A reminder that, because the council has changed its ‘financial year’ as regards allotment rentals, the association has decided that the timing of its AGM has to be changed. An AGM was held on 19th November 2025 in accordance with the constitution where the 30 members present unanimously agreed to alter Paragraph 6b of the constitution to state that the AGM would be held in March of each year. It was agreed to postpone all other AGM business (reports, committee member elections ………) to March 2026 when the first AGM would be held under the new rule. The draft minutes of this meeting are available on the web site.

As previously, the meeting will be at the Puppet Theatre, starting at 7.00pm. Members who arrive a bit early can buy very nice tea or coffee from 6.30pm. Membership subscriptions for the Association will, as previously, be collected before the AGM to save members from having to post them.

The council no longer requires all existing tenants to complete missive forms annually. Only new tenants, or those whose plot or plot size has changed (e.g. been subdivided or amalgamated) or whose concession status has changed (e.g. reached the age of 60) will be asked to fill in missive forms. From this year the council will be invoicing tenants individually for their rents so the KAA will not be taking any rentals at the AGM.

Any resolutions that a member would like to propose for the AGM, or any nominations for the committee should be submitted to the allotment secretary by February 5th 2026.

Remember, and tell all your friends and acquaintances, that the Julian Avenue allotment site is holding its Open Day on Saturday August 23rd. From 2.00pm to 5.00pm. The good weather is currently forecast to hold, with zero probability of rain in the afternoon, so it should be a lovely experience.

The book chosen for this meeting is The Dictionary of Lost Words by Pip Williams. The meeting will be held from 5.00pm to 6.00pm on Wednesday April 2nd in the Communal Shed on the Kirklee Site. The Association has a number of copies of the book on loan from the library. So email the committee if you would like to borrow one of these copies. As always the book group meeting is about getting together with other members from both the Julian and Kirklee sites, having a drink and a bite to eat and talking. There’s no need to like the book, or even to have finished reading it! There’s always interesting and informal chat around the subject and about the allotment. We look forward to welcoming people who’ve come along before and those who are coming along for the first time.

The next book for the group is Held by Anne Michaels. We have library copies to share around so let us know if you want to borrow a copy and come along to the shed near the big gate on the Kirklee allotment site. We meet from 5 – 6pm and although we normally meet on a Sunday, this time it is going to be Wednesday 26 February.

Everyone is welcome, we have enjoyable conversations about books and allotmenteering, and there are always nice things to eat. If there are books you would like to suggest we’re always looking for a good read whether it’s fiction, non-fiction, autobiography or any other genre.

On Friday Jan 24 Storm Eowyn blew over Glasgow creating quite a lot of havoc as it went. Our allotment sites were not spared. Sheds were blown over on both sites, some merely damaged, others destroyed. The Kirklee site suffered considerably less damage than the Julian site possibly because it is on flat land and somewhat sheltered by big hedges. On the Julian site it was striking how the plots on the north side, at the bottom of the slope, were spared while sheds on higher plots were badly damaged. However the worst event was the demolition of the big Cupressus Leylandii on the west border, which was blown right over, destroying the fence and some of the pavement outside and landing itself right across the two nearest plots.

The first meeting of 2025 will take place on Sunday 19 January from 5.00 to 6.00pm in or next to the communal shed beside the big gate on the Kirklee site. The book will be Silent Earth by Dave Goulson. We have a number of copies from the library so let us know if you would like to borrow one of them. As a subsidiary book some members are also going to look at Small Things Like These, a short novel by Claire Keegan. There are library copies of this book also available. There is a film of this book out just now. While the main conversation on January 19th will be about Silent Earth, it is expected there will be time for a short chat about Small Things. All plot holders are welcome. There is always hot drinks and baking, a good chat about many books and general community chat.

The annual general meeting will be held at 7.00pm on Thursday 21 November 2024 at the Scottish Mask and Puppet Theatre, 8 – 10 Balcarres Avenue, Glasgow G12 0QF. Tea, coffee and biscuits will be available from 6.30pm. All KAA members should have received an email with full details and all the relevant documents for the AGM attached. In case this email has gone astray, the documents can also be downloaded from the web site (by members who remember the password) at this link.

In addition to the formal business of the meeting there will be a presentation from Emma Plant, a research student at Glasgow University, on the research project on pollinators that she undertook at the Kirklee site this summer.

On this occasion there will NOT be the opportunity to pay rental and membership fees. Glasgow City Council have moved from Calendar to Financial years for the payment of rents and they have not sent out the missives. The committee will contact members when the missives are received.

We were bathed in sunshine at our June book group meeting: 9 of us gathered around a table  on the Kirklee site, 4 of us with plots at Julian Avenue, 5 of us with plots on Kirklee. The home-made, allotment-grown rhubarb cake disappeared quickly. We’d shared around three titles by Raynor Winn that we’d borrowed from the library, people reading one, two, three or none of them, so we had lots to talk about.

Our next meeting will be on Sunday 14th July, from 5 – 6pm, at the Kirklee site. We’ve got copies of ‘The Chronicles of a Cairo Bookseller’ by Nadia Wassif from the library – let us know (e.g. email the committee or leave a comment) if you’d like to borrow a copy and come along for the discussion. This autobiography describes the experiences of three young women who set up an independent bookshop called Diwan in 2022. Hachette says: ‘Frank, fresh and very funny, Chronicles of a Cairo Bookseller is a portrait of a country hurtling toward a revolution, a feminist rallying cry, . . . . above all, it is a celebration of the power of words to bring us home.’