Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Growing => Grow Your Own => Topic started by: hubballi on July 19, 2011, 18:25
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Every years it's the same. I start out with good, healthy plants and end up with them either being decimated by slugs, leaf miner and other weird things that happen. This last few days of rain have just about done it for bringing out slugs.
Courgettes: Ends of fruit rot.
Healthy Italian and curly kale. Stripped by slugs. Also starting to wilt.
Broccoli: Stripped leaves.
Broad Beans: Sparse crop. Twisted, distorted beans. Leaves with small holes in. Rusty colored. Black ends to beans.
Onions: Onion maggots.
French Raddish: despite sowing in compost, ground, shade etc they NEVER EVER swell. Just produce thin stems. Hardly grow at all.
Spring Onions: never getting any bigger after months. Then finally wilting and going rotten on top of compost.
Greenhouse:white fly and aphids.
Rocket: Small wispy, wimpy leaves that wilt.
Chard: bolting and distorted leaves.
Carrots: foliage as small and as whispy as they were 3 months ago.
I have a small walled garden. I have tried soot, organic pellets for slugs. Feed and water all plants appropriately. Other plants in the soil doing well are peas, beans, raspberry, so it isn't a soil issue.
Perhaps I should give up :-(
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Oh dear, how disheartening. But I think most people are having problems this year, as they did last year. The seasons are all topsy-turvey. But still the things that do do well are still worth the bother. And you never know, next year............................... :)
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Have you thought about photography as a hobby ! ! ! :D Cheers, Tony.
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I studied Photography at college over 20 years ago.
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I think we all have seasons like that and it is very disappointing, last year it was melons and carrots for me, this year it is french beans, bortolli beans, beetroot (all of which I have grown well for years). If you read all the advice and are doing all you can you just have to put it down to the weather and enjoy what has grown (and freeze/ dry lots in case next year crops fail!)
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Remember that it happens to farmers and growers too when the weather is odd. They are dependent for their total income on good crops. We gardeners just do the best we can.
I've had more salad leaves and rocket bolt this year than in the last four - and frozen any number of peas (but not as many as last year because the kids have been taking them home to eat). Carrots were bad last year and good this year. Onions this year are not as good as last year but good enough. Garlic is better than last year. Swings and roundabouts.
I've lost the summer cauliflowers to a gale buy grown romanesco for the first time ever, the calabrese started out brilliantly but the hot and dry weather sent it straight to seeds whilst we ate plenty of it last year. However, spring onions and radish have been better this year than last.
There's no accounting for the weather - this year we had summer in spring, March gales in June and for the last week we have had the early spring rains. Hey ho, I should have planted rice I think.
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I don't think there's anyone who has a perfect season, I've been gardening for years and still find myself at the mercy of the weather and pests, as we all are. as someone has said, enjoy the crops that do well and, who knows, next year could be the one. ;)
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Are you sure its not a soil issue?
Given the time, effort and money you are putting in, don't you think it would be worth having the soil analysed. It could be somthing that was in the soil before you got the house.
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It isn't soil because other things are growing well.
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Any chance of a some pictures of the crops / situation / soil profile ?
Everything you've listed as doing well likes it wet/damp including your plague of slugs.
It isn't soil because other things are growing well.
Certain plants can be more tolerant than others, it could also be very localised 'pollution'. Have you done the basic checks for ph & soil structure ? Other than slugs is there any life in the soil?
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It isn't soil because other things are growing well.
Hubballi, we have offered to get an experienced gardener to come and look at your many problems but you have not taken up the offer. We have plenty of members who don't live too far away from you.
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A generous offer :)
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Just had a look at the courgettes that were doing well in pots with new fruit a a few days ago only to have the ends now rotten. That's 8 courgette plants and yet not one single successful fruit except the yellow shop bought one and now the leaves are going yellow and mildewy.
The broad beans are terrible. hardly a bean, the Suttons are tiny, compacted together and black and wispy. One of the tall variety has gone a funny colour altogether.
Never done a PH test I must admit. Any advice from a local would be appreciated.
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Hi. You mention that you have a walled garden and it would seem that the crops that are struggling are the lower growing ones, radish, sp. onions, courgettes etc whilst the taller runners and raspberries are doing ok.
I think we are all struggling somewhat this year - I know I am - but do you think your crops are getting enough sunlight, given they are surrounded by a wall.
