I raked the leaves from the crab apple tree at home and took them down for the allotment beds. The leaves raked up from the elder have been rained into a solid heap, so won’t be going any further. The tree is now bare, so there won’t be any more to rake up there until the apple tree sheds its leaves.

I spread the crab apple leaves on the angelonia bed and small bed and poured out spent coffee from Waitrose on top. Then I manured on top of that, which should be a good treat for the worms. I still have half a bag of crab apple leaves left over.

There was a brief period of rain heavy enough to send me back to my shed, so I just stood in the doorway until it passed. There’s been a lot of rain recently and there’s some more to come today, so I wanted to cover the beds I was finishing. I fished down the plastic sheets with a stick, but had to stop when I heard a sleepy wasp buzzing. I knocked it down with the stick and trapped it, before releasing it later.

I covered beds 5 and 6, but both of them could do with new pieces of plastic being cut in drier weather, as they don’t fully cover the beds. 6 can likely be recut for 5.

I tipped the remaining coffee out onto bed 3, but didn’t do anything else with it. So with the rain that followed this afternoon, it probably smells wonderful in that corner.

Before heading home for toasted sandwiches, I cut down all the verbena along the left hand side. There was also an old quinoa plant in that bed still. A lot of that side is really being taken over by the verbena, which is fine by me. There’s also a wonderfully lush mint plant. Heaven help the person who moves in next door!

I’ve also taken down the obelisk now and put it into the already stuffed shed. Its muddy feet have made some marks on my white walls, which need cleaning off.