Hot News In and Out of AllotmentPickings

Hot news from the Garden Museum: due to popular demand, Edwina Sassoon's photographic exhibition, London Allotments: A City Harvest has been extended and will now be showing until December 12, 2010. Don't miss it - and catch up on Christmas shopping at the Museum shop while you are there!

Hot news from AllotmentPickings! Although still alive and well

AP now has a sister blog on the Reader's Digest website. To catch

up on dahlia tips from the plot; how I finally ripened my delicious

Gourmet pepper; ate the sweetest, finest carrots ever grown and

came across a 'living' sheep on Iona, go to

www.readersdigest.co.uk/blog2/rdgardening/

London Allotments: A City Harvest exhibition at the Garden Museum

Back from holiday to the next excitment - the forthcoming exhibition of Edwina Sassoon's allotment photographs at the Garden Museum. After working together on the Three-Year Allotment Notebook it's fun to move on to another related project. Looks like it'll be a stunner with Edwina's knack for catching in her pictures the incredible enterprise, imagination and artistry of allotmenteers.

This exhibition will run alongside the Garden Museum's about-to-open show: Going Dutch: how the Dutch Wave hit Britain's gardens.

Two exhibitions, the Museum cafe and shop. Looks like a visual feast and the Christmas shopping sorted.

London Allotments: A City Harvest runs from 15 October 2010 - 28 November 2010 at the Garden Museum, Lambeth Palace Road, London SE1 7LB Tel: 020 7401 8865

Going Dutch: discover how the Dutch Wave hit Britain's Gardens runs from 5 October 2010 - 20 February 2011 at the Garden Museum

(Photograph (c) Edwina Sassoon)

The Three-Year Allotment Notebook and the five month allotment makeover

It's been quite a month. Having failed to get the scruffy, barren plot I took over in March up to scratch by my first deadline of Chelsea Flower Show, I decided it absolutely HAD to be in order for publication by Frances Lincoln of the Three-Year Allotment Notebook (by Joanna Cruddas, photographs by Edwina Sassoon). Eureka! With help from family, friends and fellow allotmenteers, the plot has had its party frock on all month. It was short-listed for our allotments competition amongst a field of 410 plots, trashed the night before the RHS came to judge and, though we may not be cup holders, I reckon the pictures prove a good plot is always a winner!

Allotments in Siberia

Ever thought you were surrounded by a load of clowns down at the plots? Think it's a right circus at times? Talking of which...why not get tickets for an evening of drinks, canapes and a performance of Yasmine by Giffords Circus. The date: September 3rd at 6.30 for 7.30pm.

Venue: Stratton Meadows, Cirencester.

You would be supporting a small and, very pertinent to us allotmenteers, charity Sponsoring Allotments in Siberia. Its simple aim is to provide large, low-income families often living in communal and cramped flats with the opportunity to grow their own fruit and vegetables and get some space during the summer months. Just like we've got.

For more details: call 01963 440297

or email: merielbuxton@aol.com

Sponsoring Allotments in Siberia: Reg Charity No: 1083278

Big Butterfly Count

It was a first on the plot to see what I think is a Five-spot Burnet flitting between my lavender and nigella. Next week is the Big Butterfly Count. What a great opportunity to spend a quiet and peaceful 15 minutes counting the butterflies and moths we see. No worries when we don't know what they are. Just take a photo and send it in for professional identification.

The Big Butterfly Count Week runs from July 24th - August 1st. Could there be a better way to spend 15 minutes?

Photograph (c) Edwina Sassoon

Allotment Anecdotes at Snails Pace

Approaching the silly season, I am reminded of anecdotes which abound in and around the allotments:

A distinguished surgeon explains that were I to drop a snail in caustic soda, it would dissolve with the exception of the tongue which would remain intact - a serrated sword set to cut through our carefully grown leaves. I haven't put it to the test.

But at an event at the Garden Museum, I did find myself repeating this alleged fact to a representative from the Chelsea Physic Garden. He looked pensive and told me of a recent bereavement. For 8 years he had kept a pet Giant African Land Snail called He-She Humungus. H-S H had recently died and lay buried in a specific spot. My new friend plans to dig H-S up in six months in the anticipation of retrieving and keeping the shell. But will the tongue lie intact or have rotted?

