Wellrooted - Gardening and vegetable growing diaries from the West Country - Part 3

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Needed some rain.

Apr 26th 2010

By: Doug

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The showers over the weekend were welcome because the garden was getting a little on the dry side. Nice to be waiting for rain rather than sun for a change!

I finally got my Kelsae onion plants through from DT Browns. – See my giant onion attempt!

All this sunshine and showers is doing wonders for the garden.

This weekend I planted my sweetcorn. – a new one for me so it will be interesting to see how it grows…

The Artichokes are now about an inch tall and all 12 seeds planted has germinated! They were planted in seed trays resting on my tropical fish tank. This is proving a fantastic propagation tool.

I planted my “Green Bush” Courgette and a Butternut Squash in the new greenhouse tub.

Peppers and Radish’s are growing really well in the Big tub in the greenhouse.

The “Hungarian hot wax” Chili and the melon plant are looking really good and growing well in the conservatory.

The garlic are looking very good in the Big Bed in the garden.

In fact the whole garden has had a really good week, let’s hope this weather continues!

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Dougs Garden
Experiment Update

Apr 23rd 2010

By: Paul

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I have been away this latest weekend but I just had time to check on the progress of my hydroponics experiment. As well as the plants that sit in the rock wool cubes, I also have the same species of plant in soil which are in the greenhouse and also in the cold frames. This is a very good method in determining which plants do better in certain environments. So far the corriander has been the most successful in the hydroponics system, growing about 5 times faster! The basil and pepper plants seem to be growing at around twice the rate of their soil counterparts. The tomato plants are slower than the plants we have in the soil though.

Here are the soil versions of the corriander, basil and peppers:

The runner and dwarf beans are now growing at an impressive rate after propogation and will be ready to put into the raised bed very soon. The tomatos in soil are behind them.

This is the corriander in the hydroponics:

Pauls Garden
Good for the Veg.

Apr 19th 2010

By: Doug

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Wow, another weekend of fantastic weather.

Things have certainly started to move up a gear in the garden. Seeds are sprouting and plants are growing.

The pepper bed is finished and has been fully planted up with nine plants, five “Big Red” and four “California wonder”. I have used the space in between the rows for some radishes. I use “rainbow mix” from thompson and morgan as they crop in about a month from sowing and it’s nice to have a good variety.

All Chilli peppers have been planted into their final pots now. They are all a bit small but should catch up if this hot weather continues! This “Hungarian fot wax” is growing in a three litre pot in the greenhouse.

Peas are looking good and the few plants that came through from the first sowing are ready to be planted out. Also potted up the sweet peas this weekend.

The courgettes and squash are coming on nicely. I now have, Butternut, F1 Sunbeam, Honey bear, Red Kuri squash at second leaf stage and the Courgettes are looking good too. I now have three times as many plants as my garden can take…

Apart from apple trees I have never really grown fruit in the garden. I have always been put off by the plants needing several years before they produced fruit. I now wish i bought some years ago! I was so taken by this beautiful goosebury bush that i just had to buy it. It should produce fruit next year.

Usually I stick to vegetables but one flower I do like to grow is the Geranium. I usually grow from seed but this year I bought 72 plugs from Blooming direct for £10. These arrived looking fantastic and i am well pleased. i have planted them in every teracotta pot i could find and still have about 40 left to find homes for!

Geranium plugs I got an email from Blooming direct with a voucher code. Use BLOOMING5 and you will get 5% off.

In the big bed most of the onions are coming on nicely. The Hercules seem to be leading the way. I also created a new onion box in the greenhouse for my 2010 giant onion attempt!

The garden is looking it’s best so far and all sorts of flowers are coming into bloom. I know this is a vegetable growers blog but I couldn’t resist taking a few flower pics!

The garden in full sunshine. How things have changed in the last month.

