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Please find some useful information about Allotments or Gardening!

Health and wellbeing

There is a growing awareness of the role that gardening plays in improving mental health. Many allotment gardeners will tell you that a spell on the plot nurturing plants and contemplating nature makes them feel calmer and more hopeful and there have been recent studies that have measured this benefit.

In 2018 the UK Government produced a 25 Year Environment Plan, which acknowledges that connecting people to their environment will also improve their health and well-being.

The social contact offered by gardening in an allotment environment helps to combat the lack of social capital embodied by loneliness, which has the equivalent risk to health as consuming 15 cigarettes daily and is twice as harmful as obesity. A study in the Netherlands showed that every 10 per cent increase in exposure to green space translated into an improvement in health equivalent to being five years younger, with similar benefits found by studies in Canada and Japan.

The physical benefits of regular spells of gardening help plot-holders to keep fit even if they have sedentary jobs. The twisting and turning involved in gardening helps to maintain good gait and balance in older gardeners and also helps with cognitive decline.

Getting outside is also good for us. Depending on your skin type, spending just 15-90 minutes a day out in the summer sunshine can build up your levels of immune boosting

Your September Gardening Checklist

September is a month of plenty and preparation.

Harvests are still generous, but cooler nights, heavy dews, and autumn winds signal the turn of the season

Soil Preparation & General Maintenance

Clear spent crops – Remove summer’s remnants and compost any healthy debris. This frees space for overwintering veg and prevents pests from overwintering.

Sow green manure – Crops like grazing rye, phacelia, vetch, or mustard cover bare soil, suppress weeds, prevent nutrient leaching, and can be dug in come spring.

Prepare beds for garlic and onions– Add compost or manure now so it has time to break down before planting in October.

Mulch fruit and veg beds– Protect soil structure and feed the ground with organic matter.

Tidy paths and border - weeding and edging now saves heavey work in the wet season

Vegetable Tasks For September

Lift and store onions and potatoes – Get them out of the ground before autumn rains. Cure onions in the light, but store potatoes somewhere dark to prevent greening.

Cut courgettes and marrows regularly – They’ll stop producing by the end of the month.

Finish outdoor tomato crops – Pick remaining green fruits and ripen them indoors in a drawer, paper bag, or shoebox.

Plant out spring cabbage – Firm in well and protect with fleece or netting against pigeons and caterpillars.

Earth up leeks and stake Brussels sprouts – This keeps stems sturdy and blanched through windy autumn weather.

Cut back leaves shading pumpkins and squash – Let the sun ripen the skins properly for winter storage.

Pot up herbs like chives, mint, and parsley to bring them onto a sunny windowsill for winter use.

What to Grow in September

September is a great time to sow a variety of vegetables that thrive in cooler temperatures. These crops either mature quickly for autumn harvests or overwinter for an early spring start.

Spinach – Perfect for autumn sowing, thriving in cool soil. Fast-maturing varieties like ‘Bloomsdale’ will give quick yields.

Radishes – Rapid growth (25–35 days), making them an excellent late-season crop.

Collard Greens – Hardy and sweeter after a touch of frost; ideal for overwinter growing.

Kale – Sow now for continuous harvests through autumn and winter.

‘Cavolo Nero’ is a popular, cold-hardy choice.

Broad Beans – Sowing now allows strong root systems to establish before winter, giving earlier spring harvests.

Arugula (Rocket) – A fast-growing leafy green, perfect for quick cut-and-come-again pickings.

Pak Choi – Grows quickly in cool weather, providing crunchy leaves and stems in just a few weeks.

Mustard Greens & Land Cress – Great hardy salad options that can keep you harvesting even in the cold.

Spring Onions and Shallots - Sow hardy types now for an early start next year.

How to Support Climbing and Bushy Plants on Your Allotment

Supporting plants isn’t just about keeping them upright—it helps them thrive by improving airflow, reducing disease, and making harvesting easier. Choosing the right support for each plant is key to healthy growth and a successful allotment.

Supporting plants is more than just keeping them upright—it’s about giving them the structure they need to thrive. Whether you're growing tomatoes, runner beans, or sweet peas, good plant support helps improve airflow, reduce disease, and make harvesting a breeze.

But with so many options—from rustic hazel wigwams to sleek metal frames—how do you choose the right one for your allotment? Let’s dig into the traditional, the modern, and the materials you can use to keep your crops standing tall.

Why Do Plants Need Support?

Many plants naturally climb or sprawl, and without support, they can become damaged, diseased, or difficult to manage. Support systems help to:

Maximise space (especially in smaller plots)
Improve air circulation and reduce disease
Make watering, weeding, and harvesting easier
Keep fruits off damp soil
Encourage better yields

Traditional Plant Supports: Rustic & Reliable

Traditional supports are timeless, sustainable, and often cost-effective.

They include:

Hazel or willow branches – Ideal for weaving into natural wigwams and arches

Bamboo canes – Flexible, easy to build into teepees or lattices

Wooden stakes and frames – Strong and sturdy, often made from reclaimed timber

Garden twine – For tying and weaving in a gentle, biodegradable way

Popular Traditional Setups:

Hazel Wigwams – Perfect for sweet peas and runner beans; biodegradable and beautiful

Bamboo Teepees – Great for peas or climbing French beans

Wooden A-frames – Useful for espalier training or low-growing fruit

Circular Supports – Created by bending branches into hoops—ideal for bushy plants like peonies or low peas

Tip:

Traditional materials are eco-friendly and lend a natural look to your plot, though they often need replacing each season.

Modern Plant Supports: Strong & Structured

Modern supports are designed for strength, longevity, and convenience.

These include:

Metal frames or mesh (galvanised steel or aluminium) – Durable, ideal for heavier crops

Plastic netting and trellis – Lightweight and easy to install

Soft ties, Velcro, or clips – Gentle on stems, perfect for tomatoes and climbing plants

Circular wire supports – Great for bush tomatoes, dahlias or floribunda roses

Obelisks – Decorative and functional; perfect for climbers like clematis, sweet peas or even beans

What to do on your allotment/garden in MARCH

Overview

Hopefully by now we are now standing on the threshold of Spring and the new gardening season. The days are beginning to lengthen and although it may not feel like it at times the temperatures are slowly increasing day by day. More importantly the longer days are the real trigger to new growth and you will find that with the help of a little protection you can really go for those early sowings. They might not all make it but it is still worth a try and you will still have plenty of time to re-sow any misses. Your best friend this month is the weather man try to keep up to date with the local forecasts, better still ask the advice of the gardeners around you who have years of experience to draw on.

Sowing and Planting

Plant out early cultivars of potatoes as soon as possible and follow on planting out at regular intervals with the second earlies and first maincrops until the end of the month. A little bit of forward planning, don’t be tempted to plant out more potatoes than you can protect from any frosty weather further down the line.

Transplant any early peas, broad beans, cabbages or lettuce you may have started off earlier.

Sow the seed of Brussels sprouts, summer cabbage, broccoli, onions and leeks in short rows on a “nursery seed bed”. These will be grown on to be transplanted in April.

Sow in rows in the open ground seeds of round seeded spinach, Swiss chard, early types of beetroot, carrots, parsnips, lettuce, Spring onions, peas, broad beans and turnips. Try sowing the seed of the white form of kohl rabi towards the end of the month.

Plant out onion sets, shallots and garlic before they start to produce shoots. If you are buying any from the site shed or garden centres reject any that are shooting they will only bolt during the summer. Transplant any onions that were grown from seed sown last summer into rows. It is best to treat these as a sacrificial crop to be harvested and used from August onwards.

If you can offer the protection of a greenhouse sow the seed of celery, celeriac, French beans (they are hardy enough to be planted out before the runners), cauliflowers to transplant on the open soil next month.

General

Complete any unfinished digging and winter pruning. Clear the old leaves off strawberry plants and clean up the ground in between the plants before giving them a top dressing of a general fertiliser. Keep some fleece handy to protect the developing strawberry flowers from frost. Any frost damaged flowers are easily identified as they display a tell-tale “black eye” at the centre of the dead flower.

When the weather conditions allow it, complete the preparations of seed beds for direct seed sowing. Spread the job out over several days to allow the surface of the soil to dry out.

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