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5 A barbecue
The other thing every allotment worker has is a compost heap. These come in various guises. Some are simply piles of vegetation left exposed to the elements; others are elaborately constructed from old wooden pallets; some are even the more modern type – a green plastic drum with a removable lid.
We have the latter variety – MJ had accepted the council’s offer of a subsidised compost bin and had given it to me for Christmas (ooh, lucky me!). After some discussion, we decide to put the compost bin at the outer edge of our plot. MJ feels that it might pong a bit during the summer, so we shouldn’t put it too near to where we will be working.
It’s worth mentioning that, as well as a shed and a compost bin, there is something else that marks a gardener out from the crowd – his or her wardrobe. It includes: stout sensible boots; lightweight practical trousers with lots of pockets; thermal shirts (preferably with a checked pattern); waterproofs for wet weather; and thick socks. This is the type of clobber you will find yourself wearing should you take up the challenge to ‘grow your own’. Incidentally, this is also the sort of clothing over which I seriously considered divorcing my parents when I was young, so I have tried to avoid it at all costs!
The following Saturday, nursing a monster hangover, I go to watch Brentford crush Barnsley (3–1). Over a Friday night beer, Chris, his wife Stella and I discussed all things horticultural, and I awake to find not only that I have a serious headache but also that I have in my pocket a list of tips on: growing tomatoes, killing slugs, types of weedkiller and building sheds. It seems that I can’t escape the allotment, even while drunk!
As the haze clears, I remember talking enthusiastically about the task ahead. Chris listened intently as I told him that we have begun the ground assault. He agreed that a shed is absolutely vital and pointed out that we will also need to start thinking about garden tools.
Stella asked if we had planted anything and I had to admit that, so far, I have only thought about clearing our space because that, in itself, is such an immense task. She suggested taking it bit by bit. Her view is that we might be spurred on once we have something in the ground. This is probably very true but the thought of actually planting anything has seemed further off every time I have considered it.
It had taken Dilly, Doug, MJ and me the best part of a day to clear a relatively small patch for the shed, so I am already beginning to redraw the ground rules of our project. I consider pushing back the whole self-sufficiency thing to next year, by which time I hope all the weeds will have been removed. Stella’s suggestion, on the other hand, will allow us to clear and plant a certain area and then move on to the next section.
After the match, despite still feeling a bit rusty, I join MJ, Ellie and Richie for a spot of digging with some new shovels. We all dig for a solid three hours until at last the base for the shed is fully dug and we can lay down the reclaimed paving stones that will act as the foundations for our yet-to-be-purchased Homebase shed. This small measure of progress is encouraging and we soon begin to tackle another small corner of the plot just as Stella had suggested.
It fast becomes apparent that weed clearing is, quite literally, the tip of the problem. The patch of land that is now free of brambles and nettles has all sorts buried in it – we have uncovered glass, metal rods, bricks, medicine bottles (why?), gardening gloves (six pairs), shoes, rusty beer cans (lots of these!), and other assorted rubbish, and it feels as though we have inherited a landfill site rather than an allotment.
I am sure there are some who would feel that all this preliminary work makes the eventual harvest more rewarding. MJ and I, however, reckon eating vegetables minus the graft is just as rewarding, and we can’t help wishing we had inherited a recently vacated and lovingly cared for plot that had only just been dug over and maybe had a mature pear tree in one corner.
Back at home the allotment is also having an effect on our daily lives. As the project develops I am finding myself thinking more about our life in general. Every news bulletin seems to include some further evidence of the environmental destruction of the planet. I have long been aware of this but now, as I begin to live in tandem with the earth (well, I have dug a couple of holes), I realise that there is possibly a bigger effect to be had from the allotment than simply putting food on the table.
Photograph by Mary-Jane Curtis
Photograph by Mary-Jane Curtis
MJ agrees with me that we, as a family, could make a bigger contribution to the planet-saving drive than we currently do. We have long been recycling paper, glass and plastic, but, to be honest, we could increase our efforts. I resolve to change all our light bulbs to energy-saving ones as soon as I can and, in the meantime, I sit the kids down and deliver a stirring lecture on the need to switch off lights when they leave a room (to be honest, this is a bit rich coming from me as I am possibly the worst offender in the house). I also advise the children to consider the amount of water they use. I sound like Al Gore as I stand in front of these two slightly bewildered children describing scenes of a sun-baked African village where children (‘much younger than you’) are forced to walk miles to a waterhole or pump before carrying a heavy container of water all the way back to their home. Once again, the irony of my speech is obvious – I have never once turned a tap off while brushing my teeth or put the plug in when washing a saucepan. However, I am not the first great leader to fail to practise what they preach and I do at least intend to change forthwith. From now on, baths are banned unless it’s your birthday and teeth must be brushed with no more than a cup of water. Ellie is horrified to learn that the toilet will only be flushed after number twos and that showers have a three-minute maximum time allowance.
