Monday, January 15, 2007

A little doorstep surprise...

I arrived home from lectures this afternoon to 150 litres of organic compost waiting for me on my doorstep!

Ok, I might be making it sound a little bit more dramatic than it actually was. For a start, it was neatly contained in 3 large bags rather than a large open pile of the stuff, but it was still a surprise nevertheless (Deliveries are not often left on doorsteps here in London.) It was also a little unexpected as I didn't think it would arrive until the end of the week!



150 litres of organic garden compost
Hopefully our only purchase as we are currently
making our own homemade compost for future years


Very exciting though as we can now get the beds plotted out and double-dug this weekend, weather permitting. This does mean that I now have to get a move on finalising the plot layout.

As our plot is partially shaded, veg needing plenty of sun will be container grown in the sunniest area so they can be rotated easily (we managed to ripen our tomatoes last year by turning the container 90 degrees each day.) I am planning tomatoes, beetroot and baby aubergines as my sun worshippers. The potato planters will also be in a relatively sunny spot. The rest of the plot is a bit limited in terms of what we could grow as it will not have sun all day, just two bursts of direct sunlight in a day. To be honest, this year is a real trial and error exercise to see what will grow and what won't. Next year I may be sending off various packets of seeds to my veggie growing friends for their sunnier plots!

I have also picked up a small paper shredder today to follow through one of my new years resolutions. Any paper/documents etc that are not longer needed will be shredded and used as part of the paper layers for the compost rather than it all going in the recycling bin. This way I can save some of the weeks newspaper to make seedling pots (I'll be using a wooden paper potter to make our own biodegradable pots.)

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yes - you are one of us - buying a shredder and using it as compost - and making newspaper pots.

Well on the way to your organic status.

Kim said...

Waste not, want not!

All of the wood that we will use for the bed edging is also recycled from a bookcase from our old flat which is now redundant as it doesn't fit anywhere in our new flat and we are putting up new fixed shelving.

Other wood salvaged includes, old rickety shelving from the outdoor cupboard we call the shed and two for sale sign posts!