hoping to keep self sufficient in them continually going forward.

I hope you can rescue the asparagus. but I understand the couch will probably desturb the roots as you get it up. I have asparagus. I grew mine from seed and have 6 plants but I'm way behind doing it that way. I still have another 4 years before I can harvest I think. Don't they say a Gardener has to believe in the future?

Nodette

I don't have an allotment, but I do have a small garden. We've only been living here for just over 2 years and one of DH's first moves was to plant 'cabbages' in the rockery (yes, weird, I know). Actually they're broccoli plants. . . . but he's learning and to be honest, I don't know much myself.

But, since there is only us two, we just ate the leaves as and when we wanted to. Just picked off 3 or 4 large ones for the meal. They have lasted since that time and are now quite ugly - long naked stems with a flourish of leaves at the top - but still large leaves. They show no sign of dying off. Never did get much flowering broccoli but the leaves are good!!

Anyway, that's our re-use tale. I never knew you could do this.

Last year we did the same with the cabbages - instead of cutting off the head we just took leaves. Now they too are long stalks with mini cabbages on top!! The leaves are not so tightly packed though, which makes for easier "cut and come again" harvesting.

BTW I love your idea of knitting liners for the hanging baskets Fuddle!

moneyistooshorttomention

True imo that a gardener has to "believe in the future". There's still all the tarmac and concrete covering a lot of the ground at present in the garden of current house - waiting for the money to rip it all up/do something a lot nicer.

But I'm doing what I can with the earth I have on show at present (which comes to a noticeable amount - just not as much as I want/will have).

I started by planting miniature fruit trees pdq after moving in. Fruit bushes and rhubarb went in fast too. By now - I'm getting comments of just how "garden like" it looks/"You have got green fingers" etc. That's the thing though - it took a few years for those trees and bushes to come to maturity. So it does happen - eventually...

Certainly a sight better than the "blank concrete garden" that the house had when I bought it...

[Deleted User]

The plots around ours are mostly in good condition and the soil is light and easy to dig but needs feeding. Looking at what we inherited I don't think whoever we took over from had much gardening experience and everything on the plot was planted randomly without any consideration of position and what was around it. Some of the fruit bushes were very old and overgrown so they've gone and the rhubarb has bigger roots than anything I've come across and must have been on that plot for many years. Hopefully we can split out some of the buds and start again with a new row in a different position. We have to build another compost heap frame from pallets and get rid of the accumulated rubbish that is in the current broken one, noting there to spread on the plot so we're hoping to get some soil improver from the council and some decent manure from the local stables which will be my job to load into the barrow and wheel down the path to the plot for HWK to spread. Strangely it's a job I really enjoy! I'm really looking forward to next year and for the first time being able to produce good crops of good sized veg from the plot.

-taff

Our front garden was patio'd over when we moved in.
I removed te stones, made a rectangle sleeper bed in the middle, dug out all around the three sides. I put a rosemary from Lidl in one side that went from 6 inches 3 years ago to over 1m2 now, a rosemary a friend had had in a pot for twenty years, also now taking over the world. I planted a rosemary from a cutting from a plant in Italy, that one however, doesn't like it so much.
I have borage every year, self seeded, chamomile, self seeded, fennel, self seeded, cornflowers and grape hyacinths, also self seeded, a heuchera, planted by me, sage bushes and aquilegia, also self seeded.
I did grow climbing beans on one side last year and the year before, and chard. They looked pretty and gave height.
I usually try to grow something edible apart from the usual self seeders.
The middle section has a quince [very small] bush in it now and will be joined by a bay bush I got for a knockdown price. The plan is to eventually have the quince wrapping round the rectangle with the bay in the middle.
I also have two more heucheras and some orange crocosmia to put in the garden, and I did get some cyclamen to put under the rosemary bush but they're still languishing in their pots.
For very little outlay, thanks to self seeders, i have a really flowery garden every year.
I did used to have a massive garden to grow veg in, and I tinkered with hugelkultur for a bit, it kind of worked, but it kind of didn't. Raised beds were a lot easier for me, but finding enough mulch and compost to keep them producing was hard every year.