By this point, my children are quite used to my sudden bursts of enthusiasm over some life-changing project or another and it is obvious that they see these new house rules as nothing more than Dad’s latest rant. However, they look quite shocked that their mum is in full agreement, rather than raising her eyebrows as she normally does when Dad goes off on one.
I really think that, if we are to be self-sufficient from our allotment, then we should embrace the whole lifestyle package. One clearly cannot expect credit for growing a carrot if one’s bin is stuffed full of plastic. With my convictions sharpened to peak condition, I turn up for a meeting at HarperCollins. I had known Jenny was behind the supermarket ban, but, when we discuss my green credentials, it soon becomes apparent that a spot of token recycling will not be tolerated. I will not be allowed to write a book about green living unless I do in fact ‘live green’. It occurs to me that I may have rather over-egged our green credentials and that actually we may not stand up to scrutiny, but there’s nothing like a challenge, and my family are more than up for it.
Back at the plot, work continues. The shed base is ready, the compost bin has had its first delivery (a salad Ellie and Richie refused to eat!) and now the task of carving out and digging our first bed can begin.
This involves hardcore digging. Each spade load is a mixture of earth, stones and bric-a-brac. After a whole Saturday toiling on the land we can dig no more. It’s back home for a quick supper then straight to bed for all of us – Saturday night and I’m in bed at half past nine. Vegetable growing sure is one crazy lifestyle!
A day’s digging can make you feel fairly healthy – you are outdoors and it’s good honest physical work – similar to running a marathon (I expect). It’s the next day, however, that puts those healthy thoughts in perspective. Needless to say, I wake the following morning to find my hamstrings are so tight that it feels as though they have been tuned overnight by the ghost of Jimi Hendrix – I can’t scratch my bum let alone touch my toes.
I eventually drag myself from the bed, go downstairs and almost immediately have a row with MJ over the allotment. I say we should have a day off; she disagrees and says she seriously doubts my commitment. Having said this, she grabs the kids and storms off to the allotment. I mooch about at home feeling a bit guilty for an hour or so and, in the end, think the best thing to do is to go down to the allotment, eat a slab of humble pie and show a bit willing.
I eventually manage to lift my leg high enough to get it over the crossbar of my bicycle and, with a genuine feeling of goodwill, I very slowly make my way up Boston Road to the allotment. Dilly and Doug are there starting on a bed their side of the divide; MJ is digging away and all the kids are charging about, filthy, and having a great time.
Having told MJ that I am sorry for my anti-allotment tendencies and reaffirmed my commitment, I grab the shovel and, with a look of resolve in my eye, I throw myself into the task in hand. On the third dig I fall to my knees in complete agony – I literally crumple up; my back clicks and gives way and I am so sore I can hardly move. I have been there for ten minutes and am now reduced to a writhing wreck. I feel a complete fool as MJ and Doug carry me to the car to take me home.
But what makes the experience so much more humiliating is that, after I have been carted home, MJ returns to the allotment where she meets Keith, the committee Chairman. He obviously takes pity on this poor husbandless woman digging her vegetable patch and offers to bring over his rotivator; he proceeds to clear half the plot in ten minutes.
It’s bad enough to be humiliated in such a way, but we have also used a rotivator to clear cooch grass, which is exactly what we were told to avoid doing. I had told MJ Chris’s warning about spreading the cooch grass, and she had quite obviously ignored my advice.
To make matters worse, Keith tells MJ that, since it’s March, our first bed should really be put aside for potatoes as they are due to be planted soon. On the back of this, MJ has bought three bags of seed potatoes on her way home … at bloody Tesco. Now the very shop we are working so hard to avoid, has sold us the first thing we are going to plant.
I ask MJ what variety of potato she has bought, determined to pour scorn on whatever strain she has got (huh, Desirée are so common, we’ll simply have to take them back), but she finds that the labels aren’t attached so we don’t even know what our potatoes are. I am away from the project (due to a serious industrial injury) for two hours and, all of a sudden, the whole thing has gone tits up.
There’s no doubt that allotments are dangerous places – I see the osteopath three times in one week. On my first visit, Mal next door literally has to carry me to his car and slide me in horizontally across the back seats, before driving me up to the Old Isleworth surgery. It is obvious to me that Stuart the osteopath had rarely seen a man as badly injured and he has to draw on all his experience to gain me just a little comfort. He uses gels, manipulation and acupuncture to relieve the pain. I am not able to walk, sit, lie or stand with any comfort, though sympathy at home is, quite frankly, in short supply.
