The 2007 Food Gardening Thread

[per]

heated propagators are for seedlings, you'd probably stick tomato seeds in there or anything else that requires extra warmth. vermiculite is a soil conditioner, I think it's used to hold moisture.

It's a seperate heat pad you plug into the wall not a heated mini green house?

 

[Herbsman.]

It's a seperate heat pad you plug into the wall not a heated mini green house?

Are you telling me that or asking me that?

 

[per]

Are you telling me that or asking me that?

Telling you can't you tell?

 

[Herbsman.]

Telling you can't you tell?

Sorry. It was the question mark that confused me, and my brain is tired. Anyway, never seen those heated pad things before. If you can find a picture of it, I'm sure I can find out about it pretty easily, my mum will know cos she's a gardening fanatic.

 

[moon]

I have been digging beds, sowing seeds in my greenhouse which has loads of glass missing but the plants still thrive in there, as well as adding loads of organic matter to the soil.

I am planning on growing loads of flowers, veg and I have a fruit patch for gooseberrys, melons and strawberrys

Its taking a while to plan everything and prepare the beds but hopefully it will be ready by early spring

I currently have a bed full of savoy cabbage that the birds seem to be enjoying and some japanese onions, not sure what will go i next but I am planning on sewing more seeds at the weekend.

I am going for the cottage garden/Pottager style where veg and flowers grow together and there is never a bare patch of soil as its meant to be suppress weeds and also keep pests down.

 

[Herbsman.]

Turning the grass over is a good method as it keeps all the nutrients in the soil, you could try hoeing and chopping and hacking at the roots then covering it up til late spring with something that wont let the light through

My mum said I should have done this before the winter, and that the grassy soil will be a bit too shitty to grow anything for a long while, until the grass has died and rotted. She said I will probably be best off just growing potatoes because they'll inhibit the regrowth of any grass or weeds.

Damn it, damn it and damn it some more. I should have sorted the soil out last october FFS

 

[trashpony]

I've got one from the HDRA (Henry Doubleday Research Association, an organic gardening trust) which they sent me when I joined. They may have one on their website.

Actually Herbsman you should join them as they're based in Birmingham I think and you get to visit the gardens for free (and RHS ones)

 

[Herbsman.]

IIRC my mum used to visit Ryton quite often

 

[pembrokestephen]

*subscribes to thread*

I want to grow things, but not much room in my gaff - all concrete out back. will be tubs-a-plenty I hope, but I killed my first ever attempt at tomatos last year....

Never mind, give 'em a second go!

 

[pembrokestephen]

Spudz go on the windowsil til they sprout the nobbley bits then straight into the soil, simple as

Are you guys chitting your spuds already?

Blimey, need to get the patch dug over and get down the garden centre fast. Pembrokeshire is (rightly) Spud Central, and last year's were so yum I want to grow lots this year...

 

[pembrokestephen]

I've heard that slugs don't like copper and won't crawl over copper to get to tasty plants. Is this true? If so, I'm going to find some big long strips of copper and put these round the top of my raised beds to stop slugs crawling in.

It's true. It's even better if you can get a pair of strips down and have a bit of a voltage between them - 12V (preferably AC) is ideal.

Good source of copper strip: look out for someone skipping a hot water tank. You can cut this in a spiral to have the longest copper strip in the world. Use a nice sharp pair of tinsnips, and be very careful not to slice yourself on the sharp edge of copper.

 

[pembrokestephen]

Unfortunately not

My back garden is all grass. What should I do to prepare the soil for veg? Last Summer I dug the grass into the ground, and planted stuff in the grass. Obviously the grass grew back from beyond the grave. How do I stop the grass from growing back, without using weedkiller? Completely remove a thick layer of soil? Kill each individual root by hand? Beg it to stop growing?

You could dig it off as turf. That's probably the best way, without resorting to nasty chemical approaches. I did the dig-it-in thing on the veg patch last year, and just pulled up the clumps as they came through, but it was tedious, even though they weren't well rooted at first.

 

[arronsmith]

Just ordered the rhubarb. Should have done this last month, but it'll be fine, I hope.

Garlic is going in shortly as well, just because I have some that sprouted.

 

[per]

Garlic is going in shortly as well, just because I have some that sprouted.

I'd like to grow some garlic, can you do it in containers if they are big enough?

Also, I was planning on using my John Innes No 1 seed compost from last year that hardly got used to do my seedlings but HDRA says not use last years?

What do people think?

I'd rather not throw the whole bag away!

 

[aqua]

I have less planned this year for 2 reasons

1) I could hardly move in the yard again last year
2) I want to move

so we have on the list:

tomatoes, cucumbers, sunflowers, chillis (I'm going for habenero range this year, will tell you which ones when I get home) and I want to try some rocket too cos abstract1 tells me its easy

I have some other seeds to try too but I've forgotten what

last year I grew courgettes which were a royal pain in the arse tbh, and I really love flowers so the veg is taking a back seat

I also grow rhubarb and lots of different herbs but my back yard is a bit of a suntrap and some herbs don't handle the heat too well

 

[northernhord]

Are you guys chitting your spuds already?

Blimey, need to get the patch dug over and get down the garden centre fast. Pembrokeshire is (rightly) Spud Central, and last year's were so yum I want to grow lots this year...

