About me
So, you may ask, why allotment ‘adventures’. Well, I took on my allotment with no experience gardening in a sub-tropical climate and every time I plant a seed it’s a bit of an adventure to see whether it germinates, flourishes, and whether I can harvest it before the bugs do.
I live in Brisbane, Australia and have one small allotment of eight square metres. Within that space I attempt to keep myself in vegetables. I was a complete novice when I took on this allotment in 2010 as I had only gardened in the UK, years earlier. I didn’t even recognise many of the vegetables that other allotment holders were growing. I had to learn not only their names, and how to grow them, but what to do with them once harvested. So this is my allotment ‘adventure’. I love it.
Allotment Adventures with Jean 
Mar 18, 2012 @ 20:48:47
Jean, what a wonderful blog site. I can’t wait to come back and visit some more. Happy blogging – Simon G
Apr 02, 2012 @ 07:14:09
Jean, Di has passed on your blog to me and now I’m a follower and will continue to follow your ‘adventures’ when I eventually return to the UK. Seeing the corn silk took me back to my childhood, part of which was spent on a farm at Moorlands outside Bundaberg. In those days, because we had to help pick the field of corn we didn’t find the silk so alluring.
Apr 02, 2012 @ 07:29:31
So pleased to hear from you Beth. And interesting to read your comment about the silk. You would see it in a completely different light. If I had been confronted with a field of corn and it needed picking I’d look at it differently too I reckon. I expect about 20 cobs – so I won’t need to call in the help at harvest time!
May 06, 2012 @ 21:06:02
Hello there from across the other side of the world! Thanks for the like! And I hope you find my blog as useful as I do yours!
May 07, 2012 @ 06:23:31
Thanks Adam.
Your blog is so packed full of great stuff. Love the podcasts. All very nostalgic for me as I left the UK 30 years ago and now I am living in Australia where the seasons are the wrong way round. Mind you, I do love gardening here in the sub-tropics. We just have different pests to deal with!
May 23, 2012 @ 21:25:29
Hey there Jean!
it’s Marissa!
great to find your blog. I am very new to gardening & so far I have started weeding & contemplating growing things…..way way behind you but all of a sudden I have a hankering to get to it!
I am about to devour your blog for handy hints.
Lots of love xxx
May 24, 2012 @ 08:42:13
Hi Marissa. Lovely to hear from you, thanks for the comment. I love my allotment, but be careful about starting gardening – it becomes addictive! Lots of love. Jean
May 24, 2012 @ 11:22:09
Hi Jean, I am very interested in the valuation of allotments from an ecological economics perspective, hence my interest in your site! Your garden looks great and for an allotment is a decent size. We have just purchased a Walled Garden in Scotland to “practice” with!
Keep up the good work, your vegetables look great!
May 25, 2012 @ 00:27:22
Dear Jean,
Lovely blog! This gardening gene is obviously very strong in our family!! It’s lovely to see your photo – you do remind me of my cousin Ros and my Aunt Mary (1913-2011). There are stacks of photos you’d be interested to see on my Facebook page – or I can email to you?
Kind regards
Your 2nd cousin
Susan
May 25, 2012 @ 02:33:47
Dear Susan. This is wonderful to make this contact. And thank you for visiting my blog. I am now going to check out the photos on your Facebook page, and email you. Best wishes from Jean
Jun 22, 2012 @ 22:48:04
Hi Jean! I have nominated you for two blogging awards because you have such a wonderful blog and I really enjoy following your adventures and seeing your garden grow. Pop over to my homepage to see what they are and if you accept them you can pay them forward xx
Jun 27, 2012 @ 13:53:03
Hi Melanie. Thank you for the nominations, and for your kind comment. This is the first time for me and I’ve been over to your home page a couple of times to try to work it out. Where do I find the nominations so that I can respond? Many thanks.
Jun 27, 2012 @ 13:59:38
Me again Melanie. I’ve tried again and found the nominations. Thank you again.
Jun 27, 2012 @ 18:59:39
oooh yes it would be a long way down the homepage now!
This is the link 🙂
http://slowdownslowly.wordpress.com/2012/06/22/more-awards-for-me-and-you-thank-you/
I love your blog, you definitely deserve the acknowledgement!
Jul 27, 2012 @ 09:43:38
Dear Jean,
The State Library of Queensland would like to archive your website in PANDORA a National Library Australia initiative to preserve our online documentary heritage. Could you please contact me so that I can send you a formal permission request?
