MY FAVOURITE AUTUMNAL JOB / ALLOTMENT GARDENING UK

[Music] [Music] [Music] Look at this. Look at this. The council have finally finally decided to chop one of the trees down, which keeps falling down. This is my neighbor's tree. This is the tree that just kept falling down over and over again. And they finally just chopped all the top off. Look, that's amazing. That will probably grow back though, won't it? But you know what? That has really opened up my a lotment plot. That is amazing. That's a good start, isn't it? It's a good start to the day. We'll just wait for the siren. Good morning, guys. My name is Emma. These are my a lotment diaries. This is my a lotment plot in South London. I just vlog all about my a lotment plot, what I'm getting up to, little projects I'm doing, what I'm doing dayto-day, things like that. So, if it sounds like your jam, hit the subscribe button so you don't miss any of my videos. That has really opened up my a lotment. I can't believe that. I can't believe they finally done something. It's amazing. There's also a new sign over here. Let's go and read it. Oh, they have been busy, right? I can't show you it because it's got the address of the a lotment plots on it and stuff, but it's about fly tipping. Fly tipping is illegal. Disposal waste is not permitted in this area. So, they're finally getting their act together and doing something about the uh the rubbish which is always dumped in this pathway here. It seems to be dumped here more than anywhere else because I think this um my plot neighbor's got this great big shed. So, it's a little bit kind of hidden and off the beaten tracks. You can kind of get away with dumping stuff there. That's how it feels. But, you know, this mattress over here, this this mattress, you might see it in the background of some of my shots. That's been there since I first got my plot 6 years ago, and no one's touched it. That's been there right from the beginning. Right. From 6 years ago when I first got the plot and I remember seeing it and going, "Oh, there's a mattress there. It's never been moved, never been touched. Six years." Another siren. There's another siren in the background. Anyway, it does seem like they're getting their act together and changing changing the rules and stuff and just making, you know, just getting their act together a bit really. I don't know if that makes me sound really mean, but it has been six years and these are things that we've all we've all written to the council about, you know, trees hanging over and falling down. rubbish. Um, you know, the pathway is not being mowed properly and stuff and now it seems to be all happening. So, really good. Um, my main job today, I really want to do like a proper tidy up of the a lotment plot because where I've been doing these little projects like doing the pond and planting things and sorting the greenhouse out, I've made them I've made little messes everywhere and I've not cleaned up after myself. So, I really want to just go around and just give it a really good tidy up, put things away, and that's exactly how we're going to start today. Yes, I have had my hair cut as well. What do you think of it? It's actually been 4 days and I haven't washed it yet, so it's just kind of gone a bit flat, but just a bit shorter, a little bit darker. Ready for the autumn winter, I suppose. Not that anyone cared, but there we go. Another [Music] rainy afternoon. I don't know what I'm to do. I just miss you more than anything. It's way too quiet in the house. I'm just wasted on the couch cuz I don't want to feel anything. Wish you stay stayed here beside me. This isn't how it's supposed to be. Wish you stay stayed here right with me. I can't shake that feeling that we said goodbye too soon. [Music] I know the hours getting late. I shouldn't sit here contemplate. I just can't stop thinking about it. I won't forget a single thing from drunken nights to Sunday mornings. And how you smile at me. Wish you [Music] stayed here beside me. This isn't how it's supposed to be. Wish you'd say stay here right with me. I can't shake that feeling that we said goodbye too soon. [Music] [Music] These shears are awful. They're awful. Look, they like, see how it goes past each other? Shouldn't do that. I can't use those. So, I'm going to have to get some new shears before I chop this up because I'm just going to hurt myself. Um, I'll just dump this in the top. Can I dump that on the top? Let's give it a go. No. No. Absolute disaster. Look at that. It just all came out. I just did it manually. That's not quite looking how I want it to look, believe it or not. Um, I'm going to have to get new shears pretty urgently. Okay, no problem. And then we'll chop it all up and it will look like compost again. I promise. I'm