A few days later I go to our local garden centre with MJ. She has spoken to her mum about our imminent potato patch and has been told that, before we plant them, we should get some manure dug in. My back is still so sore I can hardly get in the car, but I manage to hobble about pointing at the things I think we should buy before returning to the car and collapsing once more. People give me very strange looks as I sit in the car and watch my poor wife load three twenty-kilogram bags of manure into the boot!
After lunch we return to the allotment, where MJ digs in her manure (not her manure obviously – we are not that green yet) and plants our unknown variety of potatoes that she has so carelessly purchased from the supermarket. I am still way off ‘planting fitness’ and, to be honest, I feel that, since she has taken the decision to buy the things regardless of the fact that we have not done a stitch of research on the topic, she can darn well plant them. I (slowly) terminate weeds with a (very light) can of (hopefully green) weedkiller that we bought.
We arrive home to a phone message from Doug saying that he is picking up the shed and we can put it up the next day. This will make going to the allotment a whole lot less hassle as we can leave stuff there.
The next morning my back is still sore but I am determined to get the shed up. I meet Doug at the allotment at 11am and we get cracking; cracking probably isn’t the right word as we make painfully slow progress. We have purchased the cheapest shed in the shop (1.8 x 1.2 metres/6 x 4 feet); it is tiny but it still takes us the best part of four hours to assemble. This is not only because the assembly instructions have been written, I reckon, by a dyslexic foreign teenager on work experience at B&Q, nor completely due to me being bent double with a serious back injury, but also because of the never-ending stream of goodwilled advice from our allotment neighbours. The gist of this advice is as follows:
1 Face the shed into the prevailing wind (north?) or else it will blow away in a high wind
2 Have the door on the south side so that we can sit outside when the sun shines
3 Have the window facing south southeast (or something) so the rain doesn’t get in
As neither Doug nor I have a compass on us, we decide to just get the thing erected and take our chances with nature. Having put it up we realise that good old B&Q has given us the wrong size of roof boards and we are about six inches too short. Rather than go all the way back to the shop, we decide to bodge it together with a couple of redundant floorboards that we find lying about; I feel this represents the green option both in recycling the floorboards and also in terms of saving fuel emissions by not driving back to the shop (actually, we simply couldn’t be arsed to go all the way back – sometimes ‘green’ is the easy option).
During the final stages of construction the kids join us and Sheila pops over to chat to them. On seeing us finishing the shed, she delivers the most useful advice of the day – always remember to keep an emergency bottle of wine hidden in the shed in case there is a thunderstorm. This gem apparently comes from her experience one time when she was stuck in her shed for almost two hours without a drop to drink!
Despite the shed being in place, the allotment continues to feel like it will never be conquered and, as a novice, it’s really hard to see it taking shape. It is now April; the only things we have planted are a few potatoes, and the part of the plot that isn’t knee-high in weeds is still so strewn with rubble that it will take days to clear.
On top of all this, it turns out that on the Friday when I got very drunk with Chris, he apparently offered me (and I accepted) 50 cubic metres of topsoil. This is great – it is good quality soil and will help our digging efforts – but 50 cubic metres weighs around 6 tonnes and I have one wheelbarrow and a bad back. If it comes soon I shall have to tell MJ to shift it, which could see me on the receiving end of a spot of domestic violence.
Allotments aren’t all about marital strife and industrial injury though. We now have crops in the ground, something to look forward to. Ok, so they weren’t quite planted to plan but at least they’re in the ground.
The fun in this vegetable growing game is in the anticipation. Having sown our potatoes, it is hard not to start imagining what I will cook with them. The potatoes are of an unknown variety – they could be new potatoes, waxy or floury – so, for the time being, I am content just to imagine eating as many chunky chips as I want.
Photograph by Mary-Jane Curtis
Chapter 4 | Read What You Sow
Back pain doesn’t really have an upside but, in my case, having been banned from digging for seven days by my osteopath, I at least have the opportunity to do some reading and research into this allotment business.
Over the years I have accumulated a mass of cookery books, which has cost me a fortune. Where gardening is concerned, I am reluctant to do the same, so we decide to rely on four or five books for advice. I now see the chance to get stuck into each of them. As with any subject, each writer has his or her particular take on the gardening question. I don’t really know which books are the best to buy, so the following short list is simply my choice rather than the ultimate selection:
1. Geoff Hamilton – Gardeners’World Practical Gardening Course
I don’t know where I got this book but it’s been on the shelf for ages. Geoff was a man who liked to lean on a hoe and gaze wisely at the camera – he reminds me a bit of my grandpa with his checked shirts and sensible shoes. He writes quite well and doesn’t presume the reader is already an expert; he includes lots of pictures, which is helpful, though a little intimidating as his vegetable gardens are totally perfect.
