New Routes: January 2009

by Jill Coleman

One of the nicest things about getting through the post-Christmas/new year doldrums is seeing the days start to get fractionally lighter and longer because you know that the year has turned and that Spring is heading towards us.

Despite the bitter start to the month, things have been a lot more pleasant over the last couple of weeks down on the New Routes Project and we have managed to get a lot more work done outside.

The gardeners have been clearing their raised beds to plant out onion and garlic sets and to sow some early seeds, such as carrots, radish and salad leaves. We finally got those last beds filled up with topsoil, and there is enough left to top up the other beds. We use a topsoil/mushroom compost mix that we have delivered from a local farm, and it’s lovely stuff, packed full of well rotted organic material and nutrients and perfect for retaining the moisture in the raised beds.

Groundworks Mersey Valley have almost completed their remit as far as the Community Orchard is concerned, so they will be withdrawing in the next few weeks. It will be sad to see Liz and the team go after all this time, and it’s also a little daunting to think that we have complete responsibility for all of those trees.

We have a few workshops left, including a pruning workshop, and they will leave us well equipped with the tools and knowledge to carry on the job.

The seed potatoes that we picked up last month are now all chitting away in the polytunnel, getting a head start for when we plant them in March. We have actually sown some of our first earlies in big tubs and sturdy bin bags in the tunnel. We grew a fairly good crop of spuds like this last year, and it’s a lot easier for those among our learners who can’t dig. We plant the seed potatoes in the bottom third of the tubs, then earth up as they start to sprout. Come June we can just tip them out and pick the crop out of the compost. Although this worked fine for the early varieties, the tub-grown maincrops we disappointing last year, so we will be planting them in the allotment as usual.

We like to give ourselves a project each year. Last year it was the raised beds. This year we are focusing on an undeveloped part of the site which we want to develop into a circular Healing Garden, with willow fencing, (yet more!) raised beds, a pergola-covered seating area and a water feature. In truth, this will take us more that a year to construct and we are only at the planning and costing stage. It’s very much a case of watch this space!