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Plot #79

Introducing Plot #79, Orchard-in-Progress

For at least the past four years, Langley Allotments Plot #79 – the one opposite ours across the road – has been a derelict eyesore. When we first took on our plot, Plot #79 was an overgrown mess of trees and bushes with a collapsed greenhouse and not much else going for it. It’s right […]

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Plot #59

Hard Slog: Man vs. Midden

We’ve been doing a lot of general clearing and sorting down at Plot #59 this month. Jo has been hacking back her sunflower thicket and deadheading everything that’s still in flower. I’ve been clearing away spent bean plants, tidying up the brassicas and ripping out a few large weeds that have snuck in here and […]

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Monthly Updates Plot #59

Plot #59 Update: March 2016

The weather in our neck of the woods was distinctly variable during March, although thankfully storm Katie largely passed us by. A couple of dry weeks meant I could go full steam ahead on digging and clearing the back section of the plot, for a while. We haven’t worked this bit since we took it […]

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Monthly Updates Plot #59

Plot #59 Update: February 2016

After a slow start to February – mainly due to repeat bursts of very wet weather – the past week has been dry and fine enough to finally get down to Plot #59 and get on with some of the season’s prep work. Mainly that has involved basic prep work and digging in horse muck […]

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Plot #59

Allotment Planning Notes: 2016 Edition

With the recent weather continuing in distinctly inclement mode and not a great deal of digging done, I’ve turned my attention to a spot of plot planning instead. Last year – our second full year on the plot – we managed to achieve the majority of what we set out to do, despite the disruption […]

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Cottage Garden Project

Establishing Shots: Cottage Garden Project, late 2015

Jo and I moved to our new home at the very end of July 2015. We’d already spent the previous eight or nine months planning and scheming to turn the back yard – an old garage-cum-shed, a patch of grass and a mini, Japanese-ish gravel area – into a quintessential English Cottage Garden. Or at […]

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Plot #59

Establishing Shots: Plot #59 in December 2015

My wife, Jo, and I took on Plot #59 at Langley Allotments in Prestwich in January 2014. It had been only minimally worked and by the last tenant or two and by the time we arrived had mostly gone back to grass and weed. You can see from these photos what we had to contend […]