What has been happening on the allotment?
The freezing weather and snow on the ground has meant little has been done on the allotment this month apart from some maintenance work. 
The soil is cold and wet with the spring plantings delayed so the first sowings including the onion and shallot sets are being done at home in pots and root-trainers. When the weather eases, they will have a head start.
One small comfort is that the continuous cold has kept back the fruit buds so the blossom has not been damaged, unlike last year when a warm March followed by a cold April destroyed much of it.
A check is made on the plot every week to make sure all is well and the netting is still in place over the remaining winter vegetables though this week something had made a hole in the netting over the kale – probably rabbits to judge by the footprints in the snow.
What a comparison to last year! Not difficult to work out which picture is of spring flowers this year!
Jobs for next week – weather permitting: Preservative on the stakes, table and benches; Tighten up the wiring on soft fruit; Put back the fruit cage netting – hoping it’s not too windy!
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I have seen a few ‘firsts’ with birds in my garden recently, presumably coming in because of the cold. Reed buntings feeding on the seedheads of Stipa tenuissima (so glad that I didn’t cut the plants back yet). A couple of Bramblings, ground feeding on wild bird food. A pair of Yellowhammers were around, not seen for more than a year and a solitary (well – only saw one) Fieldfare for a couple of weeks until it had stripped the heavily-berried Cotoneaster tree bare. Relative near Crieff counted a flock of 9 Yellowhammers in his rural garden. Sadly there are now 7 bully-boy Magpies that come in too. BUT….this morning we watched a very large skein of geese fly over from the southwest to the northeast and across the Forth. Has Spring at last arrived?
I hope Spring is really here too!