Grow your own freegan shed  − 31 January, 2007 - 10 February, 2007

newbluedoor (February 10, 2007. 04:28pm)

Today while I was wattling and daubing a group of 3 youths (Y10ish) were messing around on the other allotments and eventually started throwing brussell sprouts at me from various hiding places! I was concerned that if I shouted at them or threatened them they would trash my plot when I left. In the end I calmly asked them why they were throwing things at me. They ran off swearing, but not very far. After another 15mins of them skulking around the edge of my allotment I asked if they wanted to do some digging, they ran off again. Another 15 mins later they came back and asked where I wanted them to dig, I didn't have a spare spade but they were interested to know what I was doing and it turned out one of them went to a local school where my wife teaches and was in a band and played guitar and followed one of my boy's band and the younger one did graphics wanted to know how was I going to make a profit on my allotment if I couldn't sell my veg and the other one's dad had an allotment once and they were making a pond in their back garden for Koi and what had I planted there and how did the paper-crete work and would I be back tomorrow and how many children did I have and... I am a bit nervous suggesting that they seemed like nice kids - cause they may well have trashed my plot after I left - but I don't think so, but I think I would have felt quite threatened if I was, older, or not a teacher...

newbluedoor (February 11, 2007. 06:49pm)

I went back to the allotment yesterday afternoon and my 3 allotment buddies were there again digging away and obviously had been for some time. I had explained what I thought I might do to create a bed and path round the totem pole I'd found in the undergrowth and they had done a great job of leveling and turning over the soil and having clocked that I had used old bits of wood as retainers around a path, were in the process of laying out the path. They had wheelbarrow, forks and spades and were very happy. We discussed using some of the old tiles I'd found on the site instead of wood and I showed them how to use a level to make sure it wasn't all wonkey and by the end of the afternoon we had the first chipings down to form the path.

I was speaking to my Mum about it this morning and she said she wasn't at all surprised that they were engaged, look at you she said, you've had to take on an allotment in order to satisfy your need to dig, where do kids go to dig these days, you can't do it in the park, your garden at home is either block paviers or decked, and there's no room for buckets and spades in your carry-on luggage when you fly off to Spain for your summer holidays. She suggested that it might be a good idea to offer them a corner of the allotment to dig and grow their own stuff and that if it proves successful the council might like to turn over one of the other unused plots for the local kids....

newbluedoor (February 11, 2007. 06:52pm)

When I got up to the allotment on Sunday afternoon, they were there again, this time mashing up the papier-mached yellow pages I had left to soak in an old dustbin, they had tried to get it to stick on the stuff I had already put up but it wouldn't work very well because it didn't have any cement in the mix. We talked about my plan to grow grass over the structure and they thought this was weird but OK, and how I had no idea if any of this stuff was going to work but that it was fun to experiment, and what we might add to the paper to give the grass something to feed on (sand, soil, compost,...) They then helped to clear the couch grass from the next bed, and struggling to wheel the barrow with the roots up onto the heap, they engineered a better ramp.

I then suggested they might like a corner of the site for themselves. They were amazed/delighted (I really don't think they are taking the piss) "what and grow our own stuff - like tomatoes?" "where would we get the seeds?" "Would we really be allowed? "Could we eat them?" "sell them?" "grow eggs?" "no you prat they come out of chickens arses..." We agreed a bit for them to have and they started clearing.

I had to leave at 3-30 and they were all still beavering away. I am a bit worried about where their tools have come from (they assure me they have brought them from home). I am a bit worried that I ought to check with their parents that it's OK (what would I think about my boys hitching up with some weird old bloke messing around on an allotment?). And I am immensely amused, and depressed at the attitude of the other allotmentees. While I went off to the car to pick up another fork the 3 of them nipped off and hid, as they revealed themselves and walked back to my plot the guy who has one of the adjoining plots came back to his house in his car, noticed the kids, leapt out all apoplectic, "get of my ground, sod off, don't go on there..." Hum I thought... not sure what he will make of my encouraging them to dig in the ground if they are not allowed to walk on it.

newbluedoor (February 14, 2007. 05:05pm)

I have been looking for a cheap way to put a sedum green roof on the shed. I have been scouring the internet and it's not going to be as chap as I thought (about £40 per m2 from http://www.enviromat.co.uk/) in the end I decided to bite the bullet and invest in a square meter which I figured I could probably break up and propagate into a bigger area, so I filled out the oder form online and it wanted £60 delivery! (explaining that they only did it by the pallet and I could have another 50m2 for the same delivery fee) so I phoned up to see if they had a local depot where I could pick it up from, and I get put through to a garden centre in Sundridge. When I ask for details of how to get there the bloke gives the centre name as Richard Able garden supplies and it turns out he's my old Scout leader, who showed me how to (amongst other life altering things) gut a fish, skin a rabbit, remove the entrails from a chicken without contaminating the flesh, build service and crash go-carts, set fire to all manner of things, make super8 movies, animate with a pin on old super8 film stock, get lost in the dark 3 miles from your home, row the wrong way on a 6 man whaler crew, build (and fall off - and set fire to!) enormous structures made out of poles and rope... now I come to think of it, I had thought my 'waking-up' was down to art and English at school, but I started scouts a year before I went to secondary school, and clearly owe a lot to Richard ("Tubs") Able (I wonder if he's seen the League of Gentlemen?)