also going to turn my compost soon, but not just within this bay like I've been doing. I've been like forking it and turning it upside down. I'm actually going to take all of this compost and put it into the other bay upside down. Does that make sense? So, the top of the compost will be on the bottom of the new compost. And then hopefully at the bottom of this, we will find something to mulch the beds with. There is a great big pile of horse manure in here as well. So, fingers crossed it's done something at the bottom and I'll be able to mulch over some of the beds. But, we'll find out. We have to find out in the next video, guys, cuz I've got to get some new shears first. Oh, Einstein's being really sociable today. What's that all about? Okay, we're getting there. It's that time again, guys. It is that time where we are going to collect up all the leaves. I This is the time of year where I feel so lucky to have these beautiful trees. When I first got this a lotment plot, these trees were sort of my biggest nemesis. they were. But my biggest like because everything I'd read about a lotment plots said that you need as much sun as possible and trees are a no no. I mean for obvious reasons, right? Because vegetables need lots of sunlight and most vegetables that you plant require at least 6 to 8 hours of direct sunlight a day in order to be able to grow properly. That's my experience of most of them. Some of them could go in the shade. Bras can do partial shade, but they all need some kind of sunlight. So trees on an a lotment plot are not a good are not a good idea really. They're not ideal. Also the roots of these trees because they're so big and established, the roots are quite big, they travel quite far and they will suck all the moisture and nutrients from from the rest of the plants. So there's a lot of reasons why trees are not a good idea. But over the years I have come to absolutely love this tree. Not only do the birds love it, it also it it changes so beautifully with the seasons. It gives me unlimited leaf mold, leaf mulch leaves every year, which I use I collect up and I use over beds and in new growing beds. I don't really leave it to rot down actually the leaf mold. What I do is I tend to collect it up, keep it for maybe a week or so and then use it to mulch over a bed. The only thing to remember and bear in mind if you use leaves as part of your growing beds is that leaves they do not contain many nutrients. There's not a lot of goodness in these leaves. They're dead. They're brown. It's a brown material. So, on their own, they're not nutrientrich. What they do do is add really good structure to your soil. Um, when you make leaf mold properly and let it rot down like over maybe 2 or 3 years it takes to make it properly, the texture of it is so good and it retains I'm trying to educate here. It retains so much moisture and it adds such good structure to your soil but not nutrients. And that's the thing to remember. So, if you use leaves, be sure to use something else nutrient-rich. Uh, compost, manure, something like that. And now, we're going to do one of my favorite jobs and collect all the leaves up. And also, we can do this. This is another good thing. They're good for doing this. Throw yourself a little confetti party. You want to get involved here? Okay. Don't want to get involved. Oh, love them. Love them. Throw yourself a party. You made it. It's autumn. [Music] [Music] [Music] Right. So, although I'm taking quite a lot of the leaves um that have just fallen around my pathways on this little bit of grass area here, I'm actually going to leave a lot of them around the tree because have I got leaves all in my hair? Not because of that. I do. Oh god, got to stop throwing them. Because animals, insects, mammals, birds, creepy crawies, whatever other name you want to call them, they love to hide in them. and it makes a great habitat and it makes a great habitat for them for the autumn time. So, it's a good idea just to leave some piles. Got my hedgehog house under here. So, I'm going to leave the leaves around the hedgehog house. I haven't checked on the hedgehog for a while. I don't even know if I've got one. Here he is down here. See, this is my hedgehog box. I had him out in the open and then a lot of people commented and said, "No, put it somewhere hidden." So, I put it under here in the hope that it would kind of grow over. And look, the tree's grown over exactly as I I hoped it would. I don't know if I don't know if I got a hedgehog, but there's a very clear entry way that he can use it if he wants it. Um, hello. Is there a hedgehog in there? No, there's a lot of spiders in there. But then I suppose he eats those. So, if there's any hedgehogs around here, there's a perfectly good