Cutting Weeds
It was high time we cut down the worst of the weeds in our allotment - so I took matters into my own hands… but eventually got a lot of great company and an amazing feeling of satisfaction!
Chapter 3: Cutting Weeds
It was definitely time - from being so excited about the allotment officially being ours, lots of time had passed and no day ever seemed to be a good day for down-prioritising work, house work or child related tasks to do anything at our allotment. But the lack of progress, and the need for something to be done about clearing it before it got too late in the year, was niggling at me.
One day, as soon as our son went down for his nap, I popped over to our neighbours’ house (we are both house neighbours and allotment neighbours!) and asked if I could borrow their weed trimmer. Our lovely neighbour Adam showed me how it worked (thank god, I’ve never used anything like it in my life and would have been pretty lost!), by giving me a quick demo in their garden. They let me know that they were going to come up and do work on their plot later too, so I would see them there. They have a son just a few months younger than ours, so I mentioned this to my husband and said he should bring our little one up to see us when he woke up!
Then off I went, up the hill carrying a long, heavy petrol trimmer. I already felt like a gardener and I hadn’t done a second of work! Arriving at the allotment I looked around at the tall grass and massive ragworts growing everywhere. “You’re all going down”, I told them, and started up the trimmer. I felt a bit bad for the people in the surrounding houses for having to listen to the noise, but then realised that this is probably a very familiar sound to them - maybe one they don’t even notice anymore, living by a bunch of allotments!
Cutting down all the tall weeds felt incredible! I’d pictured it for so long, and here I was, Rambo-ing them all down. With a lot of my time being spent looking after a child, doing work sat down in my studio or doing housework, this was just such a welcome change, and really good for my body and soul. As luck would have it, it was a really beautiful, sunny day too! I put the trimmer down after about 45 minutes to take a quick break and my hands were shaking. I had not realised how hard work it was to hold that heavy thing up for so long - clearly not work I’m used to and I gained a newfound respect for people whose job it is to do something like that all day!
My neighbours popped by on the way to their allotment to see how I was getting on, and shortly after my husband and son joined us as well. I took our little one blackberry picking around the plot while my husband, who was eager to try the trimmer too (I don’t blame him, it’s not work he gets to do often either!), finished up the job brilliantly by going over the areas where I’d cut down the taller weeds with a bit more detail, which uncovered the ground and raised/lowered areas of the allotment even more. It was great to get an even clearer picture of how the garden had been used previously. And this will tell you how tall some of the weeds were; from clearing it we discovered that there is actually a second apple tree there too! Much smaller, and not yielding any apples yet, but it looked healthy and promising.
Now we were left with huge piles of cut down weeds and grass, disposing of which would be our next challenge. But I guess that is how it continues with an allotment, and I’m learning that with life’s other demands things will have to be done bit by bit, one day here and one day there. But knowing that those pesky ragworts aren’t dominating the plot anymore is hugely satisfying.
Like before, I very much welcome all tips, big and small, about gardening, allotment practices, weeding, growing… all of it! Please do share, I will be so happy to hear from you. You can comment below or email me!
