Growing Green with the GP
In a quiet corner of the Pembroke sports-ground, shielded by trees, are the allotments.
Here Verner, Coco, and other helpers have rescued a small allotment from encroaching bushes and brambles to create a vegetable garden for the Pembroke Graduate Parlour. Come rain or shine someone from the newly formed Pembroke Gardening Society will be there planting, weeding, watering, or fixing something.
They’re using a method called Permaculture, Verner explains, in which you use the natural properties of flora and fauna to create a healthy and productive garden. Harking back as far as the Aztecs, this method of gardening involves using complimentary plants to ward of pests and promote growth. Onions and runner beans, Verner explains, do not get on well together, but nasturtiums are apparently a good companion plants and appear on most of the beds.
The beds are organised around a series of paths that allow access to all the beds without needing to actually step on the soil, thereby avoiding compaction. Avoiding compressing the soil is an important part of their strategy. There’s very little digging, except on the part of the worms, and moisture is retained by a layer of mulch consisting of grass clippings from the sportsground. It seems to have worked – the allotment remained green throughout the very hot and dry summer.
On one bed radishes, runner beans, maize and nasturtium grow together. On others there are tomato plants, kale, beetroot, or squash. Planting started late this year because of the effort required clearing the allotment and digging the beds, but the plot is full of promise for next season. The team have already taken away healthy crops of beans, kale, chives, and cucumbers. Coco is particularly excited for the corn to be ready. Not everything is growing at quite the desired pace; the carrots are declared tiny but delicious, and the potatoes are still “really, really mini”.
The current project is the greenhouse. Rescued from yet another patch of brambles it was just a metal frame when the GP first unearthed it. Now it’s halfway to being re-insulated and ready to use. Water dripping from the roof feeds directly into the water collection system, and shelves have been constructed to use inside.
The gardeners described their enjoyment at seeing the plants grow week by week, and taking food home that they’ve grown. Tending the allotment is a welcome escape for the graduate students, who have intensive academic lives. It’s easy to see why, as the allotment is sheltered, calm, and quiet. It’s come a long way from the muddy patch of the early days of summer, so let’s hope it continues to thrive and grow under the care of the Pembroke Gardening Society.