hedgehog home for you there. It's on offer at the moment because the market is really good and there's no other hedgehogs in the market, so you get it for free. [Music] [Music] Right. And this is the other place that I need to stop the leaves going in. I need to get the leaves out the pond. Leaves in a pond are never a good thing. It's one of the reasons why I wanted to move the pond, but actually I still think it's in the right place. Oh no, not the plant over. Oh no. Oh god. Knock the plant over. Oh no. Come back plant. Please, please, please. Come on. Come on. Don't be silly. Just stay there then. Why are you floating? What's going on in here? I leave you for one day. Chaos. To be fair, if that plant is just falling over willy-nilly, it's probably not in a very good place. I don't know why it's falling over. It was perfectly stable when I left it. So, it's obviously the plant's fault. The plant has done something and it won't tell me because it can't talk. Sometimes it just is the plant's fault. Nothing to do with my bad gardening skills. Oh well, get them out. Why are you floating? Where you going? I think I might dump it all in the compost this year. Uh, but I not yet. Not yet. Not until I've chopped it up properly, turned it, and then I might just throw the leaves on the compost. Yeah, I think I might do that this year. I've never done that before. But I mean, that's ultimately what I want it to be. I want it to be compost, put on the beds. Any leaves that have already fallen into beds, I'm leaving. I'm not picking those ones up because what's the point? Like, I want the leaves to mulch the beds. So, why would I collect them up and then put them back on? Do you know what I mean? It doesn't make any sense, does it? Yeah. Okay, great. So, I've got a good wheelbarrow full here. Pretty sure. I mean, there's a lot of leaves to fall still. I mean, this is going to be a bit of an ongoing job. I'll just add it to my autumn jobs until all of the leaves have fallen and then hopefully we'll just have lots of free material to use. [Music] Do you know what? I think I've caught the runner beans at the right time. This is about the time when I like to pick them and eat them. And I usually I usually don't manage to get to them on time because they grow so fast. But they look great. [Music] There they are. That's not a bad little runner bean harvest, is it? That's exactly the length and the size that I like to eat them at because they're not they're not so stringy and big and I just much prefer them like that. [Music] Right, some of my broccoli is ready to pick. Um, I did pick some the other day and I wanted to quickly show you what happens when you pick the main bit of broccoli. So, the bit that grows in the middle, because it's rather fascinating. So, this broccoli here, I picked the middle bit, which was the big bit. Now, you have to excuse the fact that it's been eaten. Okay, now just ignore that and pretend that's not happened. But it throws off more little broccoli shoots, you see, which you can then harvest and they'll be smaller than the main one at the top. You can see these ones have been eaten. But yeah, it just grows more broccoli. So, it's a really good idea to cut your broccoli and leave it and hopefully you'll get some more. And if you can beat the critters, you'll have more more of a harvest. This is the one I'm after today, though. Look at that. Isn't that glorious? Wow, look at this. Oh my gosh, it's amazing. Wow, look at that bit. Oh, this is a nice little piece of broccoli. I'll have him. I'll have you, too. Beautiful. Right, that's not a bad little harvest of broccoli there. That isn't. That is fantastic. considering that I actually do quite struggle to grow broccoli or I just don't plant it. One or the other. I can't I don't know if it's because I just don't plant it. But anyway, it's a really good harvest. So, now that I've chopped them, I've cut them, I'll just leave the plants to do their thing and hopefully we'll get more broccoli in the autumn time. You never know. Anyway, I'm going to leave the vlog there. Next time when I come, um I'm going to have new shears. We'll do the compost. I'm also going to do a lot more sewing in my greenhouse. some autumn crops that I'm going to sew in the greenhouse. So, join me next time on Friday. I think it will be. Yep. Thank you so much if you have purchased an aotment planner. I'm currently number three in the vegetable section on Amazon. So, just thank you so so much. I really hope you're enjoying them. Um they do have some added recipes this year. So, if you're ing and ingring about buying one, they do have something a bit extra in this year. And yeah, I really hope you enjoy them. Thank you so much for watching and I'll see you next time. Bye guys.