If your allotment plot is soaking wet still, then don’t walk on it. Don’t dig it, don’t stand ankle deep in the mud crying either, the salt tears are no good for the soil.

It isn’t much better if it’s frozen solid. Leave it alone. You’ll damage soil structure and kill worms, as well as wear yourself out trying to dig frozen ground.

If you needed to dig now then you missed doing this in autumn. You’re really best leaving the soil alone when it is damp and cold. It will recover better if you’ve not pulverised it under your boots.

Tidy the greenhouse, but don’t start sowing seeds unless you’ve got somewhere warm to keep them. If you like to heat a greenhouse then make sure it’s full – some people do a layer of bubble wrap or plastic inside to make it warmer, but another alternative is to use a small plastic greenhouse inside the big greenhouse. Using a blowaway indoors is probably one of the better uses for them. They’re too vulnerable to the wind outside and even tying them down doesn’t help as they’ll get ripped apart by the wind, with just whichever bit you tied down remaining after a storm.

I quite often feel left out as I read on FB that people are busy sowing loads of seeds. I comfort myself in the knowledge that very little benefits from being sown this early unless you plan on keeping your greenhouse warm for the next few months. Dead seedlings aren’t expensive but they are a waste of time. Leave things for a few weeks until March is well upon us and start then. The weather will still be cold, but it will be time to start a few seeds off under cover.

Leeks and sprouts are usually first I think for me, so I’ll post photos of the trays I’m going to use for starting leeks this year. They’re deep polystyrene veg boxes I scrounged from the greengrocers. They should allow a good depth of roots and that should mean thicker plants.