I feel very lucky to have been able to take on an allotment at South Undercliff; I know how hard an allotment plot is to come by in many places. It’s a real privilege to have an affordable piece of ground big enough to grow food. My vegetable-growing journey began last August. Having an allotment is effectively having a project that works its way into every part of daily life. This morning for instance, I woke up from a dream in which I had been planting vegetables, and my first coffee was accompanied by some research into compost and winter cabbages. (My new interests may have made me less interesting to some of my friends.)
I love to spend time on my plot first thing in the morning. I’ve been surprised to find it beautiful in every season. As someone who gets cold easily, I didn’t expect to be so warm in midwinter, but physical work makes it easy to be outside. Digging, raking or taking a break in the sunshine with a flask of coffee, I’ve built a whole new relationship with winter months that I used to hide from. As a quiet, biodiverse environment, the allotment attracts insect life of all kinds and a multitude of birds with their constant activity and song. There is always something to watch. It’s a long time since I’ve been so aware of the changing of the seasons.
I’m still sorting out a basic structure for my plot, as it had been neglected for a while and was quite overgrown. That means I’m generally working on a specific task. Since August I’ve managed to lay a (lopsided) brick pathway, created numerous raised beds from gifted pallet collars, and done a lot of digging out of brambles, nettles and bindweed. I’m still preparing beds for spring planting, but I grew a small quantity of greens and salads over winter, and now pick something – chard, salad greens, spinach, kale – nearly every day. Allotment gardening involves lots of ongoing tasks of this kind, and so requires lots of practical problem solving – something that’s very enjoyable as the solutions can be ad hoc, not particularly elegant, and free. They often involve cobbling something together from whatever is available. Doing this is surprisingly easy, since in the allotment community, gifting, recycling , re-use and exchange of resources and skills are the norm.
Since I’ve been there, I’ve been given all the basic tools I need, some raised beds, a truck load of willow withies, quantities of topsoil, flowerpots, fruit and vegetables, seeds, seedlings, bird boxes and a chair. Hopefully this year I’ll be repaying these gifts in kind. I have benefitted constantly from others’ generously shared expertise (and passed many happy hours chatting about vegetables and local news) and am also inspired by walking around the allotment and seeing what other solutions people find to problems such as how to keep weeds, bugs, birds, cats and badgers off plants.
After a morning visit to my plot, I have to tear myself away in order to get back home and start the working day. Even then, I’ll find myself thinking in my free moments about the allotment and current plans – how to build an extra low / no-cost raised bed this spring, or make something to support tomatoes, suppress the weeds on an overgrown bank or get lettuce seeds planted somewhere safe from frosts. Come warmer days, I’ll spend even more time on the plot, which will become a place for meeting friends and eating outside. The youngest member of my extended family, aged ten, already has some tools of her own there. I can see that watering is going to become an essential task in the summer, and long, light evenings might be a good time to do that. Even now, most days end with a meal including at least something I’ve grown myself – or perhaps more accurately, something that grew itself on my plot. I’m constantly amazed at the vigour and speed with which things grow.
I’m really grateful for all the ways that the allotment has changed my daily life: not just in the moments I’m there but through all the planning, anticipation and dreaming it gives rise to, though a network of shared interests and conviviality, and through a renewed connection with nature, including a supply of delicious home-grown food. When I close my eyes tonight, I’ll be looking forward to getting back there.
Image Credits: Sarah Desmarais .