The Plot Goes to Pot at The Garden Museum

For those with allotment envy, it has now been proved that an allotment can fit into a pot, scarecrow and all. The Garden Museum is displaying 34 planters designed by some of the country's best-known gardeners from today until Thursday July 1st. Want inspiration for filling your pots? Don't miss this fun opportunity to see (and bid for) imaginative and witty compositions from Chelsea Best-in-Show Winner Andy Sturgeon, BBC garden presenter Joe Swift, actress (and gardener) Penelope Keith and many others. Here are some tasters...Gardeners' World Allotmenteer Joe Swift compliments low level planting with colour coordinating pot, while photographer Edwina Sassoon fits the whole allotment into her pot, tumbler tomatoes doing just that, scarecrow perched high rise.

The Garden Museum's Matt Collins includes driftwood, Artist Charlotte Verity goes stylishly simple with a lemon tree in her elegant planter painted by Christopher Le Brun, and Richard Reynolds confirms that there's no stopping a Guerrilla Gardener.

Photographs (c) Edwina Sassoon

Perfect strawberries for Wimbledon week

It's an odd thing, but the reason I'm really proud of the strawberries I've grown at the plot this year is because they are so immaculate, they look bought. But you don't get perfection without some pretty determined action. I sprinkled Fito Slug Stoppa Granules, a 100% natural product, around each plant. On top of that went a thick layer of straw to prevent the fruit getting muddy or soggy. Next came fine mesh netting to cover the plants. Last year I used horrible flimsy netting with big holes and twice had to release small, panicked birds by cutting them out of the netting that was trapping claws and wings. Now it's the fine stuff or nothing on my plot. The only snag to my Fort Knox is that I find it practically impossible to get at the brilliant red wonders myself, but it's worth the effort and been a victory against legless, legged or winged competitors.

Out out d... (allelopathic) couch grass

All the excitements of Chelsea Flower Show and our own Open Day now over, it's back to earth. All allotmenteers battle with our old enemy, couch grass, but only recently did I learn that it had negative allelopathic qualities and can actively inhibit other plants from growing. Having just digested that bit of information, I hear on Gardeners Question Time that climbing beans don't have a hope if they are beside onions and heaven forfend that we should sow radishes near our red peppers. On the other hand, I believe growing mint near your roses helps keep aphids away so I thought I'd take it a step further and spray my rose with mint tea!

Allotments Support Open Garden Squares Weekend: 12th/13th June 2010

London Allotments will be opening their gates in support of London Parks and Gardens Trust this weekend. More than 200 gardens will be open, including Beatrix Potter, Branch Hill and Fulham Palace Meadows Allotments. Click on any of these allotments for opening times and details of the Open Gardens Squares Weekend. However...as an insider... I can promise you the opportunity to see more than 400 plots of diversity, imagination, and beauty you will find hard to beat at Fulham Palace Meadows. We shall be selling our very locally grown produce and offering tea and home-made cakes from 11.30am-3.30pm on Saturday. What more could you want? Here's a sneak preview of our allotments in June.

Photograph (c) Edwina Sassoon from The Three-Year Allotment Notebook to be published by Frances Lincoln on August 5th, 2010 @ £12.99

The gentleness of a city allotmenteer

Just leaving the allotments this morning, when my sister stopped in her tracks. A man was crouched by a wounded pigeon. It had been attacked by a magpie. As a crowd gathers around an accident, so a ring of pigeons surrounded the scene of the crime, seemingly watching, guarding. We strolled off. Some moments later, we were approached by same man with his bike. "Excuse me," he said, having heard us discuss this. "It's not a pigeon that's been wounded." He opened his bike bag to reveal two fledgling birds of prey nestled safely in the bag. Despite already sizeable beaks, their young bodies defenceless and bleeding. He thought they were buzzards. I know there are sparrow hawks in the allotments. We none of us were knowledgeable twitchers. They were en route to the experts.

