Allotment Recycling Syndrome

I like to think I do my bit on the recycling front. Green as the next woman, that's me. I keep a compost bucket in the kitchen, diligently sort all the bottles, tins, and newspapers for collection, and all that. But when it comes to the garden I find I have developed a disease. In medical circles it's known as Allotment Recycling Syndrome, and you can see common symptoms of it on any local allotments you might care to walk through, ie  you will see all manner of bits and pieces of flotsam pressed into service long after they would otherwise have ended up in the bin. There must be somthing about gardening that makes you not want to waste things, and to put old things to a new use wherever possible. This is great, but it does rather lead to an accumulation of stuff that might just be of some use at some undefined future time.... I'm thinking of  the tin labelled "Pieces of String Too Short To Be Of Any Possible Use" kind of thing.

Anyway, the other day I spotted some fruit trees in Tescos. Yes, I know they're not known for the choicest varieties, but they were selling them off for £3.50 each, and as they seemed to be still alive I couldn't resist. There's no indication of the rootstock, but an estimation of the eventual expected height makes it look like a  fairly dwarfing rootstock, and the varietal name is given, so it seemed like worth a go. I will probably put them in the chicken run/mini orchard. There is an Egremont Russet apple, a Williams Bon Chretian pear, a Sunburst cherry, an Oullin's Golden Gage, and an Arthur Turner apple (what a lovely name for an apple tree, sounds like a northern bloke in a flat cap ay-up). Of course being a supermarket everything has to be packed in plastic, (it's the law you know) and as I was un packing them, I realised if I kept the plastic sleeving it would be perfect for sliding onto the branches of my existing Stella cherry tree to protect the ripening fruit from birds, later on in the summer.  So as I say, stuff that would have gone to waste is now cluttering up the shed waiting to be put to good use in June. I hope it works this year, last year I got no cherries at all, because the birds were quicker than I was. Sounds like a result to me, so far anyway.