WHEN I was studying for my RHS I read about the importance of attracting bees and other great garden helpers into your plot, this is very close to my heart.

I think we all know just how important they are to pollination and eating pests.

But did you know it’s important to give them a home all year? If they can find a place to hang out, they will have babies there and well, it’s the circle of life all on your plot.

Find a little spot for a bug hotel. It doesn’t have to be five star, but those lonely bees, ladybirds and toads would be ever so grateful.

I made my bug hotel a couple of years ago with pots filled with straw for any passing hedgehogs, garden canes cut into bundles for ladybirds and lonesome bees. It all helps, and if they come back next year to munch on pests or pollinate your vegetables then they have earned their keep.

Kids love making little homes for insects, it’s so much fun watching their imaginations run wild, so get your mini gardeners on the case.

Another fun job for our mini gardeners is ruining your perfect pile of leaves you’ve just raked up. It’s forgivable though, who can resist kicking leaves around? The pile in the photo lasted almost two minutes before my daughter and the dog kicked it all over the garden again.

I use the fallen leaves a lot around my plot.

They are great to use as a mulch around the bases of my artichokes, I dig them into the soil as an improver and if you fill sacks with them and let them rot down over the year they make great potting compost for starting off seeds.

My allotment to do list:

Check the supports on fruit trees make sure they are firmly in place for winter.

If your digging a bean trench keep filling it with your kitchen waste.

If you have winter brassicas you may need to net them as birds will start to get peckish now.

Why not collect your leaves or make a few bug hotels?

If you have an allotment query, you can email: vixlot@outlook.com