Regards
Gina
Jul 27, 2012 @ 14:59:20
Dear Gina
I would be delighted. I’ll contact you via email. Best wishes. Jean
Oct 09, 2012 @ 10:03:02
Thanks for visiting my blog. Can you tell me exactly what an allotment is? I can generally guess from reading about it, but I’m not familiar with the term.
Oct 10, 2012 @ 06:06:01
An allotment is a plot of land which can be rented by an individual for growing fruit and vegetables for personal and family use. I believe that allotments in the UK are quite large, but my allotment area here in Brisbane, Australia is 16 square metres. Each allotment is 8 square metres and I am renting two of them. My allotment is on land owned by the Council but leased out to Beelarong Community Farm and is managed by a committee which is re-elected each year.
Oct 27, 2012 @ 05:17:50
Thank you for the comment on my blog, albeit about The Kinks rather than allotmenteering! I’ve signed up to follow your ‘adventures’ – especially as you are on the other side of the world. My daughter’s allotment is on a slope, so at the moment, not very easy to navigate in all the MUD! She doesn’t have a huge amount of time to allocate to it, but is hoping to plan an allotment for relaxing in (she lives in a flat without a garden), and to grow a few vegetables and flowers – we’ll see how it goes!
Oct 27, 2012 @ 05:40:35
Hi Sandy. I suppose it is funny commenting on The Kinks when in fact I was searching for links to other allotment holders when I first came upon your blog. But that just shows that I have a ‘cultured’ side too. Not sure if rock can be referred to as such – but either way your post was a trip down memory lane. I am looking forward to following your blog, and hearing more about your daughter’s allotment adventures.
Dec 06, 2012 @ 02:12:21
Hi Jean
I’ve nominated you for a blogging award. Many congrats and well done. It can be found here. http://digginwivdebb.wordpress.com/2012/12/05/yaymy-first-blogging-award
Debbi x
Dec 06, 2012 @ 12:48:15
Thank you for nominating me for a blogging award Debb. So very kind of you.
Dec 27, 2012 @ 06:12:20
Oh, Jean, from blighty with love!
Dec 27, 2012 @ 06:57:50
Horticultural Hobbit thanks for visiting from Blighty. I started gardening when I lived in the UK and it was a whole new learning experience trying to grow my own food in Queensland. A great learning curve, with support from lots of lovely local people.
Jan 13, 2013 @ 07:57:49
Hi Jean,
How lovely of you to stop by my blog. I cant email you because you;re a no reply blogger in Blogger land.
My mixer has changed my life. I dont know how I managed without it. Worth every penny!
Looking forward to getting to know you a bit better . I love the idea of a community garden allotment. We have a ton of land here at our place and have been talking about putting in a vegie garden for ages.
Shay
Jan 14, 2013 @ 06:03:31
Thank you for visiting Shay. Not sure why I’m a ‘no reply’ blogger. Perhaps because I’m with WordPress and not Blogger. Who knows.
I get great pleasure from visiting my allotment and the community garden. Life seems so busy generally these days, it’s good to get ‘back to the land’. It is of course wonderful to reap the benefits of our work in the form of fresh vegetables.
Jan 30, 2013 @ 08:03:02
Hello Jean
I just wanted to say thank you for the warm welcome you left on my blog.
I have very much enjoyed what I have read so far on your blog. Going from gardening in the UK to an allotment in that climate would have filled me with horror, what an inspiration you are. I look forward to reading more from you
Michelle
Jan 30, 2013 @ 11:48:49
You are welcome Michelle. Exciting times ahead for you.
Jan 30, 2013 @ 13:43:32
Thank you Michelle. Gardening in Queensland after the UK was just a bit of a culture shock really. But I am lucky that the other gardeners down at the allotment have been absolutely wonderful giving me lots of good advice and sharing their knowledge.
Mar 05, 2013 @ 12:11:58
Dear Jean
Thank you for sharing so much about the joys and challenges of your allotment. I am Assistant Editor at Green Journey – http://www.greenjourney.com.au. We are a not-for-profit online community hub providing sustainable living resources for people on the Sunshine Coast and SEQ. We aim to connect residents, farmers, gardeners, food producers, community groups, educators, allotment holders and more.
We have a section called Inspiring Stories where we tell the story of a local person who is doing something significant towards sustainable living that we think would interest our readers. We would love to tell your story! I really hope to hear from you to talk about it further – alison@greenjourney.com.au.
Best wishes,
Alison.
Mar 05, 2013 @ 14:38:01
Thank you for your interest in my blog Alison. I have emailed you direct.
