The spraying has worked!

These photos taken yesterday (November 16th) show that the spraying we did has worked really well and is starting to kill off most of the perennial weeds. We'll plough as soon as the ground has dried out a bit after the recent downpours.

The border at the far end of the site:



The border at the lane end:



We missed a bit:

Better photos!

I had wanted to keep this blog chronological, but Martyn Wright just sent me these photos he took earlier in the year and I had to post them as they are such nice pictures - all the ones I have taken so far are terrible!

This is the site as seen in the spring:



Here is the view from the site down to the village:



And this was taken on the path just up from the site back in bluebell season:

Photos of the site - November 2009

I took these this morning, almost three weeks after Martyn and I sprayed the field with Roundup. Very pleased to see that all the vegetation is yellowing nicely. We'll probably wait another week or so before ploughing.

A brief outline on the project so far..

I originally had the idea of starting a new allotment site for East Garston in spring 2008 and it didn’t take long to find others who were equally enthusiastic. By summer we had formed an informal group and had the support of the parish council. In April 2009 we finally found a site, five minutes from the village in a tranquil spot on Gold Hill. On 4th August 2009 the East Garston Allotment Association was officially formed and we then opened a bank account, started applying for grants and began the initial preparations to the site. The field was topped and sprayed with Roundup and we cleared the lane sufficiently to allow vehicle access. On 1st November we signed a five year (minimum) lease on the site.

Photos of the site - July 2009

These pics were taken just after the field was topped for the first time - a week earlier there had been 5ft high nettles, dock, couch grass and brambles covering the whole site.