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Dougs Garden
Last Weekend

Apr 19th 2010

By: reluctantgardener

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Saturday 17^th April 2010

The grand weather over the past few days meant that it was time to pick up my tools and do something about the mess that we call a back garden.

Spoke to She who must be obeyed and got detailed instructions and the plan of action for the day ahead.

The easy job came first, clear all the large stones from the bottom left flower bed and turn the soil. So after a bit of effort I managed to turn it from this…..

The bottom left flower bed

…into this.

Bottom Left Flower Bed

All that is needed now is a bit of peat/manure to fork into the soil and then plant a few bedding plants.

After the easy job came a bit more work of the hard kind. The bottom centre flower bed is the largest bed that we have and had a medium sized fir tree, a creeping fir and a black spider plant in it. There is also a stump that is all that remains of another smaller fir tree that was taken down late last year.

First to go was the creeping fir. Cut all the green stuff off with a pair of secateurs and then dug up the remaining stump and roots. After that the black spider plant was easily taken up and placed in the recycle bin (more about the black spider later).

I then tried to dig up the old stump that remained from the fir tree destruction of last year but after much grunting and heaving (and a few choice words not repeatable on here in case some young gardener of the year is reading) I gave it up as a bad joke. It’s still there taunting me, but I have a plan to have the last laugh at it.

Anyway, the flower bed is looking a lot tidier now that most of the green stuff has been dug up.

We have gone from this…

The bottom centre flower bed

…to this

Bottom Middle Flower Bed

So a good few hours spent in the sunshine and the back garden was already looking a lot tidier. So not wanting to get too involved in it I cleaned up all the tools and packed them away and beat a hasty retreat to the lounge.

Sunday 18th April 2010

Another glorious day dawned over Plymouth so after treating the Manager of the house to breakfast in bed (again) I received more detailed instructions on the way ahead.

This time the bottom right flower bed was the centre of attention and then it was onto cutting the lawn, front and back, for the first time this year.

Obviously the selective hearing that I sometimes find most useful kicked in at the wrong time and I mis-heard some of the instructions that was given and I started to dig up the dwarf fir tree in the flower bed. This brought forth she who must be obeyed who informed me that it was to stay where it was and I just had to get rid of the fir tree and the creeping fir.

I hadn’t gotten far with digging up the dwarf tree so replaced the soil that I had disturbed and started to carry on with getting rid of the fir tree and creeping fir. At this stage also she who must be obeyed noticed that I had dug of the black spider plant yesterday.

After a brief “discussion” I rescued the plant from the recycle bin. Thankfully it was near the top and I didn’t have to go searching too far down the waste to find it. The rescued plant was then potted into one of the many flower pots we have and given a drink of water and now sits happily at the bottom of the garden by the bird feeding station.

Back to the flower bed and again with the trusty secateurs and a shovel I made quick work of the remaining tree and plant that need to be dug up and the flower bed went from this..

The bottom right flower bed

to this…

Bottom Right Flower Bed

That was the all the hard work out of the way. Next up was the lawn, front and back. So out with the lawn mower and in no time at all the first cut of the year was complete.

The Back Garden

All in all about 5 hours of work and the garden is looking a lot more tidier than is was a few weeks ago as can be seen from the image above.

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The Reluctant Gardener
Prolific Planting

Apr 18th 2010

By: Paul

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Yet another fantastic weekend of spring sunshine, gardeners are being spoilt! I finally got round to putting the potatos into the raised bed this weekend – 16 plants went in. I also completed planting our ‘staple’ veg and the raised bed is now full for the time being. Here is what I planted:
- 8 x onion sets ‘sturon’
- 2 x rows of lettuce ‘salad bowl’
- 2 x rows of lettuce ‘little gem’
- 2 x rows carrot ‘chantenay red cored 2′
- 3 x rows raddish ‘french breakfast 3′
I had also been given some nice new plants from Doug which has helped my variety a bit. I now have a squash ‘F1 sunbeam’ and 2 courgettes – ‘midnight’ and ‘green bush’.

