Saturday 6 May 2017

WHAT DO CAT LITTER TRAYS & CAKE CARRIERS HAVE IN COMMON?

The answer is that they make brilliant seedling holders and propagators! Yes, the litter trays are higher than seedling trays so that you can carry your seedling pots very safely and the cake carriers make brilliant propagators! Who knew? Well, she must have as she's been using both these items for ages.

The latest, but actually she thought of this last year and it worked very well indeed, is to use cupcake carriers as seedling trays, they hold twelve cupcake papers into which she puts good potting compost, having sprayed it gently, she puts in a seed, fills up the paper with a little more compost, another spray of water and then the plastic clear lid is clipped onto the base.

Hey presto.. hey li cheese.. when the seedling appears, she places the paper into the designated previously dug and watered bed. The vegetable roots grow straight through the paper which, of course, disintergrates.

What's not to like about something so useful?

There's been much work done at the allotments, not only can you now actually see and touch Little Shed, she's slashed and burnt all the crap that had grown up and around it.. and in the process, has found wondrous things!

They are very old terracotta flower pots, given to her by her beloved Mary, when she was very little and Constance and Hugo travelled, Mary was her official guardian.

She was the most lovely, lovely woman, who in 2001 when she heard about the allotments, rang mum and said "I've got a present for you, I'll be with you by 3.00pm and I want to see your plots", and bless her heart, she piled them into a wonderful basket wicker that mum uses to this very day, and drove from Sherborne, in Dorset, up to London.

But her 'get-up & go' was pretty legendary, for this is the woman who in 1958, decided to take on the Dutch Tomato Growers at their own game, she had spent many years in France as a child and knew about the very old varieties of this culinary treasure, goodness knows how she found the seeds but she started growing the most amazing varieties which, of course, the chefs of the very fancy London hotels couldn't believe were being grown in Kent! And so she invited several of them down to see what she was doing.. and never looked back!

She was thrilled that Constance's daughter was picking up her mother's and her gardening habit and gave her these very old pots as a gift.

Yesterday she made the salad bed.. salad doesn't like to be too hot, so this long narrow bed is situated in the middle of the plots with a massive rose - 'Compassion' planted in 2003 in memory of her aunt Hay darling - at its' southern end, the rose is tall and wide and filters the sun perfectly.

What else has happened? Oh yes, she met herself coming through the first part of the beastly briar patch! She'd slashed and cut through on the northern side, now the next thing was to do the same on the western side but without damaging two 'Jacques Cartier' roses which are on the edge of this patch.

Having dressed again in slippery clothes and tall boots, she waded in to do damage to Mr. Beastly Briar! Oh.. yes, it Indeedy, it is highly satisfying to suddenly find yourself with a clear space in front of you! It's all been cut into manageable bits, will lie in a hideoes heap for about a week and then be burnt in the incinerator.

The first lot of climbing French beans have been planted out, she put glass cloches on them for A. for it's certainly not yet that warm at nights and B. these glass cloches will deter Mr. Slimy Slug from munching these new tasty things!

Nothing else much to report.. I am in disgrace because I got 'ants in my pants' and nibbled my little top feathers on the left wing yesterday, so I wasn't taken to the allotments today. That'll teach me to be stupid. I was left 'home alone' with the mice. She had a visitor which was pleasant, Corinne who has two plots opposite ours, came to call, that meant she could stop feeding the ever-hungry briar gobbling incinerator and sit and chat for a few minutes.

Corinne is a new comer to the allotments but is already a seasoned gardener, she shares the plots with Stuart, who is tall, strong and does the heavy duty stuff! We are most envious of Corinne for having such a useful person sharing the plots with her!

Whoops.. is that the time? Got to go, very early start tomorrow, we're going to the allotments with Claudia, she is from mum's other life when she worked with decorators, designers, architects etc and she's as passionate about gardening as mum is, so today will be a day of much hard work being done and lots of good food being eaten.

Chirps to you all.

GeeGee Parrot.
May 6th, 2017.

No comments:

Post a Comment