It reminded me of our special responsibility to birdlife this summer. The winter hit them hard, garden birds need all the help we can offer them to keep numbers up. In allotments we have to balance nurturing our birdlife with protecting our plots from rats and other vermin. But just after I created my birdbath (see earlier post), I discovered this website which really does seem to have something for every one of our feathered friends: www.farbrookfarm.co.uk

Chelsea Flower Show: Shops for everyone

Just as exhaustion struck on the hottest day of the year, a young man popped off the Tregothnan stand and handed me an instant Cornish Cream Tea. From leaves grown on the Tregothnan estate, a cuppa has never tasted better.

I turned round to see

the coolest plant containers from Bronzino (above right). Made from

solid copper and zinc they put any other pot I've seen in the shade.

Meanwhile, my old friend The Allotment Shop still has the best garden string in town and a variety of must-haves for any allotmenteer.

(photographs: Edwina Sassoon)

During Chelsea Flower Show week, ANYTHING GOES as Cartier in Sloane Street showed us...

How cool is being such a prize winner outside the show ground?

(photographs: Edwina Sassoon)

Top Hat at Chelsea Flower Show, Old Hat at the Allotments

The ingenuity of Chelsea Flower Show hats leaves Royal Ascot's attempts at the starting gate. My fav (above) comes from Kate Bainbridge of Simply Flowers

At the allotments, multi-tasking hats from around the world get put to good use (above right)

(Flower Show photograph:

(c) Edwina Sassoon)

Chelsea Show Flower Arrangements

Interflora's Progression gives Pom-poms

a whole new meaning - no wonder they are Gold Medalists this year; Florigene's stunning Moon-series gives carnations a whole new colour.

Down at the allotments, our black and yellow sunflowers are as stylish as the rest of them; blue bottles recycled into specimen vases.

Photographs: (c) Edwina Sassoon

Chelsea Flower Show and Allotments support the B(ee) word

"If the bee disappeared off the surface of the globe, then man would have only four years of life left," said one of the world's most famous allotmenteers, Albert Einstein. Global Stone socks this information to us by engraving the quote on the wall (see above) of their Bee Friendly Plants Garden designed by Janey Auchincloss

The Royal Horticultural Society's Biodiversity Display offers bugs stylish apartment accommodation designed by Andrew Fisher Tomlin and Stuart R Thomas (top right)

Meantime, lacewings (gobblers of aphids who like to take refuge in hollow sticks & canes) can relax in high-rise living courtesy of the Bradstone Biodiversity Garden (right)

But if you really fancy a country cottage best, slope off to the allotments and create an authentic, completely recycled bug hotel.

Photographs (c) Edwina Sassoon

Chelsea Flower Show style/Allotments style

Places of Change garden. Eden Project

in partnership with

HOMES & COMMUNITIES AGENCY,

COMMUNITIES & LOCAL GOVERNMENT,

HOMELESS LINK

Almost the first garden we saw included this wonderful full-size recycled 'plastic bottle greenhouse', the bottles linked and supported by canes. Per chance, I've been collecting used bottles all winter with a more modest version in mind, but who knows now I've seen this!

Down at the allotments, our greenhouses come in many shapes and sizes; some seedlings have their own individual homes.

Photographs (c) Edwina Sassoon

Global bath for high flyers

I picked up a discarded dustbin lid this week, sensing it could come to good use. Simultaneously, my MTF (most travelled friend) decided to shed a collection of stones she had collected from around the world. The rest is obvious. My plot now has the most luxurious bird bath any high flyer could dream to splash in, surrounded by pink quartz, petrified wood, hues of turquoise, greys, black, sandstone. My feathered friends just have to find it...

Allotment Rules...

and if you can't beat them...

Because our paths are quite narrow, any construction has to be 9" inside our own plots to enable wheelbarrows etc to move freely and safely around. This takes valuable growing space, created a ridiculous shady passage on my plot and my chest looked stranded. And then an offer for convallaria majalis (lilies of the valley) plopped into my inbox. The obvious spot. I ordered 9, stuffed them in with a pile of organic matter, gave them a good water and they are already filling out and hopefully on the march.

