Got the nod for an allotment after a couple of years on the waiting list. So, allotment people, any starter tips and advice for what equipment I need to go out and buy?

Ear plugs.

So you don’t have to hear all the politics and bitching by various members about each other…

Ear plugs.

So you don’t have to hear all the politics and bitching by various members about each other…

Not needed. I’ve built up enough tolerance to that in the workplace…

Spade
Fork
Hand Trowel
Rake
Box of Matches

Until it’s time to plant stuff you’ll just be digging weeds and clearing it up. The matches are for the big bonfire you’ll have with all of the crap you clear from it.

dig it in over the winter, “she” says.

I say, balls to that, it got boring really quickly, hire a cultivator and do it the lazy way.

eating stuff is fun.
growing stuff is diiiiffffiiiccuuuulllt. (which is why ive left it to my “better” half ;-))

6 months of digging coming up then 😉

Your choice, but if you use a rotavator, you risk chopping into small pieces the roots of any perennial weeds. Each piece will then grow…

Slowoldgit is right about the rotorvator. Don’t do it.

If you don’t want organic, nuke it with roundup. One of the guys on my patch did that with extraordinary effect.

We weeded organically.

Divide into eight beds. You want to do two four-crop rotations.

Program is:

Bed 1 once weeded, add compost. Grow spuds next year.
Bed 2 once weeded add lime. Grow leeks / carrots / beets next year.
Bed 3 once weeded add compost. Grow peas and beans next year.
Bed 4 once weeded add lime. Grow brassicas next year
Beds 5 to 8 follow 1 to 4 except grow toms instead of spuds in bed 1.

Each year move on one bed.

What you’re doing is alternating crops that like acid soil with those that like alkaline. The idea is that any pest that really liked that years conditions will be thwarted by the change in conditions the following year. And any that like a particular crop will be thwarted by not seeing that crop for 4 years. Or for spuds and toms, 8 years. (Commercial organic spud farmers wait 8 years before reusing soil to defeat blight).

Stick salad in gaps between other crops, it’s not that fussy.

Enjoy.

Thanks all, it’ll be the organic way. Good info flap_jack – cheers.

rotavating an alottment with a hired rotavator that was

a) unused for a year

and

b) dry as a bone after a dry summer

was probably the hardest day’s work I’ve ever done, even after I worked out that I had to lift the handles to make it ‘dig in’.

I’d say do a little at a time and don’t turn it over until you’re ready to plant – you’ll just spend your whole time fighting weeds on the freshly turned earth.