Update from Alan R Hickman

Another drippy, better-in-than-out day opportunity to write an update.

Last month I noted that we were 250 hours down compared to last year and it seemed to have an effect. For the next four weeks we got volunteer turnouts of more than 50 hours a week. The three main sign beds were cleared and covered with a thick layer of leaf mulch. The large corner bed was cleared and covered with a layer of sand to help modify the sticky clay which we have put up with for the past seven years. In the nursery, all the beds in block E have been profiled and covered with enough straw to smother weeds until we get onions planted in the spring. Most of block A has been weeded and is covered with straw mulch. Block C is ready for winter and about half of block D is fully covered and the other half is lightly covered but not enough to smother germinating weeds.

John has moved twenty trailer loads of material this month to keep the winter prep work going. This is the first time that we have been able to move so much straw from the pile behind the arena. Since the fall fair, we have spread forty trailer loads over the beds and that has made an appreciable dent in the size of the heap. I never supposed that the nursery could ever get big enough to run out of straw mulch but, as other demented individuals are like to proclaim: ‘The End is Near’!

Things in fact were going swimmingly until last week when the weather turned and only one volunteer showed up. As this is written we are 64.5 hours down on last year. So close but, at best, we’ve only another week or two to go before snow shuts us down completely. If the people who haven’t completed their sixteen in-garden hours actually showed up and did them we would be over the top.

Deliveries of produce to the Knights Table continue from the stock in my basement. We’ve sent almost 850 lbs so far and we might get to 1000lbs. The remaining small white potatoes and the specialties - the purples, the reds, the yellows and the fingerlings - will show up for distribution at next year’s classes like they did last January. (In 2009 we sent 1,800 lbs to the KT).

So far we have 18 applications for next year’s classes and there has been an unnerving silence for a couple of weeks. We need 25 to 30 reservations for comfort so please try to get the word out. In a city this size we shouldn’t have to scratch to give knowledge away for free.

As always, if you can find time any day, phone me before 8 am and we’ll work around your schedule. There is still lots of cleaning up, sorting, mulching and even trenching to keep the chill at bay.

High Temperature:
Actual: 9°C cloudy Wind SW24km/h P.O.P.61%
Average: 6°C
Record: 16°C in 1999

Low Temperature:
Actual: 2°C cloudy rain 2mm Wind SW22km/h P.O.P.78%
Average: -2°C
Record: -12°C in 1989