Here is the final garden plan that I have tinkered with for way too long.

At long last. It has stopped raining. Gusty wind from the east, temperatures no better than 5 Celsius, but I had to get out to the allotment to check things hadn’t blown away during the bad weather. Everything was fine. Not even waterlogged. But naturally not a lot in the place where I wanted it – the big plastic wheelie bin where I think I will need to store an awful lot of water this year (we are still in drought). I may have to rig up some sort of water catchment system with a tarpaulin to get more falling into it. Perhaps rigging up something around the compost bins. But rather than thoughts of engineering, I was more concerned with planting. In went the garlic in two rows, all rather neat and sorted. And I spent the rest of the day weeding the new potato bed. You can get into quite a good rhythm with the work: fork large amounts along a row to lift the roots, down onto a big of old plastic to protect the knees from the wet, then work your way along the row pulling the weeds, hoiking out the worst of the grass, throwing the slugs to the awaiting robins, and generally turning the soil over as you go. I unearthed an interesting clump of bulbs from the previous owners. Not sure what they are (tulips perhaps) so I will leave them and see. Naturally they are in the middle of where the path will be.

Couldn’t resist buying a few more bags of spent mushroom compost from the little shop, and a bag of rather interesting looking shallots. They will have to wait until I get back. Met another neighbour, an Italian named Rino (I think). He explained that he didn’t speak English, but then proceeded to tell me a long complicated story about my shed (it’s a theme around here) and the previous owners. Goodness only knows what it all meant, but he did suggest that the onion sets should not go in before March. That much I gleaned. Ah well, hopefully mine will survive. Off to Australia for two weeks. The onions and garlic will have to fend for themselves.

Rain. Gusty winds. Struggling to even reach 3 Degrees.  My poor, poor onions.

Rain. Snow. Snow. Rain. Gusty winds. Around 3 Degrees.

Rain. Sleet. Rain. Strong winds. Maximum 6 Degrees.

Planting sweet peas? Stroll out to the potting shed and doing the deed neatly and cleanly? More like, planting messes all over the house. First it is fiddling with the plastic root trainers which don’t snap back after one use, dropping bits of multi purpose compost on the carpet while filling them inside a plastic garbage bag on the white sofa in my office, spills on the sofa during this process. Dripping water onto the soil, and then spilling a bit more just on the spot where the soil fell out. Planting the little peas, dropping a bit more of the compost while I walk upstairs to the propagator. Furious session with the vacuum cleaner. Finally I can sit down and write down just what I did plant.

And now I can happily report that my first crop is in. Last week of February, not bad at all. I went out to the allotment at ten and was working happily until a hail storm halted me around 1pm. Before then it was windy, sunny and about 4 Celsius. Perfect weather for planting up the onions. I forked the soil, then made a small trench. In went the sand and the multi-purpose compost first. Then I added the 14 onion sets. They just fit into one horizontal row. More compost over the top; and then the soil. They are neatly packaged away, and the first four (planted early) have sprouted already. I had to erect some little sticks and a straight row of string over the onions to deter the birds. (That will teach me for encouraging them with worms.) And they do look a bit forlorn and swamped in such a large ocean of dirt. But tomorrow I will put the garlic down nearby and it won’t look so bad. I did the sand and multi-purpose trench for them but was lured away by weeding before I could do any more. The soon to be extra potato bed was attacked with verve. I managed a foot or more of heavy duty weeding and hope to get more done tomorrow (hail permitting). Came back and called David to proudly announce the planting of our first crop.

Vegetable: Sweet Pea Matucana
How many?: 4
How planted?: Root Trainer
Notes: In a cool room upstairs

Vegetable: Sweet Pea Cream of Southbourne
How many?: 4
How planted?: Root Trainer
Notes: In a cool room upstairs

Vegetable: Sweet Pea Dark Colour Mix
How many?: 4
How planted?: Root Trainer
Notes: In a cool room upstairs

Vegetable: Mizuna lettuce
How many?: 4
How planted?: Jiffy 7s
Notes: In a warm heated room

Still wild and wet weather. My indoor garden is romping away. Well, that’s the broad beans. The Aquadulce Claudia variety shot up in no time. And all of the ‘pinching out the growing tip’ actually involves chopping madly back. I have potted them all on into cut down plastic water bottles and hope that their growth will be checked a bit.  If they go outdoors I’m going to have to find a way to support them properly.  The Sutton variety were slower to germinate and are bushier. I definitely will choose Suttons next time if I insist on germinating so early in the year.

