Allotment project begins

Allotment Project

Well, it’s late February and the allotment project is now taking its first tentative steps to fruition. The surface ‘soil’ (an insult to the word) succeeded in hiding a multitude of obstructions to our enterprise, however we have established our initial selection of raised beds, and seeds have been planted indoors; Potatoes are ‘chitting’, young cabbage are sprouting and the petunias have been re-potted! To anyone who already works an allotment, I can only say you have my absolute admiration for your hard work and dedication. If I had only known…… Still, we will be updating this site regularly to keep you informed. Once again, donations of soil and equipment would be greatly appreciated.

K. Lahiff

‘How It Started’ – By Eve McCutcheon (Year 8)

When we heard that an area that used to be the site of the swimming pool was available, we thought it would be great to use for gardening. When our school EcoGroup heard about it they were keen to help.

At the moment we have got lots of help and support from parents and from people with resources that they don’t mind giving to our school. We have already done some research on what plants we are going to have. We have been given some seeds and a little soil, which will really help.

We hope that this will become a lovely place and in the future well known and a special part of the Westgate School.

SPRING 2012

Well, it’s the Easter break and Phase 1 of the Allotment Project is nearing completion. All of the initial raised beds are now in position and all beds planted in readiness for the flood of growth associated with the arrival of Spring. The ‘greenhouse’ is full of trays with a wide variety of sprouting seedlings: sweetcorn, potatoes and beans are showing lots of foliage; Dahlia’s, marigolds and Gladioli are coming along nicely.

Some of the local wildlife has also shown its appreciation of our efforts, but the attention has not been received warmly by the younger members of the Allotment team! In fact, it has been a challenge to explain to our more exuberant individuals why an electrified grid across the plots would not be considered ‘environmentally friendly’ even if – yes - we lose all of our initial plantings! The learning curve is regrettably still quite steep – but all the more fun for it. We will be exploring more humane ways of discouraging our visitors shortly. Any ideas on this would be welcome.

We still have a long way to go, and there is still space to use but the limitations are ever more noticeable. We have a chalk ‘bank’ running across one side of the plot, so this may become our ‘wildflower’ area. The material used to fill in the old swimming pool is very poor, from an allotment viewpoint; it now appears that a mixture of clay and building hardcore fills in the bulk of the area, with up to 6” of dark claggy material (not quite ‘soil’!) on the top. Clearly, we will be looking to supplement this somehow as we will have to create our flower beds in this area. As always, contributions, advice and assistance would be very welcome. My thanks to all those parents and associates who have provided support so far, it has been a hugely enjoyable experience for all the pupils involved.