Thanks to
We had a rather magnificent collection of cans. Now we have no cans but a welcome cash injection of £76 to our Fence Fund. The 'can dealer' had to set some of his men to sorting the cans into steel and aluminium but still he paid us the full amount due. We must sort cans in future into steel and aluminium sacks.
Thanks to Paul on plot 50 for arranging the collection, to Paul and Dunni for making sure all the cans were bagged up ready for collection and to Jan for collecting the cash.
Jan will collect the sacks soon and we will be all ready to go again - so please save all your Christmas cans and make sure all your friends do too!!
Not only does collecting the cans provide us with a source of funding but we are also doing our bit to reduce the amount of waste taken to our landfill sites and also recycling valuable resources. So well done and thank you to everyone that contributed!
And we have some 'volunteer' pea seedlings too!
Didn't visit the plot this week - due to snuffles and the weather so I have put together this little video instead. To read more about ladybirds on our website click here
If the weather as kept you away from the plot then you may have missed this lost visitor!
Surprising how the wildlife comes out when it is quiet!
Paul (plot 50) has arranged for the cans that everyone has been collecting to be picked up. This may happen next week although the company have said that they will only take cans if they are in the large builders' bags. This way they can load them into their lorry easily. Can I ask that in future would you please squash the cans before popping them into the collection bags as in this way we will be able to store them prior to collection much more easily. We will try and create some sort of storage area on plot 46 to accommodate future collections.
Thanks to Paul for arranging this.
The November diary has now been started on the web site click here to access. One feature of last week for me (other than piles and piles of manure being delivered), has been the wonderful leaf colours. I have never noticed before that leaves on one half of the tree turn colour sooner and also fall off the tree sooner. I suppose that shouldn't be a surprise as presumably the side facing prevailing winds will lose leaves first.
We have started work on plot 46 with the intention of turning it into a communal resource. To see how we have got to the stage shown above click here.
The next stage will be to level the plot - hopefully we may be able to persuade a nice man with a machine to help with this. If you are a man with a machine and you operate close to our site at Green Lane then we would love to meet you.
Once the site is level we propose to cover the plot with a weed suppressant membrane. We think that there may be sheets of this languishing on some of our tenants plots, after having been used on a temporary basis whilst new plots were knocked into shape, (the stuff that Phil acquired rolls of). If you have any of this material that we can use then please speak to Dunni on plot 51.
Ideas, for the plot, so far are to build storage bays for manure, chippings and poultry waste. We would like to build a sort of BBQ structure to enclose Barry's fires. If possible we would like to pave much of the area but cost may prohibit this. Unless you know of anyone who would like to donate some paving flags to us.
Other ideas so far include a few raised decorative flower beds to provide an attractive welcome to the site. Another suggestion has been for a sort of wooden gazebo structure that could be used for meetings or gatherings when the weather is a bit wet. Obviously all this will take time as we need to raise some funding for this. (I know that we are also trying to raise money for our fence but some awards for which fencing is not eligible may be open to us). If anyone knows of any cheap or even free sources of materials such as breeze blocks, paving, bricks or timber please let us know. As usual I will be writing letters to potential benefactors and will acknowledge anyone who supports us on the blog and web site. If you have ideas about what you would like to see in this area then post a comment here. Also anyone who would like to help with the development will be more than welcome.
I spoke to the Radio Leeds breakfast reporter today and he has confirmed that 
want to!!
Merci beaucoup pour les photos, Odette.
What about some photos from our other visitors from across the world?
By the way Odette, have you noticed that I have repaired the sign?
Just wonder if someone like this could be the culprit?
I haven't seen any squirrels on the site. Has anyone else? We certainly have some in the garden at home where they are busily stealing the peanuts put out for the birds and burying them. Click here to read about grey squirrels and view the video clip of a squirrel busy in our garden. Must admit we did encourage him or her. If squirrels are helping themselves to the hazel nuts then they are welcome to them. I took some home and they weren't paticularly nice.
Or what about this?
This was our broccoli at the end of August - it had suffered a caterpillar attack whilst we were on holiday. We removed the caterpillars and now, just a few weeks later, it looks like this.
Moral: Don't be too quick to pull it up and throw it away!! The 'pests' don't always win.
During the autumn and winter period we are going to clear this area and create a storage area for manure, wood chippings etc and any dumping will just make our task all the more difficult. Also the allotments' officer covers the cost of the rental of this plot on behalf of the allotment association on the understanding that it is used for the stated purpose.
Many plants benefit from regular dead heading and dahlias are one such plant. So which of the stems below would you cut out? Both of them - neither? Are you unsure then click here to read more.
Let's hope that we don't have an early frost or you could be dead heading for nothing!
August's diary is also complete click here to view
Back from holiday we found that the cabbages that we had planted just before we left had been devastated again!
Date and time of next meeting:
At the April meeting of the association people asked for meetings every two months. However problems over weather and holidays meant that the last meeting was poorly attended.
The next meeting is scheduled for the end of September beginning of October. To ensure that as many people as wish to can attend the meeting could I ask you to let Sue know of your preferences for date and times and those to avoid. For instance do you want to keep meetings on a Sunday and if so at what time? Would you prefer a midweek meeting in the evening and if so what time and day? Do we want meetings less frequently over the winter months? We are open to suggestions. It is pointless having a meeting if few attend as we don’t want to make any decisions without people having the chance to have their say. Could you please contact Sue either on site of by email greenlaneallotments@hotmail.co.uk by 1 September 2007.
Each competition costs £1 to enter.
Each individual competition will only be run if 3 or more people enter it.
The competition is scheduled to be held on Saturday 18th August. Is everybody happy with that date, or due to the weather we have had and its effect on the crops, do you want to move the date back into September?
Alastair is running the competitions so please either talk to Alastair as soon as possible or make a comment on this post (to ensure that comments come from plot holders on Green Lane please state your plot number in the comments).
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