Blog Archives

SPARE PLANTS SWAP

29/4/2014

SPARE PLANTS: BRING AND BUY

Bring your spare plants up to the Trading Store this Saturday May 3rd, to find them good homes and raise some money for the Summer Show. If you haven't got spare plants, come to the Trading Store and buy some! Who knows what you'll find, it'll all depend what turns up on the day. Some may be rarer ones you've never tried!

If you are bringing plants, please bring them before 11am if possible (the earlier the better in fact). All plants should be in clean compost and should be labelled - just the way you'd like to buy them. If you'd like any unsold plants back please call back just before the Trading Store closes.
You don't need to be a member of the bulk buying scheme to take part.

All the money raised will go towards Summer Show expenses. The Trading Store is, as I'm sure you all know, at Westrees allotments on Quantock Drive.

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Meet other gardeners and be useful too - does that appeal to you?

24/4/2014

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Geoff is still looking for people to help out at the Trading Store . . .

. . . many thanks to those who've already come forward. Would you like to give it a try? The atmosphere is jolly, the setting is pleasant, and if the Trading Store building is far from glamorous - well, the customers are really nice.

Check the Trading Store page for opening times to see if you're free on the right days. If you think you could be a Trading Store person email [email protected] or reply to this post by clicking on 'Add comment' at the bottom, and we'll put you in touch with Geoff.

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SECURITY ALERT

19/4/2014

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There has been a spate of break-ins to allotment sheds lately. Police are keeping up with developments but these things often go in bursts. Be extra vigilant, especially at dawn and dusk. If you have expensive items in your shed which could be stored at home, you may wish to move them for the time being. If you live adjacent to your site and you hear or see anything suspicious, call the police immediately. Make sure your back gate is secure as thieves have gone in from William Road allotments to gain access to a plotholder's private garden.

The police do not belittle this type of crime at all - they have a zero tolerance policy and every incident of shed break-ins is properly dealt with. Notify all break-ins to the police immediately, before contacting your rep. The number for the incident room is 01622 690690. If a crime actually is in progress dial 999 - the police would just love to catch the thieves in the act.

The William Road site rep is working with police to set up some crime prevention advice. If you are concerned about this and would like help from the Kent Police crime prevention team, you should first speak to your rep. If you are not able to get them to set up a visit, then contact us and we'll take it from there.

More news about crime prevention advice will be posted as soon as available.

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New slug product at the Trading Store

19/4/2014

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"Slug Gone" from Vitax

This new product is made of pelleted sheep's wool and traces of sheep manure. It prevents slugs from reaching your treasured plants, and at the same time slowly releases nutrients into the soil.

After application it swells to produce a mat that slugs just can't cross. It's particularly good for hostas!
FULLY ORGANIC AND SOIL ASSOCIATION APPROVED!

The Trading Store has stocked this after determined popular demand from gardeners who've already tried it and found it highly effective. Click here for more details

RRP from Vitax is £5.99. Trading store price is £4.30. You may find it cheaper online but when you add on the cost of postage this is a jolly good deal.

STILL NOT GOT ALL YOUR SPUDS IN? There are a few bags of seed potatoes - nice varieties - left at the Trading Store - but hurry!

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I've never grown that . . .

17/4/2014

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Chiltern Seeds little summer brochure has just plopped onto my mat. Hmmm. You can always expect the unexpected from Chiltern Seeds - 'Flower Sprout' is described as a "new vegetable - Like tiny cabbages with frilly purple and green leaves, they grow, sprout-like, up a central stem. Mild and sweet in flavour, with a distinctive, nutty taste." Intriguing, but at least I can see where it comes from. The same with a very handsome-looking broad bean called 'Karmazyn', which has red beans. What really tempts me is the Cucamelon, "bearing masses of fruits that look like mini-watermelons with a flavour of cucumber and lime".

Vegetables that used to be 'unusual', like sweetcorn, are now mainstream. Chiltern Seeds still manages to come up with something genuinely special!

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Fun and games at Godinton

15/4/2014

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All this week there are fun activities for kids from 1 till 4 at Godinton Park. The tea room is open all week from 1-4 too - and there are new homemade cakes on the menu too. Don't miss out!
Click on the pic to go to website

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The BIG ALLOTMENT CHALLENGE

15/4/2014

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"Great British Allotment-Off" - brilliant idea or barking mad? Watch it and have your say.

Will it work? Is it just very, very silly? Will it bear any relationship AT ALL to real life allotmenting? Dare we watch?

Give us your views on the Big Allotment Challenge after tonight's first episode. All comments will be posted anonymously so you can be as flattering or as scathing as you like.

