Order! Order!

 ... (or so they say in the shambles that is our system of democracy...)

 

So, this long and eagerly awaited email is to remind you that it is not time to rest on your growing laurels.  Instead, you will undoubtedly be tidying away the last of this year’s triumphs in the vegetable patch, putting your beds to ... er ... bed and already planning how you will increase your yields and defeat the aphid army, in a totally environmentally friendly manner.

 

Firstly: Technology permitting, next year’s Potato Order form.  Once again we have reduced the total quantities of stuff that we are ordering, to try to match the demands of the past few years.  With this in mind, we would seriously urge you to pre-order as soon as possible in order to secure your preferences, although we will probably still be able to offer some for sale in February.  If you want, you can email your order to us, or visit us at the hut on a Sunday morning.  Onions, garlic, shallots etc are also on the list.  Ooooh, and there is a rumour that the ever-popular bucket/potato competition will be making a return.

 

Secondly: The Kings Seed order will be being placed on November 15^th, or thereabouts.  For a handling fee of £1.30, we hope to be able to offer members a discount of 50% off vegetable, herb and flower seeds, assuming that our order totals more than £200 altogether.  Your order needs to be submitted by ourselves in order to qualify and, again, you can email this to us, or beat a path to the hut.  We can build a little bit of flexibility into the date, but don’t want to repeat the excitement that we lived through earlier this year.  Please let us know if you are running late AND please contact us if you do not receive acknowledgement of your order within 14 days of sending it to us. 

 

Thirdly: We have had a delivery of Peat Free Compost this week -  Bloom and Gro Organic Peat Free 40L. It is new to the market!

 

Finally, it has been lovely to see an increasing number of visitors to the hut, and to meet new allotment holders from both near and further afield.  We look forward to seeing you sometime soon, and socially distanced cups of tea are on offer once more,

 

Get them orders in!

 

 

Seed Potato Order Form

 

It has been sow long

 Autumn planting onions and garlic

These were available to purchase from the hut from Sunday, September 12^th. Because of the unpredictability of the numbers of customers that we are getting, once again we have only placed a small order.  I’m sure that you will appreciate that we need to cover our costs and it is always a tricky balancing act making sure that we are not left with unsold perishable items.

The hut is currently open from around 10am until 12 noon. Sunday.  As usual, cash only.

 

Kings Seeds Allotment Scheme

In spite of the large amount of unwanted tension and excitement earlier this year, we are proposing to repeat our participation in this scheme again for the 2022 season! (If you partook in this rollercoaster ride of seed buying, you will understand where I’m coming from!) Kings Seeds offer a good range of very reasonably priced vegetable, herb and flower seeds, and give allotment societies a generous discount. If we collate a seed order between us that is worth more than £200 we will be able to pass on to you a 50% discount, give or take a £1.30 handling fee.  At the moment we only have one real paper catalogue between us, but I can obtain more if there is interest.  You can also view their full range on their website.

If you do decide to dip your toe in this lily pond of opportunity, please note that we are bringing forward the ordering date to November 15^th , so that we can breathe during January, February and March.... we will not be able to guarantee any discount after November 15^th .

If you would like more details as to how to order, please email or call at the hut, remembering that we will need to place your order on your behalf. 

 

Volunteers

Our team is now very much at skeleton level!  If you would like to put on weight by sharing some cake, and burn it off again immediately by heaving compost around, please make yourself known to us!

 

Compost

We now , once again, have Clover, Growell and John Innes composts, but have not been able to secure any deliveries of Peat Free Compost to date, because of both production and transportation issues.  We are aware that many gardeners are trying to avoid the use of peat, and we will be getting peat free compost as soon as we are able.

Compost Pricing Update

Please find below recent update from our main supplier:-

"Just to add a little more to this year’s challenge, the worst peat harvest in Northern Europe for 15 years, very heavy and dense peat, Environmental Legislation vastly reducing the amount of peat available in the Republic of Ireland and the global interruption of supply of coir, horticultural textiles and plant pots caused by the pandemic will result in us all going to have a roller coaster of a year"

 Compost Manufacturing Update

"Clover. Clover has stopped manufacturing Clover 75ltr Multi-purpose, 3 & 4 plant gro-bags and bales of peat. This is down to the weight/density of the peat and conserving peat socks for professional products. This situation is likely to continue until they can harvest some dry peat in hopefully June/July.  The 60ltr Clover Multi Purpose are still available.

Gro-Well. Due to the lack of availability of quality, fresh water washed coir, we have replaced the coir element in our multi purpose with Fibagro, a Professional Woodfibre Substrate.

This product will appear in a natural form because it is an unnecessary process to dye it brown. The advantages of Fibagro are that reduces nutrient leaching, provides an excellent nutrient base for good rooting and improved water holding capacity.

 

Price Increases

Nobody likes price increases but in the current climate they were going to happen. Unfortunately, the days of quality, cheap compost are over. We have kept increases to a minimum but cannot guarantee that these prices will not have to increase again as the cost of transport, manufacturing under Covid secure conditions and the availability of raw materials start to be reviewed by the manufacturers across the world"

Potato and Onion Orders

All orders are available for socially distanced collection tomorrow between 10am and 12 noon.

Update

In the light of the current lockdown, the hut will remain closed for the next few weeks.

If things go to plan, depending on the weather, and on our suppliers, we expect potatoes to be delivered during the last week of January.  With this in mind, we will ask anyone who has ordered potatoes (and other items) to collect them from us on the weekend following their arrival – probably either January 23rd or January 30th.  Once we know for certain, we will let you know, and will provide details as to exactly how and at what time we would like you to fetch them.

We are aware that there are often members who have not pre-ordered, and who would normally pop in to buy off the shelf!  I am sure that you will appreciate the possible difficulties with this, this year.  As soon as we know what surplus stocks we have, we will email out again, and work out some sort of system for making them available to those who want them.

Similarly, if you have ordered seeds through the Kings Seeds scheme we will contact you directly as soon as they have arrived with collection, or delivery details!

 

On this rather cold, dreary and damp day in January, summer days seem like an awful long way in the future.  Once again, it seems very unlikely that we will be able to stage a full-scale plant sale in May, but we are trying to work out if there are other ways in which we could possibly match up plants with people. Suggestions welcome!

 

Needless to say, we continue to hope that you, and your loved ones, are safe and well, and wish you a Very Happy New Year!