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Today’s Allotment & Garden Diary | Stories, Tasks & Growing Moments
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Nov 13, 2024
📖 Today’s Tales from the Allotment and Garden! Every day brings a new story from the plot — small wins, surprises, and peaceful moments. 🌿😊 In this relaxed and chatty diary entry, I share what’s been happening today on the allotment and in the garden — the jobs I tackled, little observations, and thoughts on what’s growing, what’s changing, and what’s next. What’s your latest garden tale? #AllotmentTales #GardenDiary #GrowYourOwn #AllotmentLife #GardeningWithBen #GardenStories #UKGardener
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hello and welcome to gardening with
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previous episodes sit back grab a brew
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and let's enjoy today's
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episode hello and welcome back to
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gardening with Ben for a new episode
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well today it's Thursday and have I been
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busy down at the allotment today I
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certainly have and it was absolutely
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freezing when I got to the alotment this
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morning it was so bitter it was trying
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to rain it was just so cold but we got
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down there and we spent hours down there
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um absolutely loads of time down there
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today getting bits and Bobs done
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so what have we been up to today well I
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went to my favorite garden place where I
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always buy all my stuff from recently
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and I have purchased two blueberry
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bushes and
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some seed
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potatoes as I've grown blueberries for a
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couple of years now and they get really
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good uh blueberries on them but I've
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also created this new fruit area that
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I'm growing um all my strawberries in
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and my phoness blackberries and
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raspberries in and I thought I need
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something else to add in there um so I
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thought what can I get and I know
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blueberries are expensive to buy from
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the supermarket and I thought why not
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yeah they don't take much looking after
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so why not purchase some blueberries so
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I've purchased two more and I'm on the
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verge of attempting to buy another two
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uh to go in another spot so we'll have
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to see if we get them the only thing is
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with blue bries is that you need to
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plant them in
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acious compost or ous
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soil and the reason is that they prefer
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that sort of compost to survive and to
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get the crops that they need so the best
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tips and advice I always give for
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planting blue bries is to get your cous
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compost and plant them in large tubs now
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you can get tubs quite cheap these days
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these plastic ones and make sure that
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they've got holes in for the drainage so
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that they will obviously let the water
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out because you don't want them getting
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water logged or too wet and rot the
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roots on them so I've planted these two
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in tubs and I've sunk them into the
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ground now the reason why I sink them
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into the ground is because obviously
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when it gets windy it will um blow them
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over and you could damage them and lose
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the food off them and also if they sunk
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into the ground it's as if they like
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planted really they look part of the
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allotment and part of the attraction so
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they're in the ground and also they look
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less
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opportunistic if if I can say
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that if they were just stood on the
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allotment in pots who knows who would
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walking past and they just come and grab
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them and take them away and have free
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blueberry plants for themselves so yeah
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I SN them into the ground and I was
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talking to my plot neighbor today and he
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knows quite a bit about gardening and he
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was saying make sure you feed them with
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ericaceous feed and also that you can
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feed them with chicken pellets manure so
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I need to read up on that because it's
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got the nitrogen in it he says and they
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are good for blueberries uh so chicken
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I'll have to get some more because I've
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run out of them I know they're quite
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cheap as well to buy so we need to get
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some of those for the allotment as well
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because I usually feed my rhubarb with
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it as well uh I usually feed that at the
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beginning of the year so that could do
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with feeding this time of year as
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well and then I've bought my sea
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potatoes I have purchased ones that are
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called Charlotte and Nicola so two
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girls' names I purchased them ones
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as I've grown Charlotte in the past but
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I've never grown Nicola so I thought I'd
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give that one a try and see how they get
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on these are second earliest uh so it
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says to harvest them around 14 to 16
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weeks after you planted them so that
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should see us through summer I will be
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starting these off chitting them and
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getting them ready uh for planting out I
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usually plant out on Good Friday I stick
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to the old wife's tale of planted on
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good Friday yes I know Good Friday moves
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every year but it's to do with the moon
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and it's an old gardeners saying to
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plant them on Good Friday so that's what
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I've always done I always stick around
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that Daye and that's when I plant them
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all so I'm looking forward to getting
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those started so what else have we been
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up to well I'm currently in the process
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of getting all my plot cleared I've been
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working from the front of the plot and
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working my way to the back of the plot
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I'm I've cleared around all my fruit
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trees that's all done I've cleared
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around my rarb area they're all nice and
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ready for growing they're all popping
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the heads through I shared a picture on
