Allotment update June 2026
It’s our 26th season at Bushy Park Allotments and I am reminded, mostly by the stifled grunts and groans from plots 5 & 6, of the passing years and the amount of effort it takes to grow food while keeping a semblance of ‘control’.
There have been highs and lows and if I’m honest, the occasional, slight resentment over the amount of time we must devoted to get a half-decent return from a garden that takes a bit of effort and organisation to get to. However, it continues to nourish and sustain us, both literally and metaphorically and perhaps more noticeably in a world with higher levels of consternation than the one we knew over a quarter of a century ago.
Notable landmarks include…
2000 – 2006 – Early years finding our feet. Making sheds. Protecting crops. Disputes with unsavoury rogues stealing, poaching or intimidating elderly tenants in order to take their plots. Not exactly the good life we’d expected but eventually resolved by one brave heart who we are happy and privileged to know.
2006 – A Chelsea year. Monthly diary for Gardens Illustrated with photos by Howard Sooley. Happy days and memorable lunches.
2008 – A Chelsea year. Also…something I can’t divulge just yet but, amazingly, still bubbling on the back-burner.
2010 – Completion of a homemade pizza oven but, to be honest, a duff year after a sudden and unexpected bereavement.
2011 – A Chelsea year. Publication of ‘Our Plot’ celebrating a decade of allotment gardening (Frances Lincoln).
2012 – Another Chelsea year. The plot takes a back seat once again and suffers as a consequence.
2015 – Adopting a vegan ethic. Ditching animal derived inputs to garden veganically.
2020 – 2021 (Covid years) – Like many others, our most fruitful year ever having the good fortune and privilege to be able to use it during lockdown. Our level of engagement, enjoyment and observation there is elevated significantly by the absence of traffic noise accentuating the coming and goings of wildlife sharing our patch.
2023 – 2024 – Hiatus. Chelsea in 2023 and heart surgery (for atrial fibrillation) in 2024, kept me away from the allotment through the crucial months of May and June. Two consecutive years of relative inactivity during these important months in the grower’s calendar finally resulted in us getting our first warning letter from the council.
Embarrassing as it was, it came as no surprise (I emailed back “what took you so long?”) the plot really did look more like a re-wilding project than a veg garden. We were still using it as a retreat and even though the council acknowledged our photographic evidence that wildlife was flourishing due to our inactivity, we resolved to make more of an effort so as not to risk losing the plot.
Fertility
Interestingly, the two ley years helped boost productivity in 2025 and this has inspired us to refine our strategy to improve fertility as veganic gardeners.
Before 2015 much of our fertility came from home-made compost and green manure. We also found that woodchip used on paths could, after a few years, be used as mulch and even potting compost. By and large this remains the same except that our home-made compost doesn’t include horse manure which from local stables, a useful free resource to bulk up our reserves.
Currently we have three compost heaps which, in theory at least, are used in rotation. Lately we’ve refrained from using the largest heap from fear of disturbing grass snakes we’ve seen there. The plan was to turn the heap last year in late August this year but hornets made a home there and this year wasps have moved in, no doubt making good use of cavities within the heap made by rodents. The earliest we can now use it is November/December but the concern will be whether snakes are hibernating. It might sound like “dilemmas of a vegan gardener” but surely these are the sort of concerns any gardener should have if we are genuinely invested in our concern for wildlife?
Our limited supply of home-made compost means that our aspirations to adopt no-dig as part of our fertility program have never really got off the ground. Step-over fruit trees bounding vegetable beds have compounded the problem by harbouring roots of couch grass making it impossible to get rid of completely.
Recently though, after attending a one day course with Eddie Bailey at Rhizophyllia, we’ve made two ‘Johnson Su’ compost heaps using 1.5m high x 1.2m diameter rings of 50mm galvanised mesh. These were filled with alternate layers of green waste and woodchip and two should be available come spring 2027. Maybe then we’ll be better equipped to give no dig another go.
Until then we’ll use green manures among crops and on any bare ground. Phacelia (our favourite as it’s so versatile) and crimson clover are used in the summer. Grazing rye and winter tares in the winter for any beds that would otherwise lay bare. Buckwheat has been a bit hit and miss for some reason and I haven’t quite worked out why but slugs are the most likely reason.
Chop and drop is something we’re trying among crops that are established but again with one eye on how this might boost the slug population. In theory it will also improve the beetle population and things will achieve some sort of balance but I fear the scale is too small and that slugs will get the upper hand.
Considering the tough year they’ve had so far with another dry spring, it’s hard to feel resentful.
