Starter Plotters
It’s fair to say the popularity of allotments has always ebbed and flowed - nothing new there.
Through the COVID pandemic, demand was extraordinary, and it seemed like everyone wanted to have a go at growing their own food.
Since returning to normality, though, interest in taking plots (yet again) has steadily declined.
We like to think that our site is creative and innovative. In 2019 we examined the demands of family life and the skills of working a full-sized allotment.
It prompted the idea of creating six starter plots, each measuring around three metres x seven metres, rentable for one year before the plot holders are moved onto main site.
During the year, the starter plotters are invited to attend the ‘Growing Academy’ on Saturday mornings and are taught the basics of working a plot. This includes growing everything from seed, which most people cultivate on allotments.
‘Why did you want a starter?’, asks Julia.
‘Well, we knew some people who had a plot on the site and they showed us around,’ she replies. ‘We were so impressed with what we saw, we thought we'd give it a go.’
‘Did you feel like you had the knowledge for growing?’ continues Julia.
‘We thought we’d be quite good at growing because dad used to have an enormous garden and at the top was an allotment,’ Liz responds. ‘We used to help him and thought we knew a lot - until we came to the Growing Academy!’
Listening to Liz enthusing about her experience, we ask what the best part of having a starter was for her and husband Brian.
‘The camaraderie,’ is the reply. ‘We really enjoyed it on the starter plot. It's been such good fun. You're out in the fresh air and you meet lovely people too.’
‘What have you learned?’ queries Elaine.
‘The main thing is you learn you don't need to grow as much of a certain thing as you think you do,’ replies Liz, whose response seemed to resonate with the others as they nodded in agreement.
Julia directs a question to Tom, the youngest members of the group. ‘What has the experience given you?’
‘I think it's just a place to escape from work for me,’ reveals Tom. ‘I just find it like a nice getaway. The main challenge has definitely been the slug problem!
‘Tell us about your year’ Elaine asks Kevin and Claire, who are eager to join in.
‘We stumbled into this by mistake!’ admits Kevin. ‘We went to visit the site and found ourselves agreeing to take a starter plot!’.
‘So, what would you say to anyone who’s thinking about taking an allotment?’ concludes Julia at the end of our inquisition
‘It’s great. Do it - but keep away from you two!’ he laughs.
How rude - but agreed!
Potatoes are the simple ‘treasure’ on our plots and Easter is traditionally the time to plant them.
Growing underground, we have no idea how many will be produced from the number of seed potatoes we set, but they are some of the most exciting things to discover after a relatively short space of time in the soil.
We plant seed potatoes in three different ways:
• Using a long dibber, we ‘screw’ holes into the soil around nine inches deep every eight inches or so across the width of the recently dug over plot or raised bed. Having had a dibber specifically made for the job, it makes this method of planting easy!
• Alternatively, dig a full-length trench in the ground following the same depths and distances as dibbing. Then cover the row by mounding up the soil.
• And finally, container planting where we set three seed potatoes on top of around four inches of compost or soil in a retired supermarket ‘Bag for Life’ or large container with drainage holes in it.
Cover them with another four inches of compost or soil and place outside where the rain, light and sunshine can reach the container.
As green shoots appear, cover with more compost or soil up to the top of the container. Bags for Life are not waterproof so no need to make holes in them.
Note the varieties you have planted, together with the date set. This will help to work out how long the potatoes need to be under cover.
We grow potatoes not because it’s necessarily cheaper than buying them from supermarkets, as it’s probably more expensive to grow your own, but for the flavour.
Freshly grown potatoes cooked with a sprig of mint straight from the soil is a taste rarely forgotten!
We probably have more fun growing and talking about loofahs than anything else on the plot, especially when we are out on our community adventures.
Have you ever grown them? Maybe, 2025 is the year to start! Similar to grow as cucumbers, they just need a longer time to mature on the vine.
Immature loofahs are edible as small vegetables, although we grow them specifically to dry to use as exfoliators or scourers in the home. So, we leave them on the vines until the skins on the sponges firm hard like a shell turning dark brown in colour.
Remember the broad beans we set some weeks ago? As they reached around three inches, we carefully lifted them from their cell trays and set them into the ‘meal barra’s’ – discarded wheel barrows with holes in their bottoms!
We camouflage any damage with broken terracotta pots before filling with a mix of soil, sand and a dollop of horse muck for good measure.
Not only does this ensure good drainage, it also provides food for the immature plants.
The added bonus? Being off the ground, the plants are out of the reach of slugs (unless they can abseil?!).
Four years ago, we zipped along to a local garden centre when they were selling off their tulip bulbs and bought as many as we could carry - for the total cost of £6!
Back to the plots and on our knees for a couple of hours. The whole batch was set at the base of a raised bed and we were curious to see if they would flower.
Eager to deter squirrels from foraging, we spread cuttings off the rambling rose over the top of the soil… success! Every year since, we’ve have had another £6 display… of bargain bulbs!
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