Surviving the storm

Today I walked to the allotment worrying about the shed. There have been extremely high winds and torrential downpours of rain overnight and most of the morning. I knew that if the new shed roof survived the night, it would survive for many years to come.

I dashed to the shed to check it. Bone dry. Not a single damp piece of wood remained. What a relief! I celebrated by spending the next hour chatting the Geoff and Cliff in the clubhouse.

Upon my arrival I had noted that vast swathes of my plot were waterlogged despite all my hard work last year. The site joke is that I should be growing rice as I have a perfect paddy field. Days like today makes me think they are right!

Eventually I decided that I really must go and feed the chickens. They clucked their usual disapproval before scoffing everything I put out for them. As I was changing their water, the heavens opened. Not rain but hail! It threw it down for a few minutes before returning to a steady drizzle. The chickens weren’t impressed. I added some more wood shavings to their nest box and left them to it.

Dashing into the shed to dry off, I remembered I had brought down the curtains for the shed. Now that the shed is completely watertight, it was safe to put them up. I also removed the bunting to take it home to be fixed (the triangles keep falling off!).

Later in the afternoon, I decided to walk up to B&Q. They have a lovely garden section and lots of things are on sale at the moment. I enjoyed my walk up, the sun had come out but it was still cold. As I ambled around the garden section, I discovered a section of fruit trees. This was dangerous. The only reason I left with only two trees was the fact I knew I had to walk 20 minutes home with whatever I bought. I found a beautiful Jonagold apple and a peach tree for a tenner a piece. In my way out I also spotted a bucket which made an excellent bag to carry the trees in. Halfway home, I ran into Rachel who kindly gave me a lift to the allotment so I could drop off the trees.

I dropped both trees in the shed before remembering I had to pick up some bits in the retail park. As I walked past Pound Stretcher I spotted more fruit trees. Our cherry tree in the chicken coop came from that shop and it has done really well. I am hoping to train it over the coop to provide a green roof for the outer side of the coop. I confess that I weakened and bought two more trees. This time, a Victoria Plum and the scrumptious Cox’s Orange Pippin. Again, armed with two trees, I walked home.

Back at the allotment for the third time today, I put them in the shed. The weather forecast for the next week is pretty dreadful so they will stay safe in the shed until the weather improves. Whilst I was on site, I ran into Rachel again who was busy working on repairing the storm damage to her plot.

I left Rachel to her work and spent a happy half hour sweeping out the shed and reorganising it. There are a few tiny bits of damp left in the shed but these are from putting in wet tools etc from yesterday. Finally, I sat on our new bench and watched the world go by as the sun began to set.