It's really quite simple,...
...the absence of a project plan notwithstanding, the biggest drag on allotmenting is all the glass, which means the dogs can't go there. This means I have to walk the dogs, bring them home, and only then can I go to work on the allotment. This is doubly aggravating because their daily long walk takes us to Alexandra Park, the East gate of which is 2 minutes from the plot.
If the dogs could come to the allotment with me, then I could walk up of a morning or evening with them, do my 2 hours of work, whatever it be, and then walk home again. Dogs exercised, me exercised, another couple of hours further forward at plot.
It's no.5 bed, now much extended with the greenhouse foundation gone, where most of the glass is. Obviously, most of it came from the old greenhouse. And part of that area was used as a midden, so any glass that the Predecessor was unable to ignore, would have been gathered up there.
It hit me last night over a glass of wine, as we were watching telly. Never mind the gorse in the hedgerow battling it out with the grass. Never mind breaking rocks for the shed, or indeed the shed. I've just got to set to with a will, big and medium riddle, and get that whole bed cleaned to about a spit's depth. It's about 60sq yards. It's also well drained, so the soil is pretty dry, making the riddling easier.
I've had a lot of opportunity to observe the behaviour of glass in soil. The credit- to playing-card sized fragments are the worst, being most likely to sit end up in the ground, 2/3 buried, like knives waiting for the dogs' paws. Smaller pieces are more likely to lie flat. I've started to smash up all the larger pieces as they go into the rubble of the shed base.
Anyway, I can't begin to build the shed until the base is ready. There's the rubble I need to smash up, but there's still going to be a hell of a lot of debris from no.5 bed, and if it doesn't go under the shed, I'm stuck with it. The shed base does need to be higher than it is by quite a way, to avoid any waterlogging - it's lower, still, for now, than beds 1 & 2.
So, that's me, apart from any urgent weeding. IF I had a project plan, which of course I don't, I'd estimate that the cleaning of this big bed will take me up to mid June. Let's see.
If the dogs could come to the allotment with me, then I could walk up of a morning or evening with them, do my 2 hours of work, whatever it be, and then walk home again. Dogs exercised, me exercised, another couple of hours further forward at plot.
It's no.5 bed, now much extended with the greenhouse foundation gone, where most of the glass is. Obviously, most of it came from the old greenhouse. And part of that area was used as a midden, so any glass that the Predecessor was unable to ignore, would have been gathered up there.
It hit me last night over a glass of wine, as we were watching telly. Never mind the gorse in the hedgerow battling it out with the grass. Never mind breaking rocks for the shed, or indeed the shed. I've just got to set to with a will, big and medium riddle, and get that whole bed cleaned to about a spit's depth. It's about 60sq yards. It's also well drained, so the soil is pretty dry, making the riddling easier.
I've had a lot of opportunity to observe the behaviour of glass in soil. The credit- to playing-card sized fragments are the worst, being most likely to sit end up in the ground, 2/3 buried, like knives waiting for the dogs' paws. Smaller pieces are more likely to lie flat. I've started to smash up all the larger pieces as they go into the rubble of the shed base.
Anyway, I can't begin to build the shed until the base is ready. There's the rubble I need to smash up, but there's still going to be a hell of a lot of debris from no.5 bed, and if it doesn't go under the shed, I'm stuck with it. The shed base does need to be higher than it is by quite a way, to avoid any waterlogging - it's lower, still, for now, than beds 1 & 2.
So, that's me, apart from any urgent weeding. IF I had a project plan, which of course I don't, I'd estimate that the cleaning of this big bed will take me up to mid June. Let's see.
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