Leaves: With the coming of the Autumn Fall, collecting leaves will be the next allotment "hobby". In a matter of days the house garden has become a golden bronze but not for long.
The garden's leaf moulding bin is to go to the allotment this week - with the left-overs of two years' of leaf-mould. A couple of annual wasps' nests made me wary of moving it but I shall proceed cautiously - we have had so little or no frost so far. The bin is strong; it is made of three scaffolding frames and fence wire-netting. At one point it had a metre high of leaves but is down to 15 centimetres now - it should prove a good soil conditioner!
I estimate that I shall pick up about 30 or 40....? sacks of leaves over the next few weeks!
Horse Manure: During the last few months and days I have been / am still filling the car with very old (years' old) horse manure and depositing and spreading it about the allotment. Generally, the lack of rain had resulted in the early loads remaining on the surface in clumps. I suppose however that the nutrients have not leached! But now the rains have fallen (last Thursday) with unusual "ferocity" but I have yet to see the state of play on the allotment.
The latest load was tilth-like - I struck a new seam in the 20 metres' long pile at the livery stable! The previous loads might have been on their way to becoming coal! All of the manure is a welcome soil conditioning addition to a variable quality of soils - which varies from humus-sy,... to clay-sy,... to sandy-sy.
Raised Beds: The winter will be spent making "walls" for new slightly raised beds. I have been collecting (scrounging) the planks (timber and plastic) and purchased hop-poles. I had planned to use the hop-poles to make a log cabin /playhouse in the garden but found that each was too tapered in shape. (Instead my grandchildren have an old shed as a bothie (but that is another story).) Some of the poles were used as border-markers on a sloping bed and others for a "sustainable fence" (yet another story). The remainder are destined for new yet-to-be-made-beds on the allotment.
Once the beds are prepared the horse manure and several bins of spent compost and made compost will be used to improve the soil on the allotment. I have tried this approach for two years and have been encouraged to create many more beds.
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