[snowdrops]

Thank you, I'll give them a go.

[GrannieAnnie]

I bought an Andrew James juicer, blender and smoothie maker as it was a good price, but the juicer bit is pants, so it's going back.  Even though I chopped the apples up, they wouldn't juice unless I pushed down with the plunger, then it started to over heat and stopped running for about 5 minutes.

So just waiting for them to send me a returns label. 

We don't like applesauce, and don't have a dehydrator, so Apple jelly and Apple wine it is then!   

[LotuSeed]

I put loads of cucumbers on the compost pile. Some got to the size of 2 litre bottles and I just couldn't keep up with them all. Once cucumber blindness sets in it's a bust lol. The ones I did manage to catch in time and use were a little too bitter for my liking anyway. Oh well!

You need chickens!  The mature cukes that are too seedy are sliced lengthways in half for the chickens to eat the seeds and they love pecking at the fruits 

I would love to be able to keep chickens! Unfortunately the laws regarding keeping backyard chickens are vague and I haven't figured out all the mumbo jumbo of the county codes

[Christine]

I always allow the end of the packet for composting!  I mean, you have to do something to save a bit on the expenses in running an allotment so excesses and failures are in the end a money saving device.

[beesrus]

I always allow the end of the packet for composting!  I mean, you have to do something to save a bit on the expenses in running an allotment so excesses and failures are in the end a money saving device.

How true. 
I couldn't find any Winter Tares locally this year, so I have had to make do with planting a hundred or so left over Masterpeice broad beans as a green manure for bulk soil conditioning purposes, that will cut and dug in at the appropriate time. I was a bit tardy but I might even be lucky and get a small bonus nitrogen fix if the weather continues as it is.

[Aled]

Some runner beans at the moment, but another few weeks to go....
Cheers
Aled

[Lardman]

So much has ended up on the compost heap this year, far more than I've actually eaten !

All but 3 courgettes so far, huge amounts of lettuce, all the beetroot, most of the runners after the frame fell over. Most of the chard and all but a handful of French beans. Huge amount of split toms I picked to do sauce with but the botrytis beat me to it and most of the bell peppers.

I've been rather rubbish this year.   

[Beetroot Queen]

So much has ended up on the compost heap this year, far more than I've actually eaten !

All but 3 courgettes so far, huge amounts of lettuce, all the beetroot, most of the runners after the frame fell over. Most of the chard and all but a handful of French beans. Huge amount of split toms I picked to do sauce with but the botrytis beat me to it and most of the bell peppers.

I've been rather rubbish this year.   

Look forward to a great year next year. Just picked up garlic and onion sets. Looking forward hate seeing the plot look empty

[adri]

Cucumbers.  Tried selling them (50p each sold by the kids to make a bit of pocket money) and then giving them away and now composting a few...

Next year 1 less cucumber plant...

[colin120]

With your runner beans & French beans store a handful until they go black then take then bean out put in a jar then plant next year, makes great plants with a very good yield. 

[JayG]

Only complete failures have been crops which failed to germinate well, so nothing to compost!

A few radishes and lettuces which ran to seed before I got round to eating them.

Even without the runner bean bines, which are still just about producing a few short, misshapen beans, my daleks are already nearly full, one almost entirely with sweet corn plants - I've sliced the stems up but I know from past experience that the roots and spent cobs will still be more or less intact in a year's time, but you tell me an easy way of chopping them up so they rot down quicker! 

[cadalot]

Someone on here suggested hitting them with a hammer, which is what I did. I placed them on a section of scaffold board then hammered them all along and then I cut them into inch long bits.

They have gone into the bottom of Dalek No 3. I'm going to do the same with the sprout stems this year, a good bashing with a hammer.

[surbie100]

I burn mine - I like the sound of the corn popping in the fire. Likewise I dry out and burn the brassica stems. Am too impatient to wait for them to compost.

[Snoop]

Some beetroot and will be composting a lot of toms and some melons and aubergines that have rotted in the rain. I've fed quite a few bolted lettuce and a fair bit of chard to the chickens, so indirectly composted I suppose.

[Beetroot Queen]

Only complete failures have been crops which failed to germinate well, so nothing to compost!

A few radishes and lettuces which ran to seed before I got round to eating them.

Even without the runner bean bines, which are still just about producing a few short, misshapen beans, my daleks are already nearly full, one almost entirely with sweet corn plants - I've sliced the stems up but I know from past experience that the roots and spent cobs will still be more or less intact in a year's time, but you tell me an easy way of chopping them up so they rot down quicker! 

We shred ours in a garden shredder, fantastic way to deal with them. The shredder does require more clearing out because of any moisture but took up about an hour to do 30 plus.