2. Dr DG Hessayon – The Vegetable and Herb Expert
It would be tempting to dismiss anyone who called themselves a ‘vegetable expert’ as a horticultural megalomaniac, but he is a doctor and that must mean he’s well qualified. The book is basically a page per vegetable, and outlines growing methods, pest control, cooking advice (steady on doctor – my territory), and varieties of plants.
3. Alan Titchmarsh – Gardeners’ World Complete Book of Gardening
Everyone knows Alan Titchmarsh. I met him once when I was working at The Greenhouse (the restaurant, that is), and he was a charming man. His books are very informative and you feel you can trust him (people say this about Delia Smith with regard to cooking, and they do share the same haircut). His outlook is a more modern one than Geoff’s so it will be a good balance.
4. Edward C Smith – The Vegetable Gardener’s Bible
This book claims to contain all you need to know about successful vegetable growing; however, I seem to have fallen for the word ‘bible’ in the title. Cookery writers have employed the same trick – The Bible of French Cookery or French Culinary Bible would be obvious titles – but generally they are written by people who spend two weeks a year in the Dordogne and claim to know all there is to know about French cookery despite the fact that they wouldn’t know Marc Veyrat if he married their daughter. (Actually, thinking about it, Alan Titchmarsh has done Songs of Praise so, from the Divine’s point of view, he would get the nod on using ‘bible’ in the title.) Anyhow, to get back to Mr Smith’s book, every subject from soil testing to pruning is covered with helpful step-by-step pictures.
Pictures are a really important element because you really do want some idea of the final result before you start to dig (or whisk).
All of these books contain fabulous pictures of finished vegetable beds burgeoning with peas, beans, tomatoes and just about any other vegetable you can think of; this can, though, leave one a little frustrated if, like us, your vegetable plot currently consists of a shed, a compost bin, a potato patch and a vast uncultivated area. All the books do, however, give practical advice on starting out, and it is obvious to me that we should give some thought to how the finished plot will look.
There are more ways than one to plant a cabbage, apparently, so it is important to think ahead. At this stage two questions need to be answered:
1 Are we the ‘plant in row’ traditionalist types, or are we going to have raised beds?
2 How are we going to deal with crop rotation?
I turn first to the issue of raised bed versus traditional row sowing. My grandpa’s vegetable patch was a succession of perfect rows, each one a different vegetable – this is the ‘row’ method and it allows the gardener to walk between the plants to weed and water. The modernists are not satisfied with this tried and tested method, however, so they have come up with a new method called ‘raised bed’ growing. Here, one builds the bed up above ground level and then sows in blocks so that, when mature, each plant is touching its neighbour (sounds like a dodgy council estate!), thus producing very high yields. This is apparently done in narrow beds so all watering and weeding is done from the edge of the beds. Geoff Hamilton is a ‘plant in rows’ man and he does look like the type you can trust, but Titchmarsh reckons one shouldn’t overlook the block planting method and he’s done OK for himself, so the jury is still out.
Next up it’s crop rotation. All the books agree that crop rotation is a must. This is for two reasons: if a bug knows that every May his or her favourite food will be in abundance then he or she just sits and waits for the harvest to begin, so crop rotation thwarts pests and disease; secondly, certain plants sap the soil of certain nutrients so, if one sows a different type of crop in a plot each year, the nutrients remain at a consistent level.
This is all well and good but here’s the snag – the authors can’t agree on how many beds one should be rotating. The vegetable expert Dr DG Hessayon suggests three beds – roots, brassicas and ‘others’. Geoff Hamilton enjoys a little more rotating with four beds, though one of these he suggests is for permanent crops (as yet, I am not sure what permanent crops are). Compared to these, Alan Titchmarsh takes a ‘radical’ view suggesting (correctly, in my opinion) that both DG Hessayon’s and Geoff Hamilton’s systems require equal space for each crop type, which can result in yielding slightly more root vegetables than is fashionable to eat. He, however, has a picture of three beds with an enormous list down the side of the page showing what he is growing, including nasturtium, Florence fennel, rocket and coriander (Geoff will be turning in his grave at this list: ‘Where are your turnips and swede, Alan lad?’).
My gut feeling on all the above is to sit down with MJ and decide what we want to eat, then group the list into types of vegetables and take a view on how many beds we can logistically chop our allotment into. We both agree to limit the rotational beds to three: legumes, brassicas and root vegetables will all get a similar sized bed and be moved to the neighbouring bed the following year. On the row versus raised bed issue, I decide to go with tradition – and the seemingly easier option – and sow at ground level in rows.
