www.oldfieldallotments.wordpress.com
E-mail: [email protected]
Edition 6
April 2010
CALENDAR
Coach Trip to Hyde Hall Gardens…..26th June
Produce Competition and Barbecue…7th August
with the barbecue beginning at 3.30pm, see our
website for fuller details.
NEWS FROM YOUR GARDEN SHOP
SPRING
IS
HERE
Start your spring savings by shopping locally, visit
your Garden Shop.
HELP the PLANET. Save petrol, shop locally.
The opening hours are now:
Saturdays: 10.00am to 1.00pm
Wednesdays: 5.00pm to 7.00pm
Our prices are on average 20% cheaper than
Garden Centres.
Please have a look at our products and
competitive prices on our web site:
Oldfieldallotments.wordpress.com
or come and visit us.
All seeds minimum 10% to 20% cheaper than
Garden Centres.
Test your soil for all major nutrients, to plan your
fertilizer application accordingly.
Test £5.00 – Ask in the shop.
Are you considering raised beds? We have used
scaffold boards in stock, at low prices.
If you require any items not in stock, let us know
and we will try to find it for you.
Looking forward to seeing you.
Poul Kristensen
COACH TRIP TO RHS Hyde Hall
On Saturday 26th June 2010
Cost £14.00 per person, to be confirmed
depending on numbers. Entrance to the
Gardens is free.
Queen Mothers Garden
Meadow and Dry Garden
Herbaceous and Rose Borders
Landscape Gardens
Ponds and Lakes
Clover Hill
Mediterranean Day
Vegetable Garden
Australian and New Zealand Garden
Refreshments and Shop
And much, much more
Check the website:
http://www.rhs.org.uk/Gardens/Hyde-Hall
We visit the gardens on the 26th June which coincides
with a Mediterranean day event being held at Hyde
Hall.
“Mediterranean food is bursting with colours and full
of taste so join for a celebration of continental culinary
including food stall, live cookery demonstrations and
specialist advice”
To book a place please see Kristine or Poul, in the
shop. Strictly first come first served.
Marian and Guy Hillman
Ponds and Their Life
The ditches of my youth have been piped away or
filled in for ‘safety’, and many wetlands that do
survive suffer from fertiliser run-off and chemical
over-spray. A pond gives a means of helping wildlife
survive, and the life it brings will enrich enjoyment
and bring your allotment added benefits.
I now have two quite different ponds, and these have
attracted frogs, toads, two types of newt, pond
beetles, waterboatmen, pond skaters, water snails,
and outside of the winter months, all the different
types of fly like dragonflies.
Hoverflies, lacewings, damselflies and dragonflies all
feed on the small and flying insects, and help keep the
white, black and green fly under control, and cheaply
too. Toads and frogs will feed on small slugs and
snails. You will find constant visitors because of the
water, that also keeps pests at bay – birds that eat
midges, flies, slugs and snails. Add to this the constant
humming of both honey and bumble bees to drink,
and I always have fantastic crops of beans and peas
etc.
Remember that our friendly Heron loves amphibians,
and their spawn and tadpoles – so I put a bean net
over mine – this keeps the heron out, but lets flies,
bees etc to enter easily.
Pick up any wood or stone within a short distance
from the pond, and with a little patience, you will
notice a ‘city’ full of different insects – these places
are especially important to insects such as ladybirds
during the winter – they will reward you by gobbling
those black and green fly during the summer!
Fill your new pond with clean rain water if possible
(that stuff from the tap is OK for cleaning, but it is so
full of chemicals you’ll have to leave it for a week to
evaporate out), and then ask an existing pond owner
for a bucket of ‘pond water’ and some weed to get it
going.
There are also water scorpions in my lower pond –
presumably they naturally migrated from the
wetlands – sounds far too cold for ‘scorpions’ in this
climate, but these are native here, and no longer
enjoy the abundance they once did. So we are helping
conservation as well as ourselves. They are very small,
probably maximum 1 inch (or 2.5cm for the younger
set) in length and sort of oblong looking with small
pincers from the head. They can nip you if you walk
through a pond or ditch barefooted, but not so you
would really notice.
It will soon be spring and I can’t wait to check this
years frog and toad spawn – remember the jars at
school? This may sound ‘just for fun’, but they do say
that the higher the spawn is in the pond the wetter
the early summer will be! So if I can’t see the spawn
because it is deep, then more water butts will be
needed, not a problem we’ve had for a few years!
AND please remember, birds need water to bathe in
even during the coldest of weather – it helps them to
fluff up their feathers really well, and so keep
themselves warmer. So just a bird bath that is not
frozen will attract birds to your allotment, where they
can wheedle out the slug eggs, woodlice etc for you.
Whilst any area of water will be beneficial, there are
some guidelines if you want to create one that frogs,
toads, damselflies, dragonflies etc will breed in.
Make it have at least one good dip that is minimum 18
inches deep, for survival under ice. Either make the
edges shallow, for amphibian access, or put plenty of
large stones around the edges which can then be used
to crawl out on, or hide under.
And never far from our minds, health and safety,
so something to keep young children from getting
near or falling in PLEASE.
Joanne Jackson
Addendum to the article on Eelworms (Nematodes)
see February Newsletter
Stomata = are small openings, many of which are
found in the epidermal layers of plants, allowing
access for carbon dioxide and the exchange of water
vapours.
Lentical = is a pore in the stem of a woody plant,
showing as a raised spot that may be filled with a
powdery substance. This pore permits air to reach the
tissues below the surface.
Rhizosphere = is an area of interaction between the
surface of a plant root and the area surrounding it.
Bacteria and other micro-organisms as well as soil
debris fill the area.
Stuart & Paula Lawrence
On Saturday 1st May at 10.00 the Ken Acock centre
hosts “ A taster day for new beekeepers”. Tea and
coffee provided, but please bring your own picnic.
Cost is £10pp, [email protected] or tel:
020 8864 3296
Ann Fox
To keep printing costs down, please forward a small
message to say that you would like to receive future
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e-mail.
Thanks, Kristine Kristensen
E-mail address: [email protected]