Mar 05, 2013 @ 15:00:32
Dear Alison. Me again. I have tried emailing you but it keeps bouncing back. Is it just me or are you having problems with your email?
Mar 05, 2013 @ 17:14:10
Hi Jean
I think the Green Journey server must be out in the allotment!! Please try: alisonj.green@bigpond.com
Thank you.
Mar 05, 2013 @ 18:13:41
Thank you for the alternative email address Alison.
May 18, 2013 @ 18:46:09
Hi Jean, Great blog! As you saw from my first posts, it’s been a loooong winter over here in the UK. But i’m looking forward to this growing season and also watching how things grow over in Queensland!
Keep up the great work,
Alice
May 18, 2013 @ 19:46:18
Thank you for your kind words Alice. The growing season really gathering steam over at my alloment.
May 24, 2013 @ 08:02:12
Great blog. I was wondering if you would be interested in guest blogging about retirement and gardening on a new retirement site at retirementandgoodliving.com
Drop us a note via the contact page if you are interested.
Thanks,
Simone
May 24, 2013 @ 15:16:35
Thank you for the invitation Simone. I’ll check out your website and be in touch. Regards. Jean
Aug 13, 2013 @ 13:27:46
Hi Jean and thanks for the kind words regarding my Joy of Simple blog 🙂 Living in an apartment building doesn’t allow me much opportunity to garden…and to be honest, I don’t know if I would be any good at it. That being said, there are public and communal gardening plots all around Montreal, so if the bug does bit me as it were, I would at least have an option 🙂
Take care and don’t be a stranger. All the best.
Lyle
Aug 13, 2013 @ 16:12:46
Hi Lyle. I love my gardening of course, but I’m really interesting in simple living so there is plenty to interest me over at your blog. Thanks for visiting.
Aug 21, 2013 @ 00:47:59
Afternoon Jean – thanks for all the kind comments on my blog over the last year. I’ve nominated your blog for a Liebster Award 🙂
http://plot10b.wordpress.com/2013/08/20/liebster-award/
Sep 24, 2013 @ 04:17:17
Love your attitude and the blog title, any way of combining adventure and allotments is a winner for me!
😉
The link to this will probably lead to my (I like to think) creative blog, but you might be interested in my allotment blog at
http://www.mucktwineandthinker.wordpress.com
… if you have the time and energy.
Sep 24, 2013 @ 06:41:53
Thank you for your kind words. Your blog title gave me a smile – clever play on words.
Looking forward to following your allotment blog. I certainly have the time and energy – as long as you don’t mind a follower with dirt under the nails and mud on the shoes.
Sep 24, 2013 @ 08:50:17
The best kind of nails and the best type of boots,come on in
🙂
Dec 02, 2013 @ 05:07:33
jean, nominated you my sweet
Dec 16, 2013 @ 16:16:37
Hi Jean,
I’ve just nominated you for the versatile blogger award, just to say that I think your blog is great 🙂
http://versatilebloggeraward.wordpress.com/
Jen
Dec 27, 2013 @ 05:08:29
Hi Jen. I am honoured that you have nominated me for the versatile blogger award and thank you for your kind words.
However I am taking a break from blogging during this hot Queensland summer – it’s a challenge to keep the garden alive – so I hope you will understand that I won’t be accepting the award.
Dec 17, 2013 @ 08:56:21
Awesome blog! I will follow to see what exciting posts you will have next!
Dec 27, 2013 @ 04:50:57
Thank you for visiting. Hope you had a good Christmas.
I’m enjoying checking out your blog.
Oct 16, 2014 @ 19:46:40
Great site Jean! You have a green thumb and a green heart. Well done Cheers Clair xx
Oct 16, 2014 @ 20:06:13
Thank you for visiting my blog Clair, and for your kind words.
I picked up so many tips from your presentation at BOGI Fair last Sunday, I’m feeding my soil with anything I can get my hands on.
Oct 17, 2014 @ 02:11:11
I recognise the veg you’re holding in your photo 😉 Hee hee! I love reading about your allotment adventures. Karen xx
Oct 17, 2014 @ 04:45:20
Thank you for visiting Karen, and for your kind words.
Aug 17, 2015 @ 01:51:45
Where can i acquire clumping onions as i have been searching for them for years.
Aug 17, 2015 @ 07:00:16
Rod, my clumping onions plant were a gift from horticulturist Annette McFarlane when I attended one of her workshops – she can be contacted via her website http://www.annettemcfarlane.com or I suggest you contact the company Green Harvest, they are reliable and will mail out – here is their website https://www.greenharvest.com.au
Hope that helps.