A few wildlife jobs on the allotment

Last week was a chilly week with snow again, but earlier in the week before the snow came we tackled a few wildlife jobs on the allotment.

The woodland area at the top of the allotment is an area where we can't grow anything because of the big sycamore tree which dominates. The good thing about this is that it provides a home for a lot of wildlife. I've written before about how we cleared the area to make somewhere for the grandchildren to play. They are teenagers now  and are no longer interested, but I still love this area. 

Our seating area is just below the big tree and when we sit there having our tea breaks there is so much activity from the birds flying in and out. There is a privet hedge behind the tree between our plot and the next one up. Also there is elder which provides us with lovely blossom in the spring and berries in the autumn. I pick the blossom  to use when I am making jam. It goes well in gooseberry or strawberry jam. 

When I first created this wildlife area I planted bulbs and shade loving plants. There are crocuses, snowdrops, Tete a Tete daffodils and bluebells. The bluebells do well and I am happy for them to spread. I've tried to get some foxgloves going too. 

The downside of the sycamore tree is all the leaves which fall all over the plot in the autumn and need clearing up especially from the paths. I don't clear them from under the hedge and around the base of the tree and any other nooks and crannies. Then in the spring the plot is covered with the little sycamore spinning Jenny seeds which fall everywhere then germinate and I am constantly trying to hoe them out.

The tete a tete and crocuses are flowering now and I can see the new growth of the  woodland plants I put in there.  Soon it will look more colourful like the picture below which was taken last year when all the euphorbias were out. I like them but they tend to take over, popping up all over the place as they send out runners underground. 

Last week I did one of the  jobs I do on the allotment every year at this time. That is to have a bit of a tidy up in the woodland area. It might seem the wrong thing to do, to tidy up a wildlife area, but it needs to be kept under control so that the weeds don't start to encroach on the vegetable beds and the rest of the allotment. And I pull up those euphorbias from places where they are not wanted. When it has all been tidied up I put bark chippings down on the pathway which goes around the tree. At the moment there are no chippings available to use so I am waiting for some to be dumped on the allotment site. Then it will be a race with our wheelbarrows as we and  all the other plot holders get their share of them.

Our other wildlife area is the pond. We built this a few years ago out of an old tin bath which was left on the allotment by the previous tenant. It was in good condition with no holes. We have had frog spawn each year which is always exciting. I give it a clean out every year in the spring to get rid of leaves and excess mud. 

This year I did the same, it was in a bit of a bad state with overgrown pond plants which I removed. Then I set to scooping out some of the excess mud and added more water as the water level was quite low. I soon realized that the pond was leaking because of a hole in the side where the metal had rusted. So we decided instead of getting rid of the tin bath we would leave it in place and put a pond liner in it. This was Richard's job last weekend. It wasn't as big a job as as I had thought and he completed it in one afternoon.

He needed to empty the bath completely of the stones and mud and to our delight he found frogs in the mud at the bottom and another one under one of the big stones around the edge. 

There must have been about four frogs and we think a toad. We kept them safe in a bucket while he finished off lining the pond and when the stones were back in place I gently popped them back into the pond. It must have been a bit of a shock to them, to be wakened up from their hibernation. We're hoping we haven't upset them too much and when the weather warms up will soon have  spawn back in the pond.

Spring has arrived at the allotment

We've not been down to the allotment much recently, partly due to bad weather,  but also because of my ankle injury which meant that when the lane was muddy and the allotment paths slippy it was a bit of an unsafe place for me. But at last Spring arrived and fine weather, so off we went to get some much needed work done.

I was greeted by one of my favourite flowers in bloom, the marsh marigold in the pond. As I took a closer look I noticed that there was no sign of the frog spawn which had been there for a few weeks. I wondered if the rain had washed it away as the pond was pretty full up of water. But no, on closer inspection I could see little tadpoles swimming around happily. Peeping out from under the marsh marigold was a frog, I spotted another one down at the bottom of the pond. The frog was very quiet and still and didn't seem to mind me. 

Another welcome sight was the daffodils bordering the path, the bright lime green euphorbia under the sycamore tree and the tulips flowering in the big tub.

The last time we went to the allotment a few weeks ago, we moved the blueberry bushes from the fruit area where they were a bit overcrowded to another bed where they would have more space. They were looking fine after their move. The mulch you can see in the photo is shredded pine needles. We always shred our Christmas tree branches to keep for the blueberries as they like an acid soil. I have heard that this is a good thing to do.

Looking at the rest of the fruit bed we could see that the fruit frame was falling down, so some work will have to be done on it soon before we need to start netting the fruit against the birds. Richard dismantled the frame and repaired the support for the apple tree.

The rhubarb is growing really well and we should be pulling some of the stalks soon.