Frost in May

I gave myself until the Chelsea Flower Show to get my new plot in order. But disaster has struck and I've extended the date to our allotments Open Day in support of the London Open Garden Squares Weekend on June 12. How much have I written or banged on about a few warm days in May does not meaning it's summer? How well did I know that I was putting my beans out A BIT EARLY. But hey, we're in a city, protected by buildings, global warming and the balcony needed space to start off annuals. After all, I'd done my bit with bandages and fleece (see previous blog post). But this May frost took no hostages. It struck pockets of our allotments cruelly. The rest is in the picture. Two plots away, my friend F, has a full line of French beans unscathed and I'm delighted. 6 plots away there's a field of limp, brown, frost-burnt potato foliage. As for me, I've lost every one of my French and Runner beans. Potatoes are hit, but will probably recover.

There are good reasons for the old phrases such as "N'er cast a clout 'til May is out".

Beanstick fracture

Last summer the stem of a neighbour's sunflower broke. He bound it and it went on to grow a full 8' and produce a beautiful flowerhead. At the end of the summer he took the bandage off to find lumpy scar tissue, but a fully-healed stem.

There have already been accidents for me this year. First I skidded on an overgrown path, flew through the air twisting my ankle as I went and landed yelping in pain. It is only thanks to multi-tasking my fork and spade into crutches that I am not still stranded there. Never again will I mock inspection committees and their threatening "lose your plot" cards. Well-kept allotments are safe allotments.

Next, I carelessly knocked a bean seedling, badly bruising the stem and

causing it to flop. Remembering the sunflower, I cut up a bit of thick filter paper (from my vacuum cleaner), stapled it round stake and stem allowing just enough room for the stem to fill out. Within days the leaves opened and it seemed strong enough to put out, with the bandage slightly loosened.

Then the temperature dropped, a treacherous wind whipped across the allotments, so emergency measures with fleece have been taken. Forget nurture or nature - we're talking full-time nurturing nature here!

Get grounded at the allotments

It's impossible to avoid a certain election fever, but worrying about putting my climbing beans out too early (again), I hurried down to protect them from the cold this evening. L, my Portuguese plot neighbour, passed by. "Beautiful," he said as I created a fleece wall around them. "Here, Jo-waanna, have some of my Portuguese onions - they're bigger, better...my mother sent them to me...you must plant them soon." As I hurried back to my house guests, I bumped into L, my Greek allotment friend. "Joanne!" she exclaimed, throwing open her arms and kissing me on both cheeks before pushing me away. "You must go," she observed. "You are in a hurry." I left - via one of the many lilac trees that surround our plots - reminded of real life, of the generosity, diversity and companionship of allotments.

Dug in to labelling

I've tried labelling my plants before - used the wrong pen or pencil, eyesore labels or too small and they've disappeared. Given up. And then regretted not being able to identify the successes. Yesterday, browsing in the irresistible Garden Museum shop, I discovered handsome black garden labels which I bought as a present for a friend but within hours was using for my own plot! This is it. Smart, big, re-usable and the white marker claims my script will be "permanent until removed with white spirit".

Thigmomorphogenesis

Last year I put my climbing beans out too early and they froze... almost literally. With the health of my broad beans already precarious, I'm being cautious with all seedlings this year. A few warm days doesn't mean it's summer. Seedlings have taken over every window ledge, being hardened off on the balcony by day, inside by night.

I first read about Thigmomorphogenesis in Emma Cooper's The Alternative Kitchen Garden A-Z. It's the principle that plants grow differently when not exposed to the wind. So, if your seedlings can't be put out, blow on them and brush your fingers through them. It'll help them become stronger and stockier before they face the outside world.

Let Nature Take Its Course

The broad beans, sown in three stages for a lengthy crop, looked so promising. Then their leaves took on a new scalloped appearance. The diagnosis: Bean Weevil. I acted in haste. A too strong solution of washing up liquid was sprayed liberally, mid-day. Out burst the sun. The combination of burning rays and not diluting the solution properly severely scorched the leaves, damaging them more than the weevils would probably ever have. If you want to spray, wait until the cool of the evening, or do so in very early morning - it's also kinder to pollinators such as bees and butterflies who will be hard at work during the daytime. Without pollinators we could starve...

Cutting Edge at the Allotments

Grass paths and edges spilling on to your plot? Inspections about to take place? Don't ruin your neighbours' peace with the scream of a strimmer. This pocket-sized Swiss knife sharpener will fix your sheers, secateurs, scissors (and carving knife). An allotmenteer's must-have, so just click on the link. 4 friends have already put in orders after seeing mine.