It's what brothers are for

Back at the allotment today and we make our usual pre-gardening walk about. 53 looked OK except the rabbits had been nibbling at the steps of the fig, I then opened the gate to 51/52 and had the great shock of a present left by Ted tied to the door handle of the greenhouse.

When we saw him we showed our gratitude and interest in his trapping of them and what he did with them next but wandered back thinking what on earth do we do now.



Only one thing for it........ the cavelry was called.





Those of you who are squeemish stop reading now.





It didn't take long for them to be skinned and prepared. It is a shame that we don't know any way of preparing the skins as they are so thick and fluffy at this time of year.

I was rather pleased to see that we have trendly rabbits at the allotment as once their coats are off they are kitted out in the greatest ski boots with matching tail! (click on the image for a closer look)

This is a reminder of why I love the allotment so much!

5.30p.m. Canary Wharf station on the Jubilee line.

More disaster

We are totally stumped by the rabbit situation. We wedged the gate shut so that they couldn't get in through there but it seems that there is another way in. Total inspection of the fence undertaken and we found one small hole that could be a posibility. They have not decided that they like onion tops, this is probably because there is nothing left on the brassica patch worth eating. The netting on the brassica patch was all over the ground but we cant blame the rabbits for that - it was the weight of 3-4 inches of snow earlier in the week.

Figgie pudding

We have planted the fig at the bottom of No 53 with the intention that it will give a bit of shade to the pond. We used a section of old water butt, which was buried in the ground, to get the fig to put down deep roots. I have great hopes for fruit this year as it produced a load of small ones last year which we removed to allow the plant to strengthen itself.

How to make Newspaper Pots

1. Use a normal tabloid size newspaper, different sized newspapers will provide an assortment of pot sizes. One sheet of newspaper opened out flat:
2. Fold the page in half along it’s spine:
3. Then fold in half again:
4. ..and fold in half again:
5. Now is the tricky bit. What you are trying to do is fold the bottom right hand corner, as you see it in the picture above, inside and to the centre. What I do is lift the fold up so it forms a right angle and then push the centre in towards the centre of the fold. You will end up with a triangular shape with the original newspaper spine flat. This is where I think most people hit a brick wall, do persevere, once you have got it then you can churn them out in seconds. It’s not easy to explain or photograph but here goes:



6. Fold the top left ‘triangle’ back over to the left to form this.






7. Repeat step 5 on the other side so you end up with this:






8. Now you need to fold the edges in to the centre, like so:






9. ..and then fold them into the centre again, like this:







10. Now flip it over and do step 8 and 9 on the other side and you will end up with this:




If I am making a batch of these and not using them right away then leave them in this state and sandwich them between 2 books with a weight on top. When you come back to them the creases will be nice and crisp and they will stay together better.

11. To make the pots fold the top flaps back first, then carefully open up the pot by putting my hand inside and gently forming it into a cube. Make sure you dont push the folds open. It may seem like it will never hold soil and just open up. Don’t worry as long as your creases are nice and crisp then it will be fine once the soil goes in, it actually helps keep them stay in the right shape.



This is what you should end up with!