I tend to chit mine early, I did this last year and had a great crop of solid sweet spudz

 

[northernhord]

I have less planned this year for 2 reasons

1) I could hardly move in the yard again last year
2) I want to move

so we have on the list:

tomatoes, cucumbers, sunflowers, chillis (I'm going for habenero range this year, will tell you which ones when I get home) and I want to try some rocket too cos abstract1 tells me its easy

I have some other seeds to try too but I've forgotten what

last year I grew courgettes which were a royal pain in the arse tbh, and I really love flowers so the veg is taking a back seat

I also grow rhubarb and lots of different herbs but my back yard is a bit of a suntrap and some herbs don't handle the heat too well

Ive had fair few problems growing courgettes over the years but last year I tried a mix seed packet of yellow black and green courgettes and they were growing like mad I had at least two spud sacks full of them, I ended up giving kilo's of them away to my Brother.

 

[northernhord]

I have less planned this year for 2 reasons

1) I could hardly move in the yard again last year
2) I want to move

so we have on the list:

tomatoes, cucumbers, sunflowers, chillis (I'm going for habenero range this year, will tell you which ones when I get home) and I want to try some rocket too cos abstract1 tells me its easy

I have some other seeds to try too but I've forgotten what

last year I grew courgettes which were a royal pain in the arse tbh, and I really love flowers so the veg is taking a back seat

I also grow rhubarb and lots of different herbs but my back yard is a bit of a suntrap and some herbs don't handle the heat too well

Ive had fair few problems growing courgettes over the years but last year I tried a mix seed packet of yellow black and green courgettes and they were growing like mad I had at least two spud sacks full of them, I ended up giving kilo's of them away to my Brother, if you still wanna grow the fuckers when you next visit Moose or Shirlaverne ask em to take you to Gordon Riggs their seeds are fuckin ace.

 

[aqua]

I think part of my problem was growing them in a small yard - they are HUGE plants

 

[northernhord]

I think part of my problem was growing them in a small yard - they are HUGE plants

Ah right, yeah they take up the lions share of space innit

 

[Gavin Bl]

going to grow plenty of beans, I've got some aquadeluce broad beans sprouting nicely for an early crop - and runner beans too. I had a single plant last year, bought from my daughter's school fete, and the sheer volume that we got from it was incredible - I reckon I want half a dozen on the go..

Also salad leaves I guess, my American Land Cress from last year seems utterly indestructible.

Not going to try cabbages again, they were just riddled with every kind of bug. Might try some calabrese brocolli, comes up pretty quick.

I understand that fennel grows very quickly too....

but mainly beans - fresh picked broad beans and runners are a million miles from those dry tough old things you get in the supermarket.

Might get a couple of grow bags and do toms - love to try bell peppers. Are they viable without a green house?

 

[hiccup]

Only got a small bed to plant in, so am gonna try something like this:

http://www.squarefootgardening.co.uk/

this year.

Planting calendars:

http://www.gardenaction.co.uk/fruit_veg_diary/veg_planner.asp

http://www.rhs.org.uk/vegetables/diary.asp

Some good stuff on here too:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/gardening/grow_your_own/

 

[arronsmith]

I'd like to grow some garlic, can you do it in containers if they are big enough?

Also, I was planning on using my John Innes No 1 seed compost from last year that hardly got used to do my seedlings but HDRA says not use last years?

What do people think?

I'd rather not throw the whole bag away!

From http://www.gardenaction.co.uk/fruit...i_project_april_3_garlic.asp#garlic container

Garlic itself loves to be grown in containers - the soil will be well-drained and they can be fed easily. The problem is one of space and the fact that they are not particularly attractive plants. However, if you are new to gardening and want to give it a go, the garlic plants will be very happy. Use normal potting compost and feed and water regularly.

wrt using old compost, I can't think of a good reason not to, but I'm far from expert.

 

[per]

Thanks for that arron

Re planting garlic how do I buy it? Can I just plant ones from the supermarket or what? It says I can but...

I've looked at my February seeds and it's telling me I can start the following

• Parsnip
• Brussell Sprouts
• Alpine Strawberries
• Onion
• Swwet Pepper
• Parsley
• Geranium
• Alyssum
• Petunia
• Snapdragon

Are these all gonna be ok to plant in containers?

Is it worth starting any in trays on windowsills or am I being too impatient

I thought it was Febrauary for a minute then

 

[ringo]

Cheers for the links for the seasonal calendars, I'll print some off.
Found a good one showing which vegetables are ready to eat each month, also helpful in planning a continuous crop:

http://sustnable.woodcraft.org.uk/1_act5a.htm

 

[Herbsman.]

whenz are youz planting herbz and tings?

can i growz herbz indoorz nowz?

 

[arronsmith]

I dunno about Onions in containers... I guess if they are of a suitable size you won't have any problems.

re garlic - I'm just using stuff I had from the supermarket. I don't use it fast enough, so I always end up with one or two cloves that sprout (although now I come to think about it, it might be better to use ones that /haven't/ sprouted in terms of sidestepping frosts). But yeah, garlic from the supermarket should be fine.

Sources conflict each other over how easy to grow it is. Some people say shove it in and it'll be fine, others say that it's very disease prone, rots easily, etc. We shall see.

 

[lizzieloo]

Mr Loo has been preparing half of our garden for veg today, we've given up the allotment cos we have room here

Not really thought about what we're going to grow yet still thinking about shit loads of digging what was a lawn, manure and leylandii destruction.

I'm really looking forward to sorting our new garden this year

*feels all warm inside*

 

[arronsmith]

Onions. Just bought some onions. Not sure why, since you don't gain much time wise by putting them in now, but they'll fill some currently empty space.