Jenny Mollison: Forgetting to lock the gate is a cardinal sin

A glance along the shelves of any bookshop reveals dozens of books about what to grow on your allotment.

Television programmes are keen to promote the joys of growing your own produce. But there is a dearth of practical help about setting up new allotments to meet the demand.

The Scottish Plotholders' Guide is a much-needed new publication from the Scottish Allotments and Gardens Society. It should be essential reading for aspiring allotmenteers, steering them through the minefield of leases, missives, and constitutions which are part and parcel of establishing a new site.

Running the gauntlet of town hall officials is not for the faint-hearted. It takes determination to keep one's sanity when trying to persuade councils to find spare ground. Battling through the bureaucracy will be much easier armed with the simple explanations in the Guide. Strategies, structure plans and tenancy agreements soon become part of everyday speech.

It's often said that if six people ask their council for an allotment, the request will be granted. In an ideal world, a suitable site would shortly be provided. It is seldom mentioned that in Scotland different laws apply. The Allotments (Scotland) Act 1892 is the relevant statute here. In reality, the process of finding land and setting up a new site can be long and tortuous. The Act is long overdue for some modernisation. Particularly helpful would be an amendment which set a time scale within which councils had to respond to the demand for a new site, instead of parking it on the bottom shelf of the filing tray.

If you are one of the lucky ones who has just got a plot, the new guide has some sections for you. While a desire to garden means you will have something in common with your fellow plotholders there are some matters of etiquette which can get overlooked. Lighting a bonfire or playing a radio could affect your close neighbours' enjoyment. Taking a shortcut across another plot is not only discourteous, but can spread white onion rot as the spores cling to your boots. Selling produce or sub-letting your plot are not allowed. Forgetting to lock the gate is a cardinal sin.

Historically hens and pigs have been kept on allotments. But because of the current shortage of plots, keeping livestock is not usually possible.

www.sags.org.uk/docs/ScotPlotGuide.pdf

• This article was first published in The Scotsman on October 09, 2010