[robbodaveuk]

No apology necessary Howard, but thank you for offering anyway. I just assumed you had misread one of the earlier posts and was correcting your assumption. Going back to the rest of your post I and again I assume some of the others would be interested to know about some of the 'science' you have applied to your veg this year and what kind of results you have had. As I said in my earlier post it interests me and I would like to apply some of this 'science' myself next year to improve my success and quality of veg. This is still in line with the original question asked by Crudders.

  Robbo.

[Howard]

...Going back to the rest of your post I and again I assume some of the others would be interested to know about some of the 'science' you have applied to your veg this year and what kind of results you have had. As I said in my earlier post it interests me and I would like to apply some of this 'science' myself next year to improve my success and quality of veg. This is still in line with the original question asked by Crudders.

  Robbo.

On Medwyn Williams' recommendations I bought some Nutrimate at the beginning of the year. This advert explains the stuff far better than I can, but what I can say is boy, does it work!

My tomato seeds were sown in riddled tomato growbag compost (at the recommendation of someone here, who's name escapes me sadly...) in the third week in Feb.

These were the first of my plants to be 'fed' Nutrimate and their initial growth rate was tremendous - to the point where they'd soon exhausted the nutrients in the compost and were showing signs of Magnesium deficiency (I even posted some photos here for advice).

They are now chest high with fruit setting on the fourth truss - and are simply stronger and healthier than I've grown before. I took this pic this morning but it doesn't really do them justice.







As an aside, when I started growing tomatoes three years ago (and before I really understood ring culture and cutting the bottoms off flower pots...) I bought some tomato grow rings. They actually work OK, but I've not been deeply happy with the idea of growing in growbags.

So, this year I opened up a giant Levington's growbag in a wheelbarrow and mixed in some Nutrimate @ 5gm/litre. This was shovelled into three florist's buckets (cadged from my local CO-OP) with the grow rings fitted to the top.

Works for me! 







Last year my leeks were a bit of a failure. So again, I read everything Medwyn Williams has written, bought John Soulsby's video from the National Vegetable Society and picked my way through a number of other web articles.

From all of this I decided on a seed growing mix of:

3 part riddled compost
1 part riddled topsoil
1 part vermiculite
Kays Exhibition Leek and Onion Base compost mix

Instead of leaving them in this until they were planted out, when I felt they would benefit I potted them on into a more 'robust' mix, following Medwyn Williams' thoughts on preparing them for life out in the big bad world. This mix was:

4 part riddled compost
3 part riddled topsoil
1 part vermiculite
Kays Exhibition Leek and Onion Base compost mix

to which I added some Hydro Complex - courtesy of John Soulsby's growing regime.

I planted them out last week, but kept half a dozen back which were potted on again and are now in the greenhouse and I shall be collaring them to blanch them up when they're a bit bigger. Sure, they're not the biggest leeks in the world, but I only sowed the seeds in the second week of March and they're already streets ahead of my efforts last year!







I could go on, but I'm conscious that it's beginning to read a bit me me me...

Oh, and to bring us back on track, I'm using the leek mixes for my onions too - and they're doing just grand at the moment! 

[Jay Dubya]

Hi, i am a show grower ( as you can see by my picture ) but i am also an allotment holder, you can do the two together, it's just a different branch of the same hobby. Also it's not all about size thats just a percentage of the points, it's about quality and uniformity and colour. Most of the show stuff you would be happy to eat if not all and we auction off the exhibits at the end and they sell like hot cakes. As someone said to learn how to grow something to that standard improves your knowledge, and showers are eager to share that knowledge. Why not try that challenge.