"watched it on Iplayer this morning , Look a bit staged to me but then I'm an old cynic"

"I thought it was dreadful. The bit where they judged the sweet peas and the radishes was interesting. But it was nothing like real allotments. They were shown the plots all ready with imported topsoil. "

"How did they organise this? Those people were from all over the country. Did they up sticks and move for 3 months? Or did the BBC bus them up at weekends and leve someone else to look after the watering during the week? Toatlly unrepresentative of real gardening"

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Burning bonfires

14/4/2014

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The Council has asked us to draw your attention to the important guidelines on bonfires.

Bonfires are sometimes necessary on the allotment to get rid of diseased plant material, or where it is impractical to take prunings to the dump for industrial composting.

The dump will take all woody and green refuse. It is open everyday, including weekends. There is no charge for taking things to the dump.
Click here to go to the website for the dump.

You should always be aware of the people living in houses nearby and be a good neighbour. Don't have a bonfire during the daytime when people may be in their gardens or drying washing.

Leaving bonfires unattended clearly isn't safe.

You don't need to burn weeds: even tough weeds like dandelions and bindweed will die if composted properly. Anything which can be composted, should be. Weedy topsoil must never ever be taken off your plot. It isn't just against the rules to take it to the dump, it's plain daft. You NEED that topsoil and getting rid of it will ruin your plot. It can be piled onto a bonfire at the end to burn out any remaining roots.

You should not under any circumstances burn plastic or polythene: it releases horribly toxic fumes. All such refuse should be taken to the dump: it mustn't be left by allotment entrances. The council does not clear rubbish from allotments.

Here is the council's leaflet for you to read.
Use the controls at the side and bottom of the box to go up and down or make the print bigger.

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Noticeboards sorted out - hooray!

14/4/2014

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Click on the logo
to go to the
Medash Signs
website

Medash Signs have reported back to us that all the noticeboards which were wrongly assembled have now been taken apart and sorted out, then replaced on their sites. This has been done as a level of after-sales service rarely encountered today.

At every point John Hobbs and the team at Medash have been helpful far beyond the call of duty, and we should all be well aware that they have, in very short order and without any cost to the ratepayer, fixed a problem which has been driving reps up the wall, and which, despite all efforts, it had proved impossible to get the council to address.

To be fair to them, however, the council, under new the head of department Julie Rogers, have also gone ahead and supplied the missing noticeboards from Gashouse Fields and Musgrove New sites. Please make sure you look out for useful information and important notices on these boards. Thank you to Culture and Environment for fixing this anomaly and providing the boards which were omitted during the original refit 3 years ago.

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A reminder about rubbish

13/4/2014

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Just a reminder to all plotholders that it is absolutely and entirely the responsibility of allotmenteers to remove their own rubbish. Though, in the past, the council sometimes generously provided a skip, this is – not surprisingly in the current financial climate – now completely out of the question.

Dumping your rubbish by the gate of your site is nothing more or less than flytipping. Other plotholders will be, justifiably, angry and disgusted. So please take everything either to the dump or, where suitable, home for the black bin.

I’m sure none of our plotholders are the sort of people who’d drive an unwanted sofa out to dump it among the bluebells in some pretty stretch of woodland, so help keep our allotments equally appealing by removing all unsightly rubbish in a sensible way.

A disgusting pile of rubbish at Musgrove Farm allotments. After the site rep Sue had bravely bagged up all the rubbish in strong bags, kind and helpful plotholders took it to the dump. No repeat performance though, please!

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<<Previous

SPARE PLANTS SWAP

Meet other gardeners and be useful too - does that appeal to you?

Geoff is still looking for people to help out at the Trading Store . . .

SECURITY ALERT

New slug product at the Trading Store

"Slug Gone" from Vitax

I've never grown that . . .

Fun and games at Godinton

The BIG ALLOTMENT CHALLENGE

"Great British Allotment-Off" - brilliant idea or barking mad? Watch it and have your say.

Burning bonfires

The Council has asked us to draw your attention to the important guidelines on bonfires.

Noticeboards sorted out - hooray!

A reminder about rubbish

This website is happy to publicise all garden-related events.
All the news, views and information posted on this website are produced and written by the website compiler, unless it says otherwise.

Categories

Archives

Geoff is still looking for people to help out at the Trading Store . . .

"Great British Allotment-Off" - brilliant idea or barking mad? Watch it and have your say.

The Council has asked us to draw your attention to the important guidelines on bonfires.

This website is happy to publicise all garden-related events.All the news, views and information posted on this website are produced and written by the website compiler, unless it says otherwise.

Categories

Archives

This website is happy to publicise all garden-related events.
All the news, views and information posted on this website are produced and written by the website compiler, unless it says otherwise.