Welcome to 2009

Well it has been a long time. A death of a relative in December kept me away from the allotment. This was then followed by a bout of the flu and it was real flu not a nasty cold, that took 2-3 weeks to get over. Or it has been raining on the days I wasn't busy. Allotment visits were token events to harvest - not much digging going on.

Someone at work was saying that this year has been the wettest January for 20 years. The soil is certainly sodden.

I got about 6 sq metres dug today. It was not enjoyable; the soil was very sticky and I had to stop often to remove sods from my boots and spade. However today was a nice day. I almost decided not to go up the allotment this morning. I looked out of the window and saw the wind blowing the Yew tree opposite and saw the temperature was only a couple of degrees C and nearly didn't bother. However, once up the allotment, I was sheltered from the wind and was quite enjoying the sunshine. In fact once I started digging, the coat was soon discarded.

I was joined by my local blackbird who was probably the scruffy one in my 17th May 2008 blog post. He seems to have survived the winter well and is looking quite slick. I found him some nice fat worms for his lunch.

I got other jobs done as well such as taking down the runner bean canes, cutting back the autumn raspberries and harvested leeks, sprouting broccoli and sprouts.

Spurred on, I then went and bought some seed potatoes from the local garden centre after a tip off from my allotment neighbour Phil. I bought Winston enough for about 3 rows and one row of Nadine. Winston is my favourite potato. A first early - but can be left in a bit longer and will provide huge spuds for baking. The taste is outstanding too.

I also got my seed order done on line. Bring on the Trumpets.