newbluedoor (February 18, 2007. 07:14pm)

Ho hum, knew it was too good to last - yesterday when I went up to the allotment the totem pole had been removed. I looked in all the overgrown bits around the site but couldn't find it. Simon suggested that perhaps the original owner had come come back for it. I'm not so sure as the allotment has obviously been fallow for a number of years. It's not a problem as I now have an excuse to make my own totem pole (and this time I'll make sure it's firmly fixed into the ground). More worryingly today some of the window wattling I did last week had been trashed and the lime paper-crete, which does not go off as fast as the daub made wirth portland cement, had been scratched off and poked through with sticks. It's all repairable and I've cleared away all the bits of timber this afternoon, it's just a bit depressing. I mentioned this to Tristram hoping it wasn't the allotment helpers, who I've not seen for 2 weekends now, he suggested it was probably a rival gang and that I was porbably the victim of some sort of turf war (ouch!)

newbluedoor (March 6, 2007. 07:08am)

My allotment helpers were beck when I went up to the allotment today, as I arrived I was confronted by a very angry other allotment holder I had not met before "ARE THESE YOUR CHILDREN?" he screamed as he charged across 2 plots... seemed they had been throwing stuff at him too... he took the "hit them with a shovel" approach rather than the more teacherly inclusive attitude. "AND THEY HAVE STOLEN MY FORK AND SHOVEL" he continued. Meanwhile allotment helpers taunt him "shouldn't be so fat" "we never threw nothing" "it's our shovel" In between I tried to explain that they were not my children but that I had offered a corner of the plot to them so they could dig. Eventually I managed to stop everyone shouting at each other and the bloke went back to his allotment and the kids went back to digging (with the blokes spade!) on their bit.

I then wandered over and had a calmer conversation with the bloke, he seemed like a nice guy and was obviously seriously pissed off but I also think a little frightened. I explained that I had thought that involving the kids might have meant they would be less likely to trash my plot, but that I wasn't sure this had worked as my shed was still being vandalised and that they had thrown stuff at me the first time I had seen them and I was sure it was his spade. He said he didn't mind about the spade or them messing about on his allotment it was throwing stuff he didn't like and that this had been going on for a couple of weeks and he had called the police the first time it had happened (but they had done nothing) and he came up here for a bit of peace and quite and they had said I was their Dad and it was their family plot and that they had been messing around in the shed and that the totem pole was in the undergrowth on a plot further down the hill....

I said I would have "words" and if they continued to throw things at him I would take the bit of plot I had offered them back. I then went and chatted to the kids, I still don't think they are malicious, just unthinking, I explained that some people (including me) didn't like having stuff thrown at them, and that I was pleased to have their help but that it was difficult for me to to defend them if they upset the other people with allotments, particularly if they threw stuff at them... "we never threw nothing" OK I said but you did throw stuff at me, and I suggested that I didn't care what had happened in the past but that even if it wasn't them it would have to stop in the future. And then we had a chat about designing, they all want to be designers (I didn't start this) and one of them has planted onion and carrot seeds at home (do I believe this?) and they did a bit more digging and then said "se ya Tony" and sauntered off... Blimey its just like 5PX metalwork all over again!

newbluedoor (April 1, 2007. 01:51pm)

I have been searching for somewhere to get mushroom compost. The soil on the allotment is very sandy and needs something to stop it dring out so fast. I have just discovered a mushroom farm in Fawkam, just down the road from Gravesend, they deliver and are less than half the price of the other suppliers I have managed to Google so far. Phone them up last week and they delivered 3 cubic meters today. When the guy arrived we got talking and it seems they have had to diversify as the market for mushrooms is not as good as it was. He explained that they were branchinf out into straw bale building and were in the process of building a new eco unit on the site. They were up to roof level with the bales and not sure what to do to span and cover the roof (my kind of organic approach to building - not sure what the planning officer thinks?) I pointed out my paper-mache shed and he was interested in the sedum roof. Seemed his business partner was off looking at some at a local supplier, "you mean Richard Able, I said", "You know Richard?" he said quite surprised, I explained that i had got my seedum from him and that many years ago he had been my scout leader, "bugger me" he said "used to live next door to Richard on Farningham Hill, my kids went to scouts with him in Crockenhill"
It is a reasuringly small world. I now have an invite to go and play straw bale building next week...