Site improvements for the Association

Thursday 3rd November
I was planning a visit to the plot this afternoon when I got a call from the farmer to say he could come to the site with his tractor shovel. I had been waiting for this call as there were a couple of important jobs the committee wanted doing.
I arrived to find him waiting so we set to. It took him very little time to tidy up all the manure/house litter bins, something a team of volunteers on the working party would have taken hours to complete.
It also has the advantage that he lifts the oldest and best manure that is at the bottom up to where you can get at it. Just unhitch the rope from the post if it is in the way but please replace it as it marks the limits for when manure is tipped.
I then got him to smooth out an abandoned plot that was very rough ready for it to be re-let. It took him a little while but when he had finished it was clear smooth earth. I think someone on the waiting list will jump at it.
After that he took several bucket loads of road stone round to the first track and filled most of the pot holes that we didn't fill last time he came.
Finally he finished off the couple of hours we had booked by putting a couple of buckets full of horse litter on the plot of a member who is working very hard to maintain his plot but would struggle to barrow enough in to mulch his plot for the winter.
Once the tractor had gone there was just enough time in the gathering gloom for me to pull up the last of the French beans as last night's frost had got them.

​I also picked another small crop of autumn raspberries. The frost had decimated the beans and the dahlias and some of the asparagus fronds on other plots but mine are still green and wafting all over the pathway so I will be glad when I can cut them down.

Planting the rest of the shallots and autumn onions will have to wait until my next visit.