How can you fail to be gloomy about the slow dwindling of the season into winter? The days grow shorter, the sun becomes an absent friend and it becomes harder and harder to stir up the enthusiasm to head up to the allotment. Time to batten the hatches and wait for spring? Surely not. Day-time TV is a mind-killer and there’s so much fun to be had setting up for next year’s growing season.
Now is the time for those grand gestures … Ripping down the old shed and replacing it with something upright, waterproof and rodent-free; replacing the corrugated iron fencing with training fruit bushes and, best-of-all, starting the fires which will progressively clear the site of rotten timber, bramble prunings and the resistant mound of uncompostables euphemistically known as the slow heap.
My projects for this winter start with digging out some cold-weather gear, finding the thermos and clearing out the leaf mould. Because the wheel has turned once more. The leaves are starting to litter the streets and its time to be out there with the brown wheelie bin bringing in the harvest. Does it make any difference? Well the street looks tidier and I have a few barrowloads of last year’s crop ready to improve the soil ready for planting some new raspberries. Rasps are woodland plants and thrive in the rich, acid conditions prompted by leaf mould. Let’s hope the new plants do better than the Glen Ample which failed this year. Note to self: it’s best to notice the warning that this cultivar is difficult to grow before rather than after buying and planting them. Something a bit more robust this time I think.
growingandreflecting 
I don’t think I have ever noticed the changes that Autumn brings as profoundly as this year, our first on the allotment. You’re right, it sure is gloomy, but onwards and upwards ! 🙂