[Potty Plotty Lotty]

At the plot today I was thinking how much what I've learnt on this forum has influenced my way of growing things. Prior to that I had based my practice in my garden veg patch on Dr Hessayon's "The Vegetable expert book" which I occasionally still flick through.

What are the top 5 things you've learnt from this forum that has influenced your way of growing?

Mine are (and I struggled to keep to five):

-Use of blue MDPE water pipe and debris netting for protecting my brassicas
-Use of these modules for sowing all sorts of seeds (20 cell ones): http://www.plantcell.co.uk/cell_packs.html
-Sowing leeks in a cat litter tray
-Growing spring onions in modules then in a raised bed filled with old grow bag compost
-Growing brassicas in modules then 3" pots to develop the root system before planting out with a handful of lime on clubroot infested plots.

[Spr0ut]

What an excellent thread. Thanks for posting it.

1. coffee grounds are pretty useless at deterring slugs from munching plants, but are very good in homemade compost.
2. the use of debris netting against the Cabbage White - cheaper than the bespoke fine mesh netting.
3. using long root trainers for sweetcorn
4. the 8 foot soil pipe comfrey liquor maker and the idea of mowing the comfrey to help it rot down quicker and help tamp it down in the pipe.
5. the use of old sanding discs, or cheap rough grade sandpaper as collars for plants against slugs - q double plus for brassica collars.

[Potty Plotty Lotty]

5. the use of old sanding discs, or cheap rough grade sandpaper as collars for plants against slugs - q double plus for brassica collars.

What a great idea-not come across that one before! Especially with the current slug epidemic.

[Goosegirl]

Over the years I have learnt that:
- there is no such thing as a stupid question on here.
- there is more than one way to grow things successfully.
- we all have failures, and it's not always our fault.
- planting hungry plants like sweetcorn in holes with chicken manure pellets in the bottom.
- DD's way of growing peas.