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It appears that most of your problem is slugs. Nemaslug is by all accounts a good product.
http://www.harrodhorticultural.com/HarrodSite/product/Best+Sellers/GPC-265.htm (http://www.harrodhorticultural.com/HarrodSite/product/Best+Sellers/GPC-265.htm)
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I have so much sympathy for you... I know for certain that I have more failures than successes, but for me, part of the enjoyment is not just the produce, it's all about being outside, getting stuck in with nature, getting some exercise, and the sense of community (either real or electronic or both).
And in the end, when almost everything fails, I think the few things that do succeed taste just that little bit better :D
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Hubballi, You say that other things are growing well - that's great! Look on the bright side, things could be worse :)
Every year my harvest across all that I grow is roughly like this:
30% fails, no real harvest, maybe enough for 1 meal
60% fair, a few harvests, enough for a few meals and maybe some for the freezer
10% glut, every meal for weeks and loads for the freezer
Every year different crops do well (giving me a glut) and others do ok or fail. That's just how it is and I reckon I'm doing quite well on that :)
Don't give up - it's worth all the effort :)
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This has just about finished me off. I find small white grubs in my Kale and Broccoli roots (the only plants that were looking good) What the hell do I do to save these ?
I could cry. It's only a small walled terraced garden. How can I be visited by every pest known to man ? Onion fly, carrot fly, cabbage root fly, abundance of slugs and snails. I have never had cabbage root fly before.
Oh, and all the carrots I had coming up have had their tops nibbled off by slugs.
DEPRESSING !!!!
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The ends of my courgettes have rotted too. I just cut them off and eat the rest. The flower is rotting on the end because of all the rain and I am just not getting out often enough to look after them. This year my beetroot has failed badly and has been fine on previous years. My sweetcorn is not going to have enough time to get going because of a slow start with the cold weather we had and my tomatoes are still green. My onions are unlikely to get very big either and my shallots have disappeared. Next year I will try again with most of these things because the weather is bound to do something different and provide a whole lot of new challenges.
I am assuming you are organic and that is why you are so troubled with slugs. You don't know anyone who can lend you a couple of hens for a spot of free ranging before your veg goes in next year? My hens made all the difference to the slug population in my garden and they were only let loose for a little while each week when I could supervise.
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hubballi, don't give up!
When i first started i had a multitude of problems as you have.
Every other plot holder used to have fab crops and mine used to be very poor if not none existent in comparrison.
What i decide back then was to concentrate on say 2 or 3 specific crops a year, (i still planted all the other stuff but concentrated on getting 2 or 3 things right) i would give them everything they needed, feed, watering, "protection" from pests (etc) and found that generally they did well.
The next year knowing how to tend them correctly to get a good crop meant i could concentrate on the next 2 or 3 types of plant whilst using the previouse years results to guide me.
Just concentrate on getting 1, 2 or 3 things right and your confidence and enjoyment will grow along with your crops.
There is still plenty of time to get things in now, so pull the stuff up that hasn't done any good and start again and concentrate your efforts on getting just a few things absolutely right, then move on to the next thing ;)
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I have pulled all my Kale and Broccoli that are still visibly good (apparently Kale and Broccoli are rarely affected by this fly.) They are covered with the things. I have got them out the soil as best I can and am soaking the plants' roots and it seems to be working as all the grubs are coming out and drowning. I did this with Onion grub and it worked the same as I still have the onions growing with no infestation.
The other thing I noticed along with the fat grubs (tough little things that are hard to squash) were tiny white fly-ish things with a lot of tiny legs. Are these harmful ?
Now the next stage after a good soaking of roots and killing of grubs is what do I do. Shall I plant them back in the soil with collars or has the cabbage fly danger passed ? I will plant these back as I really don't want to lose them. 2 Purple sprouting broccoli are all we have and we love them. Had good crops a couple of years ago in spring.
Thanks for your support and encouragement but I hope you see my frustration. Especially when things that are so easy to grow don't for me.
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Deffinately put collars o the brassicas, i use cardboard rings with a hole cut out the middle.
The cardboard gets wet and allows the stem to swell.
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So can I plant them out with collars later today ?
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Can you post pictures for us to see. It would really help us to advise you !
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I have described what I have and what I have done. I just need to know if I can get them back in the ground today with collars on. Don't really know why you would need photos as we know what the problem is.
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Perhaps re-plant with collar protection then take pics of the whole area with some more foussed/limited areas covered to show the problems. Advice is only any good if the problem is known to the advisor
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Don't really know why you would need photos as we know what the problem is.
A picture paints a thousand words hubballi. If you could post pictures of your problems the advice you are given would be much more accurate.
