PALLETISM (Making Crap With Pallets) - by @RustyRicker

If you’re anything like me then you’re trying to grow vegetables in a small space either in your garden, on your patio, or in a cold frame. etc. I also try to do things as cheaply as possible. a) because I’m married and my wife loves shiny things and b) I’m tight as fuck.

Also if you’re like me you love trying to grow said vegetables but don’t really know what you’re doing, or when you should be doing it. Winter for instance, what do you do in winter? I decided to grow garlic and onions because I had no clue what else to do and nothing else seems interested in growing over this time.

These took 30 mins to plant which left me looking for something else remotely veg related to do as winter seems to last for half the year now (it’s snowing again as I type).

I decided to upgrade my planters from the plastic shit I had to some nice wooden ones, these however cost 40 quid from the garden centre, who can get bent if they think I’m paying that sort of money. I only have a very small veg patch and planters are a must, plus I’d been getting grief that the plastic planters looked worn from the wife.

The answer was cluttering up my lean to, earlier in the year I had cause to make a canon (long story, involved me, a Frenchman and a pig's head) and subsequently had a pallet left over, plus my Dad thought boxes of screws counted as Christmas presents so I had a plentiful amount of those.

Forget the canon, veg patch is in the background, see? Tiny.

As a point of note I would build up to making a canon if I were you, maybe try after you’ve made the planting troughs? It took me ages to get the lawn to look like that, I’m looking out the window now at the state of the grass this winter and it’s fucked, pure and simple, the fat headed dog has ploughed my lawn and shat everywhere.

GET WOOD
(pallets)

Much fun can be had sourcing pallets, often the worse they look the better they are. Work has loads so I’m lucky, for those of you who have no clue where to find them just keep your eyes open! I guarantee everywhere you go from now on you will see pallets and develop a love affair with skips (they can often hold rich pickings within). A prime location is garden centres, a quiet word with a member of staff should provide you with a glorious wooden treat.

I digress, much swearing and only a little personal injury later I had broken the pallet down and now had planks of timber to build with. This did feel quite manly I won’t lie. Now I was going to leave it at this but I won’t. You need to be some sort of ninja to break a pallet down, but it does get easier with practise. I recommend a hammer and a crow bar, you’ll work the rest out.

My first attempt wasn’t the best, It took me about 3 hours as I basically made it up as I went along, had no design, a dodgy back and a very small space in which to build it. Eventually though I made the sucker shown below.

Now on reflection it looks a bit shit but it cost nothing to make except for time. I had some wood stain left over and painted the thing and it looked ok.

This inspired me to make more, this and the wife who then wanted all the plastic planters gone.

I couldn’t be arsed to look for more pallets so cheated slightly and spent £15 on wood from Homebase, making sure it was pre-treated and not liable to rot.

I must admit the others turned out better than the first, but then that is often the way with these things.

Two months on and I’ve now even managed to build furniture that’s allowed in the house and everything, so I implore you not to spend money at Homebase like my lazy self of two months ago. Expect some future posts on pallets and how to make useful shit out of them.

PALLETS ARE THE FUTURE.
PALLETISM

You can follow @Rusty_Ricker on Twitter

What to do with over-wintered chilli plants

Now I know this doesn't seem right, but Vegetablists can occasionally offer some advice and expertise.

For many people chillis are considered annuals. You sow the seed in the spring and grow and crop the plant over the summer. Come the beginnings of winter and autumn the plant slows down, the leaves turn brown and fall off, and the plant dies in it's pot as the first frost arrives. It's all rather sad.

HOWEVER! ALL IS NOT LOST!

Should you decide to, you can happily over-winter your plants and get a head start come spring time! This is alot easier than you might think. You don't need any special equipment or expensive lighting system. All you need is a pair of secateurs and somewhere above freezing to store them.

The simplest method is to bring your plant indoors and chop off every branch and leaves until you're left with a stump and then water the stump every couple of weeks or so. The chillis not having any leaves will then go a bit dormant and do very little while you prepare for Christmas, celebrate Christmas and then regret Christmas. As the days slowly lengthen it will use the increasing daylight to slowly produce shoots and leaves, and with it's already existing rootball, it will be in a much stronger position to start growing again with gusto. In fact many chillis grow stronger the second year with more fruit with a bigger kick.

Or you can forget all this advice and do what I'm doing..

There's a clue here.

So here we have a 25cm pot with an over-wintered chilli in. This has lived in the spare room for the last 5 months and was chosen for this project due to it's perfect length and girth and the subtle curve towards the base. The Pete's Penis chilli has everything a girl (or boy) could wish for.

It also managed to still be alive after I forgot to tend and moisten it over the winter unlike the other eight. But that's another story.

As everyone knows, Bonsai is the art of growing tiny trees in pots. (or halfway down cliffs if you've seen Karate Kid III) It's quite time consuming and requires a bit of patience. In fact I've read it can take years! As a Vegetablist I can't be bothered with all that so this year we're doing bonsai with chillis. 

