A Bucket of Croak

29 November - a cold, breezy morning with just a threat of water descending later, so it's off down to t'allotment to grub up some more bramble roots.  This time I decided to have a go at the whacking great things down by the apple tree, loading up the wheelbarrow with spade, fork, trowel, mattock, bucket and camera I plodded the 20 yards down to the end.  First job was to shift the layer of polythene that had been left over as a weed-killer.  Yanking it out was easy and I flipped it over to plonk down further up.  I don't know what the snails thought of being so summarily moved and expsosed to the light.  Since none of them disappeared in a smoking puff of flame, I can, hopefully, say that they are not vampire snails, hibernating away the day to emerge hungry and fanged for a night of blood-sucking joy.

Or maybe they are.

Feral Snails

Then it's out with the mattock and attack the blackberry root.  A hefty swung or two and I found a piece of black plastic, embedded in the ground.  Pulling away the overgrown grass revealed a new treasure, a mini-pond.  It's one of those things that you fill with pebbles, put in a little fountain and have as a water feature.  Here it had a few lumps of mossy concrete around the edge, an upturned flowerpot and a pile of sludge in the bottom.  About the same size and shape as a large dustbin lid, it was easy to lift out and I started to clean out the stones, bricks and ooze.  My shriek was a minor affair as I had rubber gloves on.  One of the lumps of goo wriggled.

It turned out that there were half a dozen frogs lurking in the murk.  Some were tiny, one was a huge belly flopper scarecely able to move.  Collecting them in a bucket was fairly easy, keeping them in it not without its difficulties.  The smaller, fitter ones climbed up the side and perched on the rim, looking like a BASE-jumper, ready for the off, but without a parachute.  They would take a froggy gulp of air, inflate themselves like a tennis ball and bounce off into the wide world.  Fatso Fandango gave them a jaundiced eye and remained where he was.



Not being so heartless as to leave my tenants without a home, I decided to re-instate the minipond and laying to with the mattock turned up quite a few tasty titbits for my next visitor.  He buzzed in, sounding just like a hummingbird for a moment and perched on a clod of earth before picking a nice, tasty grub.  Cheeky Charlie flashed his red waistcoat at me and gave me a look as if so say, 'Well?  Stop slacking and get on with digging up my breakfast!'  He was as pleased as punch to pose for me.
He was not bothered by the flying mattock head, he had absolute confidence that I would miss him as he darted around, picking up his elevenses and buzzing off to enjoy them in peace.

Resting for a moment (again) I saw another wriggle in the clods of soil around the pond's depression.  Only about 5cm long, it moved with the slow deliberation of a chilled cold-blood. 









At first I thought it was a newt and grabbed it with the intention of dropping it in the frog bucket but its head was more pointy.  I have never seen a lizard in a garden before, occasionally at Wicken Fen and once on the white cliffs of Dover.  He was not a happy bunny to be disturbed.

Finally, the minipond was back in position, stones and an escape ramp in place and topped up with water.  The frogs were going to have a redecorated abode, complete with daffs, come the spring.  They seemed happy to be gently tipped back in and sank quickly below the surface.



 Then their noses popped up and they took in their surroundings.

One by one, they crawled out and made off for the highlife in the undergrowth.

Fatso Fandango was the last.












He made a ponderous escape, obviously wondering why he bothered in the first place and with plenty of stops to regain his breath.

Fancy That...

A lovely autumnal day, sunny and tempting, so down to plot 91 to have a peaceful faff about.  I got there just about 11am, and in the distance came the sad notes of the Last Post.  Somewhere a Remembrance Sunday parade was ending a minute's silence for all those who have served and died.

More blackberry runners hit the wheelbarrow and will be carted off to that great rubbish dump down the road - I can't be doing with thorny wood.  Then a cup of coffee in the shed and I noticed a pair of straight lines of plants.  Whoa - already they've sprouted?

Early Garlic Early

Bulb to cloves

Green shoots

Leaves seeking sun

Garlic

Sun seeking leaves

Shoots green

Cloves to bulbs

Then I noticed some more lines of sprouts - the broad beans are coming through.  Luckily there was a bit of netting left around, so I've covered them up.  Hopefully it will keep rabbits, pigeons and muntjack off. 




