What's all this about Allotments?

by Guest Jane Perrone of Horticultural

Like a lot of things in the UK, allotments have a long history, taking in feudal society, the industrial revolution, and both world wars.

It's hard to pin down quite when the first seed was planted on an allotment, but they first came into existence in the 1800s as "common land" owned by the monarch or the local squire began to be enclosed by landowners.  This meant that the "commoners" - ordinary people who had previously held longstanding rights to graze their animals or grow crops on local common land - were kept out, their rights were revoked, and they were left with nowhere to eke out a living. This Wikipedia page can tell you more.

There was an outcry at the social and economic problems caused by enclosures, and allotments - patches of land for growing crops and rearing animals on a small scale - began to be offered as compensation to commoners for their loss of common land. This move began to be enshrined in law starting with the Small Holdings and Allotment Act of 1908.

But allotments really came into their own during the first and second world wars, when food shortages prompted the government to urge people to use every scrap of spare land for growing food, sparking the still famous Dig for Victory campaign.

From the fifties to the present day, the number of allotments in the UK has been in decline, despite their becoming fashionable in recent years as the organic movement has championed the joys of growing your own hyper-local food: there are now about 300,000 allotments left from a peak of about 1.4 million in the 1940s.

If you're interested in delving deeper into the history of allotments in Britain, there's more information here, or you can get yourself a copy of The Allotment Chronicles by Steve Poole.

So how big is an allotment plot? It varies, but most are, put roughly, the size of a tennis court or smaller. In an arcane nod to their past that may mystify non-British readers, most allotments are still measured in the ancient units of the pole, perch or rod.  A standard plot is 10 sq  poles/perches/rods (confusingly they're all the same measurement), although a lot of sites now offer half plots of five square poles - that's the size of my plot.

And who's the land owned by? The majority of sites are owned by town and district councils - in other words, local government - and have some protection against being sold off or converted to other uses. The rest are privately owned by organisations such as the Church of England, rail companies or individuals. Each plot holder, or allotmenteer as they're also known (I rather like the latter because it almost sounds like I am climbing mountains, not turning the soil) signs a yearly agreement that they'll take good care of their patch, and stumps up anything from £5 to £150 a year in rental. My five poles sets me back about six pounds a year - which is just about what you'd pay for a Chinese takeaway for one these days.

The allotment ethos has always been simple: that by growing fruit and vegetables (and in some cases by raising livestock such as chickens, goats or rabbits) on local land, plot holders could improve their quality of life, save money, enjoy the fresh air and have access to fresh produce. That ethos remains today, although the emphasis is now on the health benefits of homegrown veg, enjoying the outdoors and bypassing the sterility of the neon-lit supermarket shelves laden with vacuum packed, regimented dull produce.

Allotments are now trendy. They're sloughing off their image in popular British culture as the domain of dour men wearing flat caps and growing ranks of leeks and cabbages: Arthur Fowler from the TV soap EastEnders was their poster boy.  Now you're just as likely to see young professionals bringing along their small children to grow globe artichokes, peppers and asparagus, or retirees trying out beekeeping or small-scale self-sufficiency.

If you're interested in finding out more about the allotment phenomenon, try exploring the websites of the National Society for Allotment and Leisure Gardeners, the Allotments 4 All site, and the Allotments Regeneration Initiative.

But perhaps the best way of getting a taste of life on the plot is by tuning into some of the great blogs written by allotment holders: some of my favourites are Pumpkin Soup, My Tiny Plot, Spadework, and Allotment Lady - there are lots of links to more great allotment blogs on my blogroll.

Jane Perrone is the author of The Allotment Keeper's Handbook and blogs about her organic allotment and garden at Horticultural.

Comments

[firefly]

Excellent post. I look forward to visiting the sites and blogs linked to here.

I really wish there were more solid incentives to garden in the US -- tax credits for preserving ecosystem services would be a start, and might avoid customary howls from entities like agrobusiness about 'lowered profits' if homegrown food were to catch on.

[Yolanda Elizabet]

Excellent piece, well written and informative!

I have 1 question:

Why not mention that allotments could and still can be found in many Western European countries such as Germany, the Netherlands and Sweden, to name but a few? These countries had, after all, similar social/economical structures to those of Great Britain. The way it's written now, one might get the impression that allotments are only to be found in the UK.

Thanks for all the links, I'm looking forward to visiting them.

[Kathy, Washington Gardener]

I spent quite a bit of my formative years in my maternal grandparent's "allotment" located just outside of Bayreuth in Bavaria, Germany. It was specious enough for a croquet green, out building, cistern, vegetable garden, fruit trees and shrubs, cutting gardens, herb garden, pathways, etc. They pretty much treated it as their weekend country home away from the city life.
I remember them saying they had a 99-year lease on the land - which amount to lifetime ownership.

[JLB]

Thank you for this piece! I've encountered several references to allotments lately, and this helps me to understand how they work.