Low maintenance allotment garden
Our goal was to create an easy maintenance allotment garden. So we decided to clean out the earth properly when preparing the soil, and create decent paths to get the weeds under control. It makes life easy now and for the coming years.
Soil preparation for low maintenance
We immediately experienced the benefits of cleaning out the soil properly the previous year. What took several weeks before was done in a single day. It becomes easy to dig the soil over and plant. Of course there are many jobs to do on the allotment. Maintenance such as hoeing can be done once a week or so.
We used path edging to stop the earth beds from collapsing and sliding down hill. It also protects against weeds for easier and efficient maintenance. We used some slabs as edgings, and we also made path edgings out of wood.
Wooden path edgings made from recycled timber for allotment garden
We made wooden path edgings out of recycled timber, from wooden pallets. Businesses often love it when you do them a favour and take away their old rubbish, such as old wooden pallets and boxes. My uncle Brian once had a successful business making bird houses and rabbit hutches out of such recycled material.
Originally the upper pointing of the edgings was meant to go downwards into the earth. This was to save on timber whilst getting a 12 inch depth. However it looked better to have them the other way up.
We bought some concrete slabs that cost £30 on Ebay. We shared with another family. We only used some slabs for the paths such as down the middle. We will use wood chippings for the rest of the paths, which are provided as part of the allotment.
For maintenance we used sheets such as polythene bags under the paths to stop the weeds. We found that the grass paths were a breading ground for couch grass.
Digging and planting may sound like a simple job, but it often takes a lot of care and skill to get the soil right. Look how neat the soil looks. We used a rake as we went along to get he soil fine, which is what the onions like. We also are growing some of our onion sets from seed.
