Saturday 1 May 2010

so what do the BU Assembly and my old greenhouse have in common?



Greenhouses are marvellous things - there's probably not a day of life goes by without me eating, or admiring the benefits they bring, Once upon a time we couldn't eat things out of season, but not any more.... 
Not sure if you can see this, but it's the base of the old lean-to greenhouse I've just dismantled. Yesterday I was the BU Assembly & back there tomorrow - it's a long story why I'm not there today, so we'll leave that for now.
Anyway, coming home, late last night, I wondered whether the BU Assembly is the most PC place in Christendom & I certainly feel I learnt more today in the back garden!


We had a greenhouse & the purpose was the growing plants.
It fell into disrepair - no one decided to change its use, but we stopped using it to actually grow anything & it gradually filled up with - well most of it's now been taken to the tip - rubbish.
We decided to use the space to create a new vegetable patch.
There have been times I wish we hadn't bothered - it's a bigger job than I imagined.
Removing the actual greenhouse was one thing, but today I took on the concrete base it had been standing on - can;t exactly grow any veg in concrete can I?
This concrete is stubborn stuff, but a sledge hammer produces some nice cracks.
I decided to treat myself to a lovely new crowbar - now this really moved the job along nicely. It's all about having the right tools for the job I explained - mainly to myself I admit, but I think Maggie was listening.
With a few fault lines and a decent crowbar in the cracks, I soon had the whole base up.
Another blow - underneath the base is a load of hard core - once again no point in planting anything in this. i could try, but not convinced about the quality of veg!
I'm not there yet, but I can see the fruit/veg in my mind's eye now - tomatoes against the wall, raspberries, courgettes, carrots....
Why dismantle the greenhouse, if all you're going to do is grow stuff again?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Removing concrete like that is a horrible job but its worth it, I did the same thing 2 years ago and we now have lovely veggies growing. Its hard work but worth it. I had to do 23 trips to the tip with the concrete because we dont have space for a skip!!!