Summer has been a very busy time for the community allotments. The clear up and development of the plots carried on in earnest and the first produce of the year was proudly shown off by volunteers.
Late spring and early summer began with the site still being cleared from years of neglect. The mammoth task certainly isn’t finished but it is a lot further on from where we first started. Plans going forward include a permanent path being stalled on the left hand side and around the perimeter of the plots, this is to allow ease of access for those who are struggle with mobility.
With some of the plots nearing readiness for plants and vegetables the volunteers started potting in one of the sheds which were left behind by previous allotment tenants. However, this is going to be short-lived as we have recently secured funding to install a poly tunnel into the allotment.
Images below show the planting of the potted plants prepared earlier in the year.
In total volunteers managed to plant plants and vegetables into 3 of the 8 plots that are available on the site, the remaining plots are being covered over the winter to kill off weeds, this will make it easier for us to remove them when the time is right.
Once this happens we will be able to rotavate the plots and plant even more plants and vegetables next year.
Below shows the result of many months of hard work and dedication by our fantastic volunteers.
One of the reasons why we set up this project was to provide fresh local produce for the community and we surprised ourselves by managing to achieve this in our first year. We harvested our produce and offered it to the community, this was by means of a donation only and for those who could not afford to donate – free!
Some of our produce was selected and entered it in to the Whitefield Horticultural Society competition, we were quite proud that some of our entrances won prizes on our first attempt, fingers crossed for next year!
Late summer brought a close to our harvesting and planting projects, this gave us the chance to start some of our bigger projects and ambitions.
Below shows the installation of our first shed, which is near the entrance of the allotment. We will be using this to store tools needed for volunteers, during the summer months it will all so be used as a welcoming area and a much-needed tea-making facility for volunteers and visitors!
This rounds off our developments for the summer, during the winter we plan to get our polytunnel installed and complete a number of ground works to allow us to open up more plots for planting next year!