I'm a bit late planting the potatoes, I would normally have them done by now. So that was an important job to get done. We started work on preparing the potato containers with compost. I planted the first earlies in six of the potato bags. The variety is Maris Bard. I put compost in the bottom of the bags to about a third of the depth and sprinkled in a bit of bone meal. The bags are quite big so I put four potatoes in each bag. Then topped with more compost. When the potatoes start to grow and the shoots show through the compost I will top up with more compost. The next lot of potatoes to plant will be the second early Charlotte a salad potato.

Another important job was to weed the asparagus bed. I also fed it with some blood, fish and bone. I was pleased to see a few little asparagus spears starting to come through.

The fine weather didn't last long, it started to rain, but at least we got a good number of jobs done.

Muddy work in the pond

This is our allotment pond as it looked last summer, but it has been neglected over the last few months. It has been on my job list to 'sort it out' for a while now.  It had got into a mess, full of mud, in fact there was more mud than water, so I decided it was time for a good clean out. This job had been put off many times because of the weather. I didn't fancy putting my hands into a cold muddy pond in freezing cold temperatures. Although the pond is only an old tin bath, so not very big, the job was still unappealing. However on a fine day when it was dry and not too cold, with rubber gloves and wellies I set to work.

First job was to get the pond plants out and these were well and truly stuck in the mud. They were in pond baskets and they had grown so much the roots were poking out of the baskets and had got embedded in the mud. Well I managed that with a bit of help and they were placed on the side of the pond to be dealt with later.

The next job was scooping out the mud.  I used a plastic jug for this and it took ages.  The mud had to be got rid of--there were two or three bucket loads. Also in the pond was an underwater plant.  I can't remember it's name but I realised soon after I had planted it that it was not meant for small ponds.  It had almost taken over with roots all over the place. So all the roots were pulled out. I decided not to put any of it back in the pond, but to look out for something more suitable for small ponds.

Once the pond had been cleaned out it was refilled with rainwater from the water butts and the stones were put back in. I left the pond plants at the side of the pond for a few days to enable any little pond creatures to crawl out.  On another day I took the plants out of their baskets and split them up.

Some of these went back into the pond. They are plants which I am quite fond of. There's a lovely marsh marigold, an iris with variegated leaves, an Acorus grass which has green and yellow foliage, a water forget-me-not and a Geum Rivale. It was looking much better by the time I had finished. The plants will soon grow again and provide shelter for the wildlife.

We've had quite a bit of rain recently and the pond has overflowed into the surrounding area. But as this is a  bog garden, that's OK. The bog garden is another area which now needs a bit of a sort out. Having split up some of the pond plants I would like to replant some of the spare plants in the bog garden, especially the marsh marigold which I love. At the moment though, the plants in this area are only just starting to come through again so I don't want to start digging and planting  as I might disturb something which is yet to emerge from the ground.  Every time we go down to the plot there are more shoots appearing so I'm sure it won't be long before I can start work.

 The good news is that since I cleaned out the pond, in the last week the frogs have visited us and there is a big clump of frog spawn clustered around the marsh marigold.

The wildlife pond

 

I really love our little wildlife pond and bog garden at the allotment. It was new last year and I loved finding plants which would grow in those wet and boggy conditions. It was a whole new area of gardening which I had little knowledge of, so I learnt quite a bit.  As the new plants started to grow, the wildlife came along to live there and by midsummer it was looking great.

Over the winter it has looked a bit sad and dreary. The heavy rain flooded the area and the pond filled up with silt. Earlier this year we had a few sessions of removing as much of the silt as we could. In the bog garden the weeds started to grow and I didn't want to disturb the ground too much by digging them out as I couldn't remember where I had planted some of the plants. So I left them until the new plant growth appeared.

Weeks ago we heard frog activity in the next door allotment pond and wondered if we would get any frogs. And yes, a few days later we spotted frog spawn and a few little frogs in our pond. Later there were lots of tadpoles, but we have only seen two recently.

Here come the frogs

The pond plants are now growing, the marsh marigold flowered for weeks and was a lovely patch of bright yellow which brightened the place up. It's finished flowering now so I cut it back to allow room for the other plants to grow. In the bog garden the plants are coming back to life. Every time we go to the allotment they seem to have grown another few inches.

lovley blue iris

Most of the hostas which I planted at the edge of the pond are showing no signs of coming back though, I think they may have got drowned when the pond overflowed in the winter rains. They may like damp conditions, but perhaps not so damp! However last week I was really excited to see that one of them is now coming back, no sign of the others though.

