[joshremlin]

Hi

My girlfriend and I are new to the gardening and growing of our own veg.  We were allocated an allotment earlier this year and are getting mixed messages from other people.  We have heard that some of the veg do not like being grown in horse manure is this correct and if so can anyone give me some ideas as to what can be grown and what can not be grown in horse manure.

I have grown some veg from seeds in trays and seperated them into singles in small pots to grow a little bit more before taking them to plant in the alloment.  when doing this I have used horse manure that is old more like compost itself.  Does this make any difference to the veg we are growing? 

We are both very keen in learning as much as we can from our new experience and hope this is going to be something we both can enjoy for many more years.

[Casey76]

Root vegetables, especially carrots and swedes should not be grown on recently manured land (i.e. within a year) as the manure encourages forking of the root.

That is the only thing that I'm aware of, but I tend to stick to container grown plants, so I don't have much knowledge about growing in the ground

[joshremlin]

Thank you for your reply, would you call root plants peas, onions ect becuse they like root into the floor as patatos don't if that makes sence

cheer in advance

[mumofstig]

everything, except the roots (as Casey has said) will enjoy well rotted horse manure.
Any that is not well rotted is best applied in the autumn to bare ground.

Even well rotted stuff may be a bit too strong for the potting on of seedlings though.... not something I've ever thought of doing, in all honesty

Root veg are carrots, parsnips, beetroot ...............not onions, peas or potatoes.

[joshremlin]

cheers great help thank you it just im new to all this an just learning still lol, ive ordered some john harrison books for extra help/advice

cheers
joshremlin

[fatcat1955]

Just make sure the manure is guaranteed free from Aminopyralid. Type it into the search box for more info.

[polly nator]

I conducted an interesting experiment three years ago and called it my "living compost heap"
Turned out to be the most successful of my gardening experiments.

I have some raised beds which are about 3 foot square and 18 inches deep. I put posts in the corners of one of them and placed some metal netting around to almost double the potential depth.

I tipped in lots of bags of pretty well FRESH horse manure which  I then covered with a shallow layer of topsoil and compost.

Year 1 - I planted two climbing courgettes in the bed. As time went on I continued to add various bits of compostable stuff to the surface whilst the courgettes were growing.  The courgettes went crazy and, being trained up thick poles, I soon had what looked like a Brazilian rain forest

Year 2  - continued the experiment replacing courgettes with tomatoes. Never seen anything like it. I had "sweet millions" - For the first time in my life my produce looked as good as or even better than a seed packet photo

Year 3 - Runner beans

This year I have dismantled the experiment but following the success of year 1 - I no longer worry too much about rotting the manure down. I just chuck it on - except for area where I want to grow carrots, as explained by other posters.

This years experiment involves filling half  a large pot with fairly fresh horse manure, topping up with soil/compost - and growing Maskotka bush tomatoes.  Watch this space.

Good luck with the veg growing