Fire breathing dragons

The title does not relate to the chickens (no excuse really for a picture of our newest chicken other than she's not appeared before), although they were completely freaked out by the 'fire breathing' event.

I was trying to put the chickens to bed the other night as it was getting 'dimpsy' as they say in Devon (dusk-like), but they had other ideas and seemed to think that Thursday night was party night on the allotment. Anyway, I digress: I suddenly heard this almighty noise and my first thought was 'it sounds like a fire-breathing dragon' (obvious really), either that or a very large, very annoyed horse.

At this point the chickens obviously had a similar thought and went quite wild, running all over the place - two even managed to get themselves stuck down between the chicken wire. I looked up and there, only about 20ft above the allotments, was a hot air balloon, desperately trying to gain some height. Luckily, the homes near the allotments are bungalows, as it was a close thing. I think it came down in a nearby field, but it was quite a drama and more than a little surreal.

I haven't written for ages, and although I have been away for a bit, I've also been a little tardy with updating, so apologies for that. We have a new volunteer - Steven - who has been twice now and I hope he will continue to come along as he's already helped a great deal, including planting raspberries out in the orchard.

Victoria and Maria have also dropped in over the past few weeks and we've managed to get on with weeding some of the beds; pot up some strawberry runners; begin clearing and laying a pathway through the orchard; and designing a 'chicken proof' willow and net structure over the green manure which failed superbly.They must have put all their chicken brains together to work out that if they all bounced on top of the net then it would droop down, allowing them to skim off all the grazing rye with ease.

Yesterday - unlike today which is warmer, with a blue sky and sunshine - was awful, wet, windy and cold. So it makes perfect sense that we had our Harvest Gathering at the garden then rather than now!

Despite the rather inclement weather, we managed a record-breaking 12 people in the polytunnel, along with a clarinet and a recorder, and local Rev Stephen Hewitt took a mini-service under plastic, complete with a few seasonal hymns, some warming tea and apple cake. It was a strange, but lovely event and it was great to have some new visitors to the allotment who were interested and encouraging, as it's been a little wearing lately with lots of things falling through.

Comma, dash

This lovely butterfly, which apparently isn't very common this far North, turned up in the polytunnel this week. It's a lovely comma, which has very distinctive jagged edging around the wings and does a very good impression of bark or a leaf on its underside.


In terms of jobs, I had help this week from Maria and we got stuck into clearing a path through the orchard and putting membrane down. Victoria also turned up, so we potted up some more strawberry runners and attacked a few more weeds (of which there are still plenty).

I also took advantage of a break in the wet weather to dig over one of the potato beds in preparation for some overwintering green manure.

The plants are in, two by two...

About a year ago I had a post entitled ' Time to build an ark' so I can't use that one again, but it would be apt today when I really have trouble believing the sky can actually hold that much water. So, based on a comment one of my allotment neighbours made the other day, I'll use a Noah's ark reference instead.

Luckily, the garden is located on a hill and not too near a river, so a boat is not needed to get there yet, but the ground is so sodden I can't do anything other than look at it and sigh, hoping that the spuds beneath are not gasping for air, drowning and then turning to mush.


The chickens are also looking miserable, missing their lovely dust baths in the sunshine. David built Ethel a new nesting box and I cleaned them out, giving them a new floor covering of fresh sawdust, shredded paper and a bit of straw, so that went some way towards cheering them up a little. I've also put eucalyptus leaves (above) and some lavender in as I read that this helps to deter bugs, so they're probably the most spoilt chickens for miles around.

Due to the inclement weather, the polytunnel is now much tidier - I've stripped all the tomato plants in a vain attempt to get them to put all their energy into turning those very green tomatoes red. A little sun would help a lot at this point.


I saw Ethel hadn't laid an egg for a few days and I thought she might be moulting, but no, she'd decided the rhubarb patch, with its soft grass cuttings under the plants, was a pretty good spot for an alternative nest.

I've been busy propogating herbs and also the runners off the strawberry patch, which always makes me happy as I love making plants for free....