In earnest at the allotment

My ornamental garden with orange flowering berberis to the center, Kordia cherry tree to the right, and a Birthday chicken, March 2026

Now past spring equinox, things are starting to move a bit quicker, myself included.  Every day for the past week--excluding Saturday as we all attended the son's orchestra concert instead--I've been at the allotment getting work done.  In fact, on the school days, I've been twice a day:  both before dropping off the daughter from school and after finishing work but before picking her up.  

In the first instance I sowed a prepared bed with beet seeds, and covered it with insect mesh to keep birds/cats digging it up (I generally cover all my beds at the allotment after sowing/planting, at least until the plants are established).  

Then the daughter and I spent several days on the snap pea bed:  it had been newly sheet mulched with wood chips so we moved aside the mulch and laid down rows of compost, dug from the bottom of our composters.  Then we sowed the pre-sprouted peas over the course of two days and lightly sprinkled mulch back on top.  Finally, another sheet of mesh for protection.

 Another job which the whole family participated in:  planting out potatoes.  The daughter and I put down two short rows of seed potatoes I'd saved over winter (I grew them last year but these few were too green to eat).  A few days later I bought 1 kg of Charlotte seed potatoes to fill the rest of the bed, and the son and husband got these ones down (the ones I'd saved were also Charlottes).  Like last year, I'm growing them no-dig:  we raked aside the existing straw mulch to expose bare soil, placed the sprouting potatoes directly on it, and then covered them thickly with well-composted horse bedding (straw/manure).  I will give them one more layer of the less composted bedding--mostly straw--to prevent weeds sprouting on top.

And in addition to putting things down, I'm also taking things up:  regular picking of leeks and rhubarb (at the weekend I made a compote with some frozen strawberries we'd picked at a farm last summer) and I've started on the purple sprouting broccoli.  I was also very excited to see the new asparagus poking up, though I won't pick any this spring.  At home I'm also picking a little more chard, and some new season mizuna and lambs lettuce.