Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Growing => Grow Your Own => Topic started by: noshed on June 10, 2006, 21:10
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My Swifts were looking a bit sick today so I had a dig - slugs aargh! So I dug the lot up (still have Duke of Yorks and Jersey Royals). Quite a poor crop really but the actual spuds look fine.
Any ideas what to put in next? - I'm tempted to shove some runner beans in. And there's no such thing as a glut of beans in our house.
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Sorry about your spuds noshed. But yes, why not some runner beans? After all, they say end of May if you put them straight in the ground, and its only 10th june, what aout successional carrots and stuff too??? or would that upset your crop rotation????
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Leeks are often a follow on for earlies or you could pop some dwarf or climbing French beans.
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hm i thought brassicas go in after spuds. That's how I'm working mine. Even a large crop of summer radishes wouldn't go wrong. I'm putting kale and winter radishes in after my spuds for the winter.
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Leeks....
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Thanks everyone - I've put in White Lady runners and three cucumbers - i'll post a pic soon. The other spuds seem to be OK so I've watered them with comfrey tea - pew!
A hot day on the plot.
Thank goodness there's football on the tele...
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Forgot to say thanks to grannieannie for the comfrey - it's doing really well
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hm i thought brassicas go in after spuds. That's how I'm working mine. Even a large crop of summer radishes wouldn't go wrong. I'm putting kale and winter radishes in after my spuds for the winter.
Brassicas like lime but potatoes don't so you should lime inbetween. Some say brassicas after potatoes and other beans. But we're really talking about a catch crop rather than rotation.
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Hi noshed, pleased your comfrey is doing well. My first one is quite high now, over 4ft tall and is leaning on my rosemary, so I chopped a bit off to put under some courgettes that weren't doing too well. They were 3 left overs, so I put them in the polytunnel, they didn't seem to like the heat, curled up doing the day and opened up at night, but the ones outside don't do that, so I dug them up, put them on a nice bed of shredded paper, comfrey leaves, then plenty of compost in a big trough, tonight they looked much happier.
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i dug up 6 of my potato plants yesterday and got a fair sized bag of lovely new potatos, this is my first substantial crop of anything ever. they were absolutely delicious. in there place i have planted my chillie plants out .
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There's nothing like lovely freshly dug potatoes is there twysted1?? The ones I dug out today were one I'd put in a pot and kept in the greenhouse til the weather got a bit better, hoping to get some a bit early, and the other one was a rogue that I missed last year that was growing near my runner beans, so not touched my proper crop yet!! I think its a bit early for them.
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i have quite a large back communal garden and i have just claimed a spot to grow organic veg,where do i start?what is best to start with?also there is a large compost bin with what looks like good quality compost but is full of GIANT white slugs are these ok?please help?
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Giant white slugs!! Good meal for ya there, Twysted :)
Seriously, never come across white slugs - are you sure that's what they are?
As for what to grow - bearing in mind the time of year - you could get some french and runner beans going. If you like them that is. How big a piece of land, how many people do you want to grow for? What's it like? Overgrown? Shaded? What's the soil like?
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john cheers for the reply the area is north facing so it gets sunshine from morning to afternoon,the soil is of good quality light and airy,and im looking to grow for about 6 people in an area of around 6Sqm.as for the white slugs im sure thats what they are, a neighbour said they are white because they never see daylight...? also are potatoes best for your first grow(batch) thanks brian. :
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john cheers for the reply the area is north facing so it gets sunshine from morning to afternoon,the soil is of good quality light and airy,and im looking to grow for about 6 people in an area of around 6Sqm.as for the white slugs im sure thats what they are, a neighbour said they are white because they never see daylight...? also are potatoes best for your first grow(batch) thanks brian. :
Hi Brian
6 (SIX) sq mtr isn't much space, especially for 6 people so I'd suggest you concentrate on high value for space. Climbing beans are great in that you can get loads from little square footage, because they are vertical. Really concentrate on quality - you're not going to feed everyone but you can provide some real treats. Lovely early carrots with the young ones raw in salads. Peas (climbers too) and mangetout, salad crops. I plant radish and spring onions in close rows. Don't forget to successional sow, every couple of weeks for those. You can get selections of cut and come again salads - Italian or French salads. I thing you could supply 6 people from a 2 metre by 300 mm row of that. Use cloches to extend your season as well,
Try and find a source of rotted horse manure (even cities often have stables) and see if you can get one of those dustbin shaped compost bins. Maybe sneak some extra space by explaining to everyone who shares the garden how they are being green by recycling their green waste into improving the garden rather than landfill.
We have 3 bins in our kitchen - one for compostable, one for recycles (cardboard, tins and plastic bottles) and one for rubbish. Plus glass goes to the bank so I'm proud to say our rubbish bin is the least volume now.
Don't put meat wastes or fats into the compost bin though.
Whereabouts are you?
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john thanks,i just got a phonecall this evening from an allotment plot saying i can get a plot,i have to go and see it thursday,so i certainly hope it is bigger than 6 sqm i will let you know cheers again brian.
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Fantastic - you can use the bed near home for salads, herbs and delicates whilst using the allotment for the bulk vegetables, Congratulations :)