There's a tall plant with yellow flowers. still blooming away.  I have no idea what it is, but I like it.  Mid-November and no frost.  I think this time last year we were just about to be snowed on - also unprecedented around here.  It should be cold, damp, misty.  Just like it was at the beginning of the week, but there should have been some reasonable frost by now.  The weather is definitely on the change global warming?  Maybe.  But then, the Romans grew grapes in Yorkshire, the Medieval winters were bitterly with lots of snow and ice, weather and climate always has been variable.  The trick is to adapt, and have a good moan about it.  If it isn't the rockets, it's the CFCs or the carbon footprint.  Or Yetis.  Personally, I blame Year 8.  They're always up for mischief.

Me And My Help-Mate

A Sunday morning after the first lot of decent rain in East Anglia for months, time to do a bit more weeding of the plot.  Luckily the stuff comes up fairly easily and I'm piling it up and covering it with plastic to dry out properly, then I can have a conflagration.  Then a rest.

Cheers!

Alas, only coffee, but really welcome.











I found a frame, hidden under a generaous growth of stuff and, lurking in it a single, wispy, yellow feathery branch.  I have found the asparagus bed.  I suspected there might be one, the label from the plant packet was kicking around on the shed floor.  So I decided to clear it.  Which is when I met one of the many denizens of my patch.

Albert Flipflodder

He had rather a fine opinion of himself and posed while I took no end of unfocussed, and a few in focus, snaps of him.  He did not seem to be unduly worried about having his home destroyed, he just plopped around the frame, leapt over the edge and found himself another damp castle.  I wish him well, there are certanly plenty of fat, orange slugs lurking under the plastic.  He should have a fine feast on them.  Go Albert!

Plonked in a taggy lavender bush that I got from the grotty left-overs section in a garden centre.  It may not come to much - it's got two chances...  Hopefully I'll be able to take cuttings from it next year, the sweet waft of lavender is one of my favourites and I want to see if the scent keeps some of the pests at bay.  At the very least it should feed some bees.

Garlic and Broad Beans

A glorious morning down on t'allotment!  The sun was shining, the birds were singing, the transport planes taking off and other people were slogging away at work.  Me?  Oh, I was slogging away digging up another patch of dirt. 

It's loverly dirt, all crumbly and aerated with worms.  Nice stuff!  I found a few taters and a bit of bindweed.  It's going to be a matter of keeping it under control.  After a cup of coffee (or two) and a slice of cake (or two), in went garlic and aquadulce broad beans.

Then a bit of a hack around with a mattock to grub up some bramble roots.  After that I decided to pull up some bolted carrots and parsnips.  I am now the proud owner of buckets of parsnip and carrot seeds.  I wonder if they turn out to be viable?  I bet the ones that escaped will sprout up everywhere and the ones in the shed will go on strike.

My first crop - a fine growth of black plastic.

What is Plot 91?

It's my allotment, just taken on in October 2011.  It's a wee bit overgrown, but has an abundance of slugs and frogs. 

And a fantastic apple tree down the end.

So far I have shed blood clearing brambles, removed the shards of shattered glass that could have been for a cold frame and drank a lot of coffee in my shed.  I like this gardening malarkey!

There's a lot of black plastic kicking around on it, an easy way to kill off the weeds, provided the gales don't make it into an impromptu kite. 

Having invested in some gooseberry bushes and a rhubarb crown I have marked out my first bed and had a trial dig or two.  The ground changed from light and dusty to concrete in the space of a footstep.  Time to pack up and hope the forecast rain will soften it a bit.

The water butt is a huge galvanised cylinder, a paladin, a rubbish bin from the days when the council flats used them - they're all plastic now.  Problem: the tap has come loose, to I have to mastic it in place.  Easy enough, except that the darn thing had brambles growing over the base and it would not tip over.  More pruning and chopping and I managed to capsize it.  Now all I have to do is to wait for it to dry out, then crawl inside to fix it.  I'll be like Huckleberry Finn, living in a barrel.