The onions are ready to go out, and most of the garlic sets as well. Lots of roots appearing through the bottom and sides of the jiffys. Most encouraging.  And my package of Sarah Raven goodies arrived today.

Thwarted. I want to go weeding, but it’s wet. So will have to go for a long run instead. Hopefully it will brighten up later.

Vegetable: Cabbage Greyhound
How many?: 4
How planted?: Jiffy 7s
Notes: In a warm heated room

There are two things I will not miss when spring comes: hauling heavy sacks of compost out of the shopping trolley, into the car, out of the car, into the wheelbarrow, and then onto the garden.  That, and cleaning the fork and the spade in the kitchen sink.  The water in the pipes is turned off all winter, and you can’t get enough of the stuff to clean off your tools.  And today was another adventure in sticky soil.  First three loads of compost hauled into place, and then the bark chips down. And I sat back (managing to give my trousers perfect little half moons of mud from my shoes on my bum) and thought – this is it. The hard landscaping is done.  It’s all downhill from here. Just weeding.

I found three slugs yesterday up near the apple tree. An Ominous Sign.  It’s hard to lovingly spare worms from the fork and then gleefully get stuck into a small slug and chop it in half.  But that’s the extent of good nematode bad gastropod in this garden.

Started weeding the overflow potato plot.  The glyphosate has done its job and killed off the surface grass. But then you have to dig down and get up the weeds. I wish I had more time while it was colder and drier to get them out. Now it’s a slimy, sticky task and I have so much more to do.

Marked out the site where the carrots will go. And put up the little sticks for the big bean poles.

I met Susie as I was doing my endless laps with the wheelbarrow and compost.  She was working in the shop on the weekend and apparently heard from David Braeburn (the Allotment Secretary) that he is amazed at my progress.  Now that is praise indeed.  Chocolate swimming pool (with many bark chip paths) is complete.

Out at 10am, back at 4pm, now that’s what I call a great day gardening.  Sore back, filthy fingers and ravenously hungry, but pleased with the work.  I added the compost and the manure to the plots. And know that I need at least four more bags of compost for the soil.  We had a full day’s rain on Sunday and it shows; the soil is more malleable, but sticky.  And when I dug down a deepish hole to put plenty of manure in the place where the beans will go, I struck the dread London clay.  It’s yellow, it’s solid and it sticks onto the fork and will not move.  Goodness only knows how I’m going to manage with the stuff. But plenty of compost may be the answer.  I ran out of compost for the potato beds and the top spot where I will plant the root veg.

I added the mini paths at 3m intervals (and promptly ran out of bark chips) and have to do something about that when I can tolerate a trip to the garden centre.  The rest of the time was spent weeding. We are going to have to extend the potato bed a bit to accommodate Our Favourite Veg; and I turned that.  And then the sight of all the mess at the far end of the plot was too much. I got stuck in. Filled one of the wheelie bins with the worst of the carpet bits, and filled three bags of mess and placed them nearby. I then stupidly started pulling up the rotten carpets (hence sore back) and trying to get them into some sort of order. Bring on that skip; it can’t arrive soon enough.  I did find a rose bush under the mess. Goodness only knows what it is like; and found some useful bits of wire and decent wood.

Next task was to look at the leaning apple tree.  It really is in a sorry state. Rocks like mad and the restraining straps are cutting into the bark.  So off came the straps, and down went some better stakes. I haven’t done a very professional job – but at least it leans upright now.  Shall take advice from any passing fruiterer when I am up to it.

Next trip will have to be more weeding.  And adding compost to more of the soil.  It actually looks like a rather nice bed.

Pea sticks.  Good thing Primrose Hill has a healthy tolerance for eccentrics. Came back from my jog with an armful of sticks for propping up the peas. Established gardens always have these sorts of things. But us beginners have to make do with scavenging in Regent’s Park. Had to battle with a raven to get them.