The hydroponics experiment is still running well, with everything growing at a good pace at the moment.

The strawberry plants have been sensational so far, soaking up all of this spring sunshine.

The runner and dwarf beans have just started to sprout.

The tomato plants that are due to go into grow bags in the greenhouse are just about ready for planting.

Spring onion progress is going well.

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Pauls Garden
Fantastic weekend

Apr 12th 2010

By: Doug

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Finally spring is here. It’s official.

What a wonderful weekend in the garden, just what we needed to recover from a slow start to spring. This weekend I got down to some serious sowing, Second round of Runners, Broad bean and Tomato were sown. Onions from seed were planted out. Potted garlic was finally planted in the Big bed.

The greenhouse although still not completely finished is coming into it’s own! – I love having a greenhouse!

I built myself a new container for the greenhouse. Its bigger than it looks at nearly 4ft long and should be a fantastic place to grow the peppers. This year i am growing “Big red” and “California wonder” I am wondering what else I should grow in there.. Any ideas?

Some of the late march sowing have started to come though this past week. I am using last years peas and germination has been quite slow. Hopefully this hot weather will speed things along.

The greenhouse bench I made last weekend is nearly full! Time to put in some more shelves. All sorts of seedlings in progress. Squash and courgettes are looking good as are the chili peppers.

Hopefully the weather will continue though the week. There is always so much to do in the garden.

The chickens are enjoying their new run. They can now come outside even when we are not home.

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Dougs Garden, The Chickens
Diary of a very reluctant weekend gardener – Introduction

Apr 12th 2010

By: reluctantgardener

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Introduction

Let me get one thing straight from the start. There is only one thing I hate doing more than gardening and that’s DIY. So why am I suddenly thrust into doing something that I have no desire to do. In the word of the great meerkat…simples, my wife’s health is not as it was and she is unable to spend large periods of time in the garden.

Before I came on the scene eight years ago she was a very keen gardener and kept her 36 x 25 feet back garden spick, span and well tended. Unfortunately, her Multiple Sclerosis has grown worse and she is unable to spend the time she used too without getting too tired.

So it’s come down to me with a little help and lots of guidance from she who must be obeyed to try and bring the garden back up to scratch.

The Not So Blank Canvas

The rear garden is approximately 36 feet long by 25 feet wide. It’s made up of ¼ patio, ¼ gravel and ½ lawn and has two tiers. There are 5 separate flower beds two at the top of the garden and three at the bottom as well as numerous flower pots to tend to. There is a small paved area bottom right with a bird feeding station.

The lawn, front and back is full of weeds and there is a small patch of dead grass where an old fence panel was laid on it for a few weeks, though the grass is beginning to grow back with all the “good” weather we have had recently.

The back lawn

The Five Flower Beds

Under Kitchen Window Flower Bed

The flower bed under the kitchen window is the smallest of all the flower beds.

The flower bed under the kitchen window

Garage Door Flower Bed

To the left of the patio door is the garage door and this flower bed. There is a rose bush planted here that was a wedding present 3 years ago. It should have grown about 5 feet according to the label and although its the tallest plant in this bed its about 4 feet shorter than it should be.

The garage door flower bed

Bottom Right Flower Bed

All the plants in this bed need to be dug up and the bed planted with new flowers. It consists of creeping fir a medium fir tree and a dwarf fir.

The bottom right flower bed

Bottom Centre

This is the largest of all the flower bed and needs the most work done to it. Due to its central position at the bottom of the garden it should form the focal point and needs to be planted as such. At present there is the tallest tree in the garden and the largest creepig fir.

There were 2 fir trees here but I chopped one down last year and all that remains is the stump which needs to be dug up. There is a also a small spider plant as well.

The bottom centre flower bed

Bottom Left

This will be the easier of the flower beds to work with as its a blank canvas in its own right. Completely empty except for a few weeds and stones. All thats really needed