Disaster at the allotment

Today we had awful weather, sunny spells which deceive you into thinking you can get outside to do some gardening and then the next minute the sky clouding over and the rain bucketing down.  But we decided to risk it and go to the allotment because we had some jobs which could be done in the shed.  My jobs were quite important--I had seedlings ready to be potted on and as we are away next weekend I didn't want to leave them to get any bigger in their trays. However this was not to be.

We arrived at the allotment to find that disaster had struck on plot 8.  The strong winds of the last couple of days had caused the tubular staging in the growhouse to come apart. Well we knew the growhouse was a bit flimsy and there was a risk with it. All the trays of seeds waiting to germinate and others which had been pricked out had toppled off the shelf and were all over the floor and on top of the seedlings on the shelf below.  It was total chaos.

I didn't know how to start sorting them out and felt very tearful.  All my work of the last few weeks seemed to have gone to waste.  I started gathering up the compost and attempting to recover seedlings. I phoned my daughter Helen for assistance.  She was recovering from her son's birthday party earlier in the day, but came over to help.

Gradually we sorted through the plants and seedlings, some had to be thrown away, others could be replanted.  Most of them were flower seedlings which I had been growing for my new cut flower beds. With the growhouse emptied and swept up, Richard arrived with his drill and bag of screws to do a modification to the staging.  I have been reassured that the staging is now safe, so have put the tidied up trays back in the growhouse.

We were soaking wet when we'd finished, the rain had continued throughout but order has been restored. Let's hope it stays that way. What I really need is a proper greenhouse.