[Maccbean]

Hi

I've had just four raised beds for a year, and have obediently rotated this year.  However, in my broad bean bed I have two potato plants growing (I was sure I'd removed them all), and in my asparagus bed I have three pea plants going.  It seems such a waste to pull them out, when I could just reap the reward of letting them grow.  Must I?

Ta

[lucywil]

i have 3 raised beds that are filled with 'home made' compost and every year something pops up where it shouldn't, at the moment i have a potato invading the onion bed, i keep pulling the plant out in an attempt to stop it, found 2 tomato plants growing at the weekend so i have transplanted them

also took on a new plot this year that was a flower bed in previous years and although the previous tennant did a great job of clearing it, things keep popping up, i have some cosmos growing amongst the potatoes (which i am going to transplant) and toadflax amongst the peas, which i just keep pulling up.

can you not transplant the pea plants? potato plants can get pretty big and might crowd out one or 2 of the bean plants but at the end of the day it's your choice

[LittleRedHen]

Nay, just let them get on with it.    Don't move the asparagus next year.  They like to remain where planted! 

[TerryB]

Get potato's growing in there old bed every year.
It's up to you but I'd remove it, as I would any weed.
A weed is only a wild plant growing where it is not wanted.

[Salmo]

Self sown potatoes and potatoes left in compost/rubbish heaps are the commomest source of blight infections.

Remove any potatoes that appear like this. They may well carry over blight from last year and infect your crop.

[Maccbean]

Self sown potatoes and potatoes left in compost/rubbish heaps are the commomest source of blight infections.

Remove any potatoes that appear like this. They may well carry over blight from last year and infect your crop.

They're not self sown as such, as I put them in the bed last year, I just obviously missed them when digging up the potatoes and turning over the soil at the end of the year.  Think I'll take them out and pop them in a pot anyway.  Thanks.

[stompy]

Remove the potatoes and bin them. (when they are comming up from a previose years crop, maybe 1 or 2 that you missed, they are classed as self seeded)
They can carry over diseas,

Remove the peas from the asparagus bed, the asparagus doesn't want to be competing with anything else or it could weaken the plant

[DD.]

It takes a lot to weaken asparagus, they're brutes.

My concern is for the peas - get them somewhere safe! 

[stompy]

     

Put the pea plants in the compost bin.   

[DD.]

AUNTIE  - stopmy's being cruel to peas!

[Maccbean]

So, I can't even put the potatoes in a separate pot?  Are they more likely to pass on disease even in a separate container? 

I will put the peas in a pot, as I've heard you must keep weeds and stuff at bay from asparagus.

[whiskywill]

They may well carry over blight from last year and infect your crop.

Only if blight was a problem last year.

[Gandan57]

I`m curious about this. If a potato was infected with blight, would it not rot and fail to grow the following year?

[DD.]

They don't neccessarily rot.

You'll see on the blight map as it progresses through the year that blight appears on "outgrade" piles - ones that have been discarded as nolt good enough for market.

This is one reason why you should not allow "volunteer" spuds to grow or use non-certified seed.