Advice please

[size=medium]Hi[/size]

[size=medium]I wondered if anyone can help me please I’ve managed to get a nice little allotment plot recently and although the site is tidy it’s all grass. I was planning on marking the beds out and convincing my husband to skim the grass of the top of them for me but I’m not sure what to do with all the turf I will have left over. I have heard that I could pile it up and leave it only to re-dig in back into the beds at a later date (is this worthwhile and how long should I leave it for?)[/size]

[size=medium]Also at home I have a small area which I used to grow veg and used a 3 bed rotation system, nut now I have my allotment I was planning on having 4 beds (one to grow potatoes in) do potatoes need to be rotated or can I grow them in the same place and if they do need rotating where would I fit them in the line. At the min I have beens then brassica’s then roots veg, hope you can help.[/size]

[size=medium]Becks[/size]

 

Hi Becks.
Skim the turfs off with the less mud attached the better. Stack them, grass side down, and leave to rot down. Never done it, but I believe you'll be looking at a year before using it again.

Potatoes need rotating due to pests and diseases in the soil, usually leaving 4-7 years between planting in the same location, depending on who you speak to.

 

Skim the turf off and stack it up soil to soil and grass to grass. It makes great loam in around two years and can be stacked quite high so as not to take up too much space.

Potatoes must be rotated. Manure the ground the autumn before (preferably) you plant your spuds, then follow with your brassicas the next year.

Steve...

 

2 YEARS! lol thats a great help thanks for your time

 

Alan Titchmarsh made a garden feature from a stack of upturned turf. He build a sort of spiral staircase seat thing with it, leaving the top layer the correct way up.

 

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If it's only grass and some weeds start digging now, and dig the lot in.

Don't make life difficult for yourselves trying to make loam, that is for experienced gardeners and they do not take turves from their main growing area.

Most of the goodness in any soil is near the surface, if you skim that off, you take all the goodness with it!

Keep it simple!