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A picture of the grubs would help to identify them conclusively.
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The grubs that effect the cabbage family are surely only cabbage fly ? The reason I am asking is I can't really leave the plants soaking in water any longer for fear of killing them unless I plant them in temporary containers ?
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It's not just the cabbage root fly is it though !
Every years it's the same. I start out with good, healthy plants and end up with them either being decimated by slugs, leaf miner and other weird things that happen. This last few days of rain have just about done it for bringing out slugs.
Courgettes: Ends of fruit rot.
Healthy Italian and curly kale. Stripped by slugs. Also starting to wilt.
Broccoli: Stripped leaves.
Broad Beans: Sparse crop. Twisted, distorted beans. Leaves with small holes in. Rusty colored. Black ends to beans.
Onions: Onion maggots.
French Raddish: despite sowing in compost, ground, shade etc they NEVER EVER swell. Just produce thin stems. Hardly grow at all.
Spring Onions: never getting any bigger after months. Then finally wilting and going rotten on top of compost.
Greenhouse:white fly and aphids.
Rocket: Small wispy, wimpy leaves that wilt.
Chard: bolting and distorted leaves.
Carrots: foliage as small and as whispy as they were 3 months ago.
I have a small walled garden. I have tried soot, organic pellets for slugs. Feed and water all plants appropriately. Other plants in the soil doing well are peas, beans, raspberry, so it isn't a soil issue.
Perhaps I should give up :-(
If you would post pictures of your problems it would be much easier to tell you what is wrong !
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I see what you mean Aunt Sally but those other problems are totally different from cabbage root fly which affect only brasicas. It is a pain to get photos because my PC doesn't seem to read my CF card without messing around for ages. I need a new PC (As well as a garden)
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IIRC you posted about your new pond having some maggoty things in it recently. Could these and your veggie woes be linked ?
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No. I looked it up and it wasn't anything to do with that. Someone posted a picture up and it was identified. My pond hasn't had anything like that since.
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Overall it does seem that the bugs just love your garden. Is there anything about its position/soil/anything at all that could be attracting them ?
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IIRC you posted about your new pond
So obviously you can post pictures.
Please do so in the future as there can be many reasons for a lot of the problems you say you have.
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Ok, I will do when I get the chance. Thanks ;)
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Out of interest, what have you added to your soil?
Do you use blood, fish and bone and/or manure to help feed shallower rooting plants?
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Do you get any birds or other friendly bugs? Try encouraging these with seeds and peanuts and bright/ smelly flowers for the bugs - I understand marigolds are supposed to be good.
Not a cure all, but could certainly help :-)
This is my third year growing in the garden after we gave up with the sheer enormity of an allotment and this is really the first year I'm having success.
Just a thought, but if your garden is walled, the soil could be quite rubbly/ sandy - we have a similar problem with the house being on a new estate so raised beds is the way to go for us :-)
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Out of interest, what have you added to your soil?
Do you use blood, fish and bone and/or manure to help feed shallower rooting plants?
Manure is a soil conditioner and should not be considered as a specific fertiliser.
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Just a quick thought, but you do seem to have a lot of veg problems, i have had a look through your posts to try and find a common denominator, and came accross your very first post:
http://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=31680.msg379500#msg379500 (http://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=31680.msg379500#msg379500)
Did you apply the engine oil to your riased beds, this could have potentially leaked into your veg beds and caused some of the problems you have encountered?
Just a thought :)
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My other half and I have had an allotment for six years now,and I am convinced that nature goes in cycles.One year we were overloaded with runner beans,this year they are a poor show.Broad beans,on the other hand,are doing really well.Carrots have fallen prey to the carrot fly,although we have planted them next to onions as recommended.
I think you just have to go with the flow and be glad of what you get.It is easy to get discouraged,we have seen newcomers stay one year and because of a poor harvest,but we gardeners are in the main great optimists.Next year will be better!
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not trying to belittle your depressing experiences Hubbali, but on a lighter note I can't help thinking about the character in Hitchhiker's Guide who was a rain god but didn't know it, and wondered why it always rained wherever he went. Perhaps you're actually some sort of Vegetable Destroying Angel?
:)
Hang on in there....
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It does seem like that savbo :ohmy:
We have organised for one of our experienced gardeners to pay hubballi a visit in a couple of weeks time to advise him as to what he's doing wrong.
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It will be interesting to see how one plot/garden can suffer from every disease/pest/condition for years without any improvement.