Pooky

We took on a plot in May and as it hadn't been used for 9 years the council broke rotavated it for us. It was very uneven and on a slope so I've made bed markers from pallet wood, fences from whole pallets (42 of the blighters) and laid stupidly heavy paving slabs to support the shed. The pallets were all scavenged, the paving slabs too (via freecycle) and the shed was a gift from the in-laws. An old manky shed has been used to make a wind shield and someone's old rotten gazebo has been turned into a lovely trellis to grow a thornless blackberry up and over. I was offered a pond via a freebies page on FB which I dug in and filled and added a few snips of plants offered by other plot holders...6 weeks later somone offered us a few goldfish.

The large crates you get with paving stones in etc have become raised beds for DH to tend to (complete with some old rescued from a skip, dining chairs besides them) his mobility issues and disabilities stop him from doing a lot but he can still tend the quick turn around stuff like radish, beets and spring onions.

I've picked up seeds at bootsales, trawled the reduce section at the garden centre (110 onion seedlings for 99p was a bargain) and I've used a magazine subscription (a birthday gift) to gain more seeds as each mag came with 2 or 3 packs.

Compost bins and water butts are all from freecycle and the like and I sourced enough spare guttering in family members gardens to attach to the shed. We really have been very lucky with what we've managed to pick up and are very grateful.

The beds that are now finished were weeded and covered and I'll be doing the manure (friends down the road with horses) when I get chance. I think we've been very lucky as the land wasn't used so was in such good condition and everything we've stuck in the ground has grown and grown well. I lost one set of sprout plants to pigeons but made brassica cages the next day which are holding out well (I used debris netting from scr**fix over some gas pipe bent into arches (30mts of gas pipe brought on a local selling site for £10) does the job perfectly well and as I've made my beds all the same size I can use the cages wherever the are needed as we rotate stuff around.

I've also used a couple of garden storage boxes, the large oblong plastic things, that people have offered us, filled with soil and manure and they are my carrot and parsnip boxes...all stones sifted out so lovely long straight veg!

I need to work on my successional planting next season, it's lovely having fresh radishes and beetroot but I'd rather have a crop each week than a bigger crop one evening every 6 weeks.

I shall be looking forward to seeing what I can learn

-taff

There are froums where you can get involved in seed swaps, very good value for the price of a stamp. Grow YourOwn website has a forum.
Also, you could look into heritage seeds, there are aslo some places where you join and commit to growing a heritage variety [ of just about anything] and you send them the seeds when done and you get to pick a few different ones for growing the next year.
I've found the non hybrid ones I used to grow performed much better than the F1 types. I have quite a big collection of black tomato seeds, I love hem, they taste fab, they're all a few years old now though since I didn't grow any this year, and managed to mix a lot of them up from last year.
Will give them a go next year and see how they get on. Will also go through all the seeds I have to look for extras for possibility of swapping.

Living_proof

You are all doing so well! I took over my half plot in May and it was rotovated a little later so I did manage to get some crops in, although not as many as I will have next year when I can plan and start things off in the greenhouse. I have two completely full compost bins at home so I am regularly taking bags of kitchen scraps, hanging basket contents, plants which have gone over and maybe a few grass cuttings still to come. Also any plain cardboard boxes which come my way which are used to split the heap up. I have a metal swing which I will utilise with a scaffold pole as a frame for my runner beans next year as I will be able to secure the whole thing more securely than just canes alone. I have two cheap polytunnels 20 x10 and one I will use conventionally and the other just the frame to be covered by debris netting. Lots of old slabs and edgings to go down once the plot has been divided up into sections. Like Pooky I look to Freecycle for compost bins, water butts, canes etc. and anything else which will be useful. I will give the existing raspberries a last chance, otherwise will replant with newer ones. All very exciting this armchair allotmenteering!

fuddle

It's great to have some company. - taff I have a small strip for flowers on the plot. Calendula feature and I'm hoping they self seed again next year as I want to use the petals in facial oils.

Pooky ello. Isn't it fun making use of past it things on plots. Fabulous you got yourself one and even more fabulous the council gave you a start. I imagine you're ready to get the season off to a proper start come Feb (I say Feb as that's my first sowing - celeriac)

Living proof I get beyond excited about my allotment too. Sometimes it even interferes with my sleep!

Health is acting up a bit today so only spent 20 mins. I pruned 1/3 old wood from blackcurrent Bush and I'm thinking about using them for pea sticks come the spring.