Last year when I put the plants in I thought I would see how they looked and grew and then assess it again this year. There is a grass which I have found to be a bit invasive so I have been digging it out but instead of getting rid of it completely I put some of it into pots to contain the roots. There are two pots which I have placed on the rocks around the pond. My sister-in-law gave me some little candleabra primula plants last year which she had grown from seed. I planted these out this week. I've always admired the displays when I've seen them growing by the streamside at RHS Harlow Carr and by the lake at Rosemoor, so I was keen to have some in my own damp garden area. They're on a much smaller scale of course, but they are still a delight to see. One of our local garden centres has just started selling pond plants, which pleased me, and of course I couldn't resist buying a plant-- a little geum rivale.

candleabra primula

We find the pond fascinating and spend a lot of time insect and tadpole spotting. There's a lot of movement in the silt at the bottom too, like tiny little wriggling worms.

        

A new addition to the area is a pile of rotting logs, for insects and frogs to hide in. I also made a small animal house with the help of the  little girl from the plot above us who likes to come and chat to me and we often do jobs together. This is a little box with a hole in it, which we filled with leaves and twigs and covered with more twigs. Hedgehogs or toads will be welcome to make their home there.  Whoever claims it first. Finally as we so enjoy looking at the pond we put an old bench by the side, so when we take a break from our gardening we can sit and enjoy watching the pond life.

Allotment pond

When we took over plot 8 a year ago we were delighted to see that it had a pond. Like the rest of the plot it was very overgrown with plants and weeds. The plot also had a serious drainage problem.

Once the drainage was sorted and we could walk around without getting stuck in the mud, we were able to see the pond better.  The pond is filled from a drain running from the top end of the plot and from the plot above us. When it gets full of water it flows out into a drain down the plot and out onto the lane. We think there is a spring somewhere which is why we have all this  water on the plot.

As we started digging over the plot we noticed a few frogs and toads   They were probably a bit disgruntled at being disturbed and losing their hiding places under stones and raised beds. Later on in the Spring we were delighted to see frog spawn in the pond.  We checked it regularly and looked forward to seeing tadpoles grow into frogs. Then we got a spell of dry weather, the water supply to the pond stopped, the pond dried up and the frog spawn disappeared.  This was when we discovered that the pond liner had a hole in it.

We decided that this year we would have a project to sort the pond out, clear the plant area, put a new liner in and replant. As there seemed to be an abundance of yellow lysimachia and yellow irises, I have been investigating other moisture loving plants which would grow in that area.

the pond is somewhere in the middle of this

Well so far this year we have been busy getting the vegetable beds prepared and haven't got around to thinking about how to tackle the pond.  And with all the rain we have had this year the pond has been quite full of water. So of course the frogs are back.  When I checked a week or so ago, there were four frogs and a good amount of spawn.  Since then the spawn seems to have increased.  I think there is both frog and toad spawn. The worry now of course is that if we get  another dry spell, the pond will dry up and we will lose the tadpoles again.

But now is not the right time to clear the pond.  We will wait until the time is right, when the tadpoles have grown up and we are not too busy with growing our vegetables.  I hope we will be able to work on it this year.

frog spawn in the pond

Coming along just fine

 

When we are down at the allotment working on plot 10b we are often asked by our allotment neighbours, "How's the other plot doing?" Well I'm happy to say that our other allotment--plot 8 is coming along really well.  After weeks of rubbish sorting and trips to the recycling centre, we can at last see the ground.  And after lots of back breaking digging, clearing of bricks and rubble the original layout of the plot is appearing.  There are flagged paths surrounding beds, and some fairly decent soil in them too.

We didn't expect to be growing much this year on the plot, but in the four small raised beds which were left by the previous tenant we have planted onions, climbing and dwarf french beans, radish, spring onion, beetroot and sweetcorn.  There are two small strawberry beds planted by the previous tenants which we decided to leave for this year to see how productive they were. We now have two new beds which Richard has weeded,dug over and filled with well rotted manure. One of these has been planted up with courgettes and pumpkins and will soon have some squash in there too.

There is an apple tree which was full of blossom a few weeks earlier and we will be hoping for plenty of fruit later this year. Helen and I dug over the area around the apple tree last week. We decided to make this a fruit growing area. I have a rhubarb and a couple of gooseberry plants to be planted in there.

Richard dug up a couple of conifers last week and that area is now being prepared to make two big beds either side of the drain. The soil there is very dry as it was full of roots, so it needs lots of compost and manure adding before we can grow anything.

The pond area is starting to look colourful now the yellow irises are in flower, but there is a lot of work to be done there yet. We discovered that the pond liner has cracks in it and the pond has become more of a bog than a pond.  There are frogs on the plot, but we are not sure if the tadpoles survived when the pond dried up. Sorting it out is a project for next year I think.

At the top end of the plot is a big tree and we think the best thing to do there  is have a woodland wildlife area.  It's also a lovely place for the grandchildren to play and have a den.

So that's where we are up to on plot 8.  We still need to build compost bins and Richard wants to make a shed out of some of the materials we have lying around on plot 8 and plot 10b.

It's all looking good and we are really pleased with how things are progressing.