Tips For Digging

HOLD ON TO YOUR HATS – It’s National Allotments Week!

So get out there and get digging – but carefully!

Those of you who have an allotment (and I count myself lucky to be among those) will know the joy it can bring, but also the amount of hard work. Those of you without can still enjoy fresh veg and salad from your own gardens – or even lettuce from a window box if no other outdoor space is available.

Growing your own food is healthy, enjoyable, environmentally friendly and really, really satisfying.

Couple of tips though to maximise your pleasure and minimise your pain;
– Do stretch your back out before a session of digging. Particularly if it’s the first time that year. We see lots of people in the spring who’ve rushed out in to the garden at the first sign of sun and shifted everything in sight and are then, unsurprisingly, in agony for the next two weeks. Just a few back rotations, touching your toes and arching back will help get the muscles and joints ready for action and will save you a lot of discomfort afterwards.
– Don’t sit/kneel or squat in any one position for too long. Our bodies are designed to move, if you stay in one position for more than about 10 minutes you start to inhibit the blood supply through the contracted muscles and stiffness followed by pain will ensue. Be sure to stand and walk around every 15 minutes to enable you to enjoy your garden for longer.
– If you do overdo it and something feels ‘tight’, ‘out of place’ or plain painful, then come and see us sooner rather than later. It’s much easier to put things right when they first occur rather than three weeks later when they’ve become set in place.
– Enjoy it and if you want further information on allotments or gardening in general, there’s plenty of it here;
http://www.nsalg.org.uk/news-events-campaigns/national-allotments-week/

Happy gardening!

Tom

7 August 2013