Gardening Blog
Allotment Diary
September 9, 2008: grasping the nettle
While the rain continues to pour down, Terry Walton turns his attention from his crops to the beneficial wildlife and weeds on the allotment
This continual wet weather is driving us gardeners ‘quackers’ for it is only fit for water fowl and they are the only ones revelling in it. Day after day the torrents rain down from the dark, leaden sky. When will it end?
There is no chance to set foot onto the sodden earth for fear of sinking above your Wellington boots. But there again, in its present super-saturated state you will only compact it more and ruin its delicate structure. Keep off! That is the only solution despite the urge to get on with some digging and clearing up.
We did get a brief interlude in the monsoon season one afternoon last week and I took full advantage of this brief intermission to clean up around the pond at the bottom of my plot. An apt job in this wet weather as there was no shortage of water in it.
The little froglets have long gone and are off to other parts of the allotment to seek their fame and fortune. I only hope they will return next year as adults and feed on some of the pests that lurk on my plot. One thing for sure, is that if they survive to the full reproductive adult stage they will return to the place of their birth to mate. So I am sure they will be back.
Around the pond I leave plenty of tall grass and nettles to protect tadpoles and emerging little frogs from the eyes of those preying birds. With all the wet weather this area has thrived and is well overgrown. The grass is composted and the nettles are put to good use.
Nettles, apart from being a strong irritant to the human skin, are a very useful addition to a garden in many ways.
During good summers it is host to the young of the Tortoiseshell and Red Admiral butterflies who swarm around the growing nettles to lay their eggs. These beautiful insects are delight to have around the place and fill the air with colour without causing the gardener any aggravation at all. No such sights this summer so we weren't graced with these delightful creatures and their caterpillars devouring the nettles. Only the cabbage white butterfly has been seen in abundance wreaking havoc on the cabbage crops. The rain doesn’t seem to bother them!
Nettles are also very rich in nitrogen, silica, iron, phosphates and mineral salts and make great companion plants.
They are great helpers if allowed to grow amongst black and red currant bushes and increase the yield of these delicious berries.
They are also said to have a beneficial effect on herbs such as marjoram and saga. I cannot voucher for that fact as I have never tried it.
Because of their high nutrient content they can be used to create a highly nutritious plant feed. Early in the season collect the young shoots of the nettles and soak them in a bucket with a lid for two to three weeks. This is perfect tonic when diluted and fed to your plants.
At the end of the season clip the plants down to ground level and add them to your compost heap where they will provide high nitrogen content and produce heat in the heap to create perfect compost.
So you see all that is not what it seems in the garden and some plants classified as a nuisance have beneficial uses. Next time you chop off a nettle show it some respect for it is the gardeners' and plants' best friend.
More from Terry Walton
My Life On A Hillside Allotment
Terry Walton is a regular contributor to The Jeremy Vine Show on BBC Radio 2 and has written a book called, My Life on a Hillside Allotment, published by Bantam Press. The book is available from Amazon
