Soilman's Allotment Blog

Yet another apology

Please wait...

Dear God: Enough already

More deceptive weather, more deceptive growth. Any other time, and I'd welcome sprouting lilies. Now they seem like a bad joke; tonight we're getting sleet and snow.

I realise, of course, that this allotment blog is taking on a Cassandra-like character. All you get is moans and weather warnings. Like Jenna Jameson reading the shipping forecast.

All I can say is: if you're not whingeing, could you please start? If enough of us rant at the Almighty, He might deign to cancel winter.

He's clearly not getting the message from me.

Rained off and pissed off

Intellectually, I know March is a crap month. Always has been, always will be. Yet hope springs eternal - goddammit.

You see, it's not the despair. I can cope with the despair. It's the hope.

Anyway, the weather is so spectacularly appalling that indoor gardening is the only option. I've been potting up my celeriac and okra seedlings. Dull, dull, dull.

An apology

This text is replaced by the Flash movie.

Lilium regale seedlings

I'm fed up with pictures of pots. I want to be out on the allotment. You know, growing vegetables. Not poncing around with a camera like a horse's arse.

*Sighs heavily*

You'll gather from the above that the UK weather's been shit. And I mean, really shit. 'Gale' seems a trite word for such destructive power.

So while I'm stuck here, being a horse's arse (again), I thought I'd show you how the lily seedlings are coming on.

These are the cotyledon leaves, which grow from the seed case. The first true leaves should emerge any moment now.

And who knows? I may even do some bloody gardening one of these days.

Light at the end of the tunnel

All is not lost. I took this photo at the plot just after 7.30am today. Even a week ago, this would have been impossible.

For me, Spring arrives the day I can shower in the morning without the bathroom light. Tried it today and wished I hadn't. Stubbed my toe, fell on my arse twice and found myself trying to work up a lather with the soap dish.

Gone fishing

The weather is crap... again. It's January, so I can't grow vegetables. And the UK is back under water, with more rain on the way.

Looks like that stuff about Britain freezing as the Gulf Stream slows down is all so much horse shit. Predictably, global warming works backwards here. While everyone else is getting a Baywatch sun tan, we'll be watching TV on a dinghy in the living room.

Great.

I have nothing positive to add, so I'll just post a flower picture. This is my standard response to crisis.

No veg, only orchids

The weather's been atrocious this week. It's raining so hard today I didn't even want to get out of bed this morning.

No change there, come to think of it. But you take my point.

All I can do is look out of the window and mope. And admire my lovely cymbidium orchid, which has gone berserk this year. It's a cultivar called King's Lock, and I have three flower spikes. Outrageous.

Normal service resumes any time I can get out of the bloody front door. Which doesn't look like happening any time soon.

As you were.

Darkness at Noon

Well, not quite. But it bloody well feels like it.

I hate it when the clocks go back. I can't go to the allotment after work and I get generally gloomy. It's like being a mole for five months. 

Now that there's less happening at the plot, I shan't be posting so often. Which may come as a relief to anyone reading this. To kick off the winter 'shit time', here's a pic of me in June inspecting the delphiniums at Wisley. Just seeing those outrageous colours cheers me up:

Soilman's Stool for Business

Who'd have thought shit could be so expensive?

This stuff is good, but it's £10 for four bags. They must be making a fortune.

Mental note: Business idea - bag and sell own shit. Strengths: Money for old turds. Weaknesses: Can wife and I produce enough? Will food costs increase? Opportunities: 'Soilman' brand acquires new significance. Threats: Cholera, E Coli

I got some free horse manure from a friend a few weeks ago, but I don't have a van – so I had to hire one. It's nuts, of course: Every stable in Britain is drowning in the stuff and under a legal obligation to dispose of it safely.

But will they deliver to allotments? Will they hell.

OK, enough of that. I've ranted enough this week already. Here's my last courgette of the year, gamely growing on a very mildewed plant:

Not a drop to drink

If you've not read about the granny arrested for NOT watering her lawn, put aside a minute or two to enjoy this.

Utah is one of the driest states in the USA. It's basically a desert. Yet it's a civic misdemeanour to let your lawn go brown.

It's easy to laugh at this kind of nonsense from the 'sanity' of the UK. But we're bonkers, too. These islands rank among the lushest and wettest in the world, yet here it's an offence most summers to stop your lawn going brown. If you really believe hosepipe bans are due to lack of rainfall (rather than mismanagement and profiteering), I can only suggest a visit to a psychiatric consultant as a matter of some urgency.

Environmentalists reckon water resources will be the great casus belli of the future. Well, they're already driving us crackers. Perhaps a proper war over them would bring us to our senses.

Wanted: Animals, two by two

This basket of peas is hardly lavish. Barely enough to feed one person, let alone two.

But I'm delighted, because I picked them during a 10-minute dry patch. Can you believe that? A whole 10 minutes without rain! Is that some kind of record for 2007?

If there's ever been a wankier summer in British history, I'd love to hear about it. I'm beyond rage, laughter or any other emotional reaction. Now I just stare out of the window, dead-eyed and catatonic.

So let it rain. Or snow. Or pour liquid cow shit from the sky.

Like, whatever.

Ranting in the rain

My allotment sweetcorn is barely four feet high, in late July. Stunted, or what?

Guess I should be grateful it's finally flowering. There's barely time for it to produce cobs. Is a week's sunshine really too much to ask for?

Since I'm on the subject of the weather (er, again), I'd just like to mention what a shower of shits we're governed by. If you're stopping by for neep and tatty growing tips, Gordon, you should be ashamed of yourself. Those poor bastards in Lincoln and Hull were flooded a month ago. What were you doing? Rearranging deck-chairs in your Titanic cabinet, that's what.

The Powers That Be have noticed a problem now there are puddles on Horse Guards. You guys in Tewkesbury and Gloucester (and in Lincoln, and in Hull) must be SO relieved that the cavalry's on the way.

My advice: Don't hold your breath. And you have my sincerest sympathy.

OK, rant over. Sorry for the politics. Here's a picture of a dahlia to compensate.

Sunny delight

Apologies for break in service. Gave up on seeing any sunshine in Britain this year and went to Cyprus for some. If you're stuck in the UK and can't get away from it, avert your eyes from the paragraph below.

It was really, really hot and bloody marvellous.

OK, it's safe to look now. Am off to the allotment this afternoon to check the score. Probably rampantly weedy and ghastly, but still. Will post at length tomorrow.

Stop Bloody Raining!!

It's like the Chinese water torture. It's driving me round the bend. You'd not think there was this much water in the whole north Atlantic.

I'm trying to see the funny side, I really am. So far, so few laughs. We're getting a 1970s-style summer to go with our 1970s-style Prime Minister.

It's all about as funny as a 1970s-style comedian.

The good life: Fact or fiction?

How much land do you need to achieve vegetable self-sufficiency?

I've been pondering this lately. From a plot measuring 5m by 25m, the wife and I are 100% self-sufficient in vegetables from late June until Christmas. In May we get asparagus and some salads. And the winter store meets about 50% of our needs in January and February.

That leaves March and April – the traditional 'hungry gap' – when the allotment supplies only a few spring brassicas. That's not bad for 125 sq m... but not good enough.

I could do better with more intense cultivation, but I'd never achieve full self-sufficiency.

So does anyone else manage it? Do you know someone who does? I'd love to hear how much food you get from your plot, and how much you think you'd need for the 'real deal' Good Life.

What's a cow, mum?

Sorry, just have to comment on this. How is it even remotely possible that almost half of the people surveyed in this poll didn't know that oats are grown on farms?

I mean, where do they think oats come from? Factories? Outer space? Romford?

The disconnection between town and country is the root cause of UK agri-industrial blight. When people no longer know the first thing about where their food comes from, producers can do whatever they like to crops and livestock. And retailers can do whatever they like to producers.

Everyone, in short, can profit to the max from consumers' pig-ignorance. And feed them poison.

Will this crap ever end?

Caveat emptor

I've been pretty well-behaved of late. No ranting and raving. So I'm letting myself off the leash today.

I watched that TV show last night about Fairtrade. Specifically, about claims that the Fairtrade programme may not always deliver the benefits it tries to confer on developing world producers. I have no idea if these claims have any foundation. But like you, in all probability, I absorbed them without evincing so much as a twitch of mild surprise.

It's impossible to guarantee that goods you buy haven't involved exploitation of somebody, somewhere. You didn't produce the thing yourself. You can't possibly know. You take it on trust. 

The organic movement has suffered from this. Time and again we read of crooked traders slapping 'organic' tags on vegetables – without any justification – merely to push a 20% price hike to credulous consumers. I don't blame the traders, really – they're just doing what greedy people do. Nor do I blame the organic movement, whose intentions remain as pure and noble as ever.

No, I blame the British consumer. That's you and me. We are so absurdly, criminally lazy when it comes to food. We'll sift and weigh car manufacturers' claims for hours before buying their products. We'll dissect a politician's every syllable, avid for hints of mendacity. Then we'll buy a leek because it's got an 'organic' label.

That's it. No questions, no scrutiny, no scepticism.

Food's the fuel that runs you. It makes you who you are. It couldn't be more important. Yet we worry more about the fuel we put in our cars.

Moral: For Christ's sake, wake up. Question what you're told. In Stalin's cynical dictum: "Trust, but check". And if you really want to be sure what goes into your food... grow it yourself.

Here endeth the lesson.

All is forgiven

I'm just back from Spain and I must apologise for my intemperate comments about the Alhambra. Not because I was wrong about the system that runs it, but because the place is so lovely you can forgive anything. Well, almost anything. French tourists shouldn't be allowed anywhere near the place; to endure their jostling, rudeness and queue-jumping is to gain a brief, but chilling, preview of Hell.

The gardens were nice... but not fabulous. I've struggled to find one photo worth posting. Lots of nice pools and fountains, but curiously unimaginative planting. Also the vegetable gardens were rubbish. My plot looks well tended in comparison.

One thing did make me laugh, though. Call me childish if you like. Don't care. This is a picture of one of the inner sancta of the Alhambra Palace. A place of meditation and beauty, hallowed by centuries of history. Check out the gorgeous columned cloister in the background. Then enjoy the sight of the resident feral cat in the courtyard. Which IS doing what you think it's doing:

Bloody Alhambra

I know I shouldn't rant about this on an allotment blog. But I'm going to.

A plague on the Alhambra Palace... or rather, upon the authorities that run it. The wife and I are due to visit southern Spain soon, motivated chiefly by a long-standing desire to see one of the world's most stunning Islamic structures. Only we're not going to see it: we can't get tickets.

Seriously. The authorities, in their wisdom, have set up a system that requires you to book a 30-minute slot for entering the monument (arrive outside the half-hour 'gate' and you're turned away). These, it turns out, are so heavily subscribed that you need to book months in advance. You only find this out from the website after you've gone through all the aggro of uploading your credit card details and 'booking' a day to visit.

Oh, I forgot: you might be able to get in by queueing on the day. But only if you arrive at 7am. And even then, it's not guaranteed. I'm sorry, but I wouldn't queue at 7am for an appointment with God Himself. For which, Holy Father, my profound apologies.

It's all ineffably shitty. So I duly curse the Spanish authorities with the same camel-related oaths that would doubtless have been familiar to the Alhambra's Moorish residents.

I'm told we may be able to see the gardens. Which is, I suppose, some small consolation. If they're any good, I'll post pictures. If not, I'll firebomb the Palace*.

* Author's note: This comment should perhaps not be taken too seriously

"Are you organic?"

I dread this question. It usually means I'm in the presence of a moron.

In modern Britain, 'organic' is a quasi-political term that drags behind it a creaking trailer of loaded assumptions. It's the password to membership of a smug, complacent urban bourgeoisie. Who watch Channel 4 News and think they will save the world by driving a diesel Volvo and fitting low-watt lightbulbs in their four-bedroom houses.

Oh dear. Do I sound bitter? It's not that I'm anti-Green, or anti-organic. I'm passionately pro. And I have the bad back and muddy boots to prove it. No, my beef with "Are you organic?" is that it's the wrong question.

The purest 'green' goal of vegetable gardening isn't served by following faddy growing regimes. It's not about eschewing Derris, or the phases of the moon, or composting your own shit in preference to Growmore. It's simply about growing food on your own doorstep. Which means marvellous taste, no planes, no trains and no packaging.

Best of all: no Tesco.

So please don't ask me the organic question. Let's stick to the point, shall we?

They're not watching the allotment... yet

Was disturbed to read this yesterday. So you cop a £2,000 fine for lifting pebbles from the beach. And this while kids shoot other kids at ice rinks in broad daylight, with impunity, and men are gunned down in front of their families in east London.

If that seems too tendentious a link, consider this: there are now more CCTV cameras per head of population in the UK than in any other developed country. Yet UK violent crime is at an all-time high.

Er, hello. Spot anything incongruous here?

I’m fed up with Stalinist busybodies spying on me, telling me what to think and slapping my wrists for piffling ‘offences’ while kids run amok and genuine villains get away with murder. This is not the country I was born in.

I often reflect on this while I’m at the plot. It’s luxurious to breathe free air in a place without cameras.

Pity there are none to film the little shits who break in and nick people’s rotovators.

*sigh*

This is a different view of my plot, from the western end. Really must dig up the old salsify and scorzonera you can see by the water tank on the left. Last season was the first time I tried these vegetables. Probably the last. They're OK, but dull. I should have seen it coming: they were risibly easy to grow. Germinated in seconds, shot up to 18in within minutes. The only way to make them taste good is to bake them in a cheese sauce. But hey, dog turds would taste good in a cheese sauce.