Bonchi!

Obviously you will need a few things to do this. So here is a handy list.

One chilli plant

One bonsai pot

Two bits of mesh

Some wire

A handful of perlite

Baby-Bio

Uri Geller's dessert fork.

Remove your chilli plant from it's pot and gently tickle off all the soil from the roots. Use the fork like a brush and after a little time you'll have one bare root chilli plant, one fork and one huge pile of mud over the lounge carpet. Take my advice here folks. Buy a hoover.

Once you've cleaned up a bit, gently plonk you plant into it's new home.

It doesn't fit mate.

As you can see, there's a lot more roots than there is pot. This is easily remedied. Without asking, take your lovely partner's nail scissors and cut around the edge of the pot taking away any excess roots. You will now find the plant fits in the pot.

Bonsai pots are a bit rubbish in that there are two bloody big holes in the bottom so all the mud falls out. Luckily my old mate @Richscrich (Bonsai Expert) gave me 2 bits of mesh and a bit of wire to cover the holes with. We're talking proper bonsai skillage here! He's even in a tree club don't you know! So yeah, mesh over holes, a handful of Perlite to retain some moisture. Plonk the trimmed chilli plant in, then cover with mud. It's worthwhile considering at this point how 'arty farty' you want your plant to look. I decided I wanted mine as 'arty farty' as possible. This mean't that I left some of the roots exposed and drank red wine instead of my usual can of beer.

Arty - Farty

Rootage

 Now obviously at this point, I looked at the plant and decided it still wasn't 'arty-farty' enough and went outside and raided the patio plants for some more ostentatiousness. This was going to look AWEZOME. Rocks, and stuff, maybe even some moss. Who knew the potential?

A Bonchi was born.

The important part at this stage of the project is to be quite careful with how you treat the bonchi from now on. I decided to feed it some Baby-Bio at regular intervals and give it the best spot on the windowsill for light and warmth from our local star. Three weeks later and the Bonchi looks like this..

Ickle shoots (and possibly a bit of mould)

How awesome is this? Answers on a postcard. (Or blog)

If you're wondering where we've been, then you're obviously not following our Facebook page. It's full of pictures, links and ideas that don't quite make it here. Have a look. Some people even think it's better.

Return Of The Muck

Do you see what I did there? Shit, now I have an earworm....

Last year when we took over Plot 32/2 we thought the ground was a bit tired and needed some muck.

We could go to Homebase and buy manure in bags, after all it's only down the road, but we thought that £6.99 a bag was a bit expensive for what is essentially poo, and after Rootgate, (even though handsomely compensated in the form of a gift card) we weren't sure if we could trust them again.

After a bit of internet research we came across Puckamuck looking at the product page and price page it soon became clear that we were going to go big and get a truck of muck delivered for about £120. The Homebase equivalent volume would be about £600, that's £600!! The thieving bastards and even if you factor in £34 for a visit to the chiropractor after shifting it all, it's still a bargain.

The Puckamuck site says that a transit load would be about 50 barrow loads, it was more like 60. it took 3 of us over an hour to shift it onto the plot over the fence onto the rhubarb.

Mucky Truck 2011

This year I dropped George an email saying how pleased we were with his muck and could he supply some more and maybe a bit of discount if we gave him a mention on here. Nothing ventured and all that..

I told George about the monster Offenham cabbage and another truck of muck delivery was arranged for a Friday afternoon.

Friday's are normally a good time to be at the allotment, one of us is working a 4 day week to use up remaining holiday, while the other can flexibly have the afternoon off. A bit of digging, then Pub is how Fridays should be.

Unfortunately the Friday arranged for delivery turns out to be a bad choice. Someone is actually working on his normal day off, but may be able to get away early....

Muck me!

At 2pm as arranged, a tonne or so of Puckamuck arrives.

Just as much as last year, if not a bit more. George sings it's praises, I don't need telling, this stuff is great and full of lovely little worms.

I text @5olly 'It's here'. He replies 'I'm still at work, I'm being as quick as I can'

The truck is long wheel based and couldn't get the angle to turn in the haulageway and dump it on the plot, so I make a start getting it over onto where the 'over wintered' green manure is still growing. I start digging.

An hour or so in and I've run out water and diet coke. I have to stop every few spades as it's still winter and I am not 'allotment fit' yet. I'm slowly beginning to realise that I am going to have to shift this bloody lot on my own...

Mucked!

It took about 2 1/2 hours on my own. Then off to the Pub where on @spitaldyke's advice I consumed 3 pints of beer in quick succession. Just in time for 5olly to arrive.


That should do us for while. It's the good shit.

Read all about the forgotten fertilizer here

Puckamuck - Sponsors of Vegetablism. 

Red cabbage harvest

There's nothing like harvesting a vegetable that you sowed in the spring the previous year, and then tended, weeded and cared for throughout the summer, autumn and winter.

There's a satisfaction that difficult to write down, so for once we did a video.