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Instagram the other day of them
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gardening with Ben if you're not
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following me on
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Instagram so I've got all that cleared
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then I moved on to creating this new
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fruit area where I've been planting my
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strawberries I've planted absolutely
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loads of spring bulbs around it as well
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and I've I've also done my raspberries
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which are summer raspberries these are
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summer ones what I've uh popped up where
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they shouldn't do from my neighbor's
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plot so I've planted those I've planted
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my phoneless black bris which I'm
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looking forward to quite a few people
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were commenting on them yesterday uh
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saying that they're not too vicious when
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they're growing so we'll see how they
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get on and now we're moving on to my
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main plot area which will take a few
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weeks to get cracking on that area and
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get all that completed but it's not
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going to be as hard as the other areas
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cuz it's quite straightforward it's case
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of getting it all cleared I'm not
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digging around anything or protecting
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any plants or anything like that because
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it's where I grow everything uh that
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only grows once a year so I can like
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literally go in and demolition it all
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and just get it all cleared and tided
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and get it cracked on with real and
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they're all split up into beds where
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they are as well so I usually say I'll
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do four beds today or I'll do four beds
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tomorrow or something like that depends
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how long I stay down at the plot for and
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I actually stayed longer than I thought
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today because my plot neighbor was down
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like I said and it's always more
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encouraging when somebody else is down
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there at the side of you working on
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their plot you think ought stay down
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here if somebody else is down here and
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stay that a little bit longer and it
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certainly helps me get along with my
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plot and hopefully by the end of
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February my main plot area should be
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cleared that is my target to get my main
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plot cleared by the end of February and
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I'm well on the way to getting it done
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and getting on track with that so I'm
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looking forward to sharing that once
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photo of it once it is completely
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cleared and show you what it looked like
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before cuz it did look a mess uh it got
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the old sunflowers growing in it and
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everything so yeah hopefully in a couple
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of weeks it will look brilliant and then
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I can move on to the jobs inside my shed
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and it's Cas of getting all new shelving
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up getting all of it swept and cleared
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and hopefully fingers crossed I'm going
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to give it a good liquor paint this year
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and Spruce it up and make it look nicer
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uh because it does need a bit of TLC and
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Care inside it and it needs a lot of
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improvements doing to it uh it's been up
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quite a few years now so it's looking a
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bit derilict inside if you must say uh
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but yeah we're wanting to get them sort
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of jobs done and then my poly tunnel as
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well um I didn't use my poly tunnel like
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I said last year and hopefully like this
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year I'm going to be growing melons
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Peppers chilies cucumbers Tomatoes Au
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jeans all inside my polyon also so I'm
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looking forward to sharing all that with
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you from uh the plot from what I'm
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getting up to
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really so yeah it has been a busy four
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days down at the plot we have certainly
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cracked on getting it all done there's
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still so much to get done and I'm adding
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adding adding lots more flowers that
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come back year after year and my auntie
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and uncle came down today and I was
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showing them my campola what I planted
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and they were saying how much it spread
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on their Garden when they had it and it
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looked fantastic so I'm looking forward
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to that taking hold this year as well
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and starting to spread and fill up all
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the soil gaps and stuff like that and I
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was even nearly tempted to get some more
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gladiol light bulbs today so I may get
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some more uh soon I saw two packets for
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£9 and there was 50 in a pack so it be
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like 100 gladi eye bulbs and they'd look
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absolutely fantastic in one of the
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flower beds just all gladiol eyes it
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would look absolutely
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stunning obviously it take quite a bit
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to hold them all up once they've all
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grown because uh they do start to bend
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and Sway and stuff like that uh my
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grandma she used instead of using rubber
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bands she used to use her old tights and
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cut them into rubber bands uh because
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they were a bit more gentle on the
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plants so that's a little gardening tip
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there for you uh use all tights and cut
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them up and make your own rubber bands
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out of them not that I can be doing that
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cuz I don't wear tights only at a
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weekend but yeah um I've enjoyed talking
10:27
about what I've been up to down at the
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allotment on these podcasts for the last
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few days obviously like I say I'm back
10:35
at work tomorrow so there will be
10:37
pre-recorded episodes talking about
10:39
different gardening tips and hints
10:42
sharing them with you if you've not
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listened to my other podcast where I
10:46
just talk about hints gardening hints
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and tips I talk about a different
10:50
subject each episode please do check
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that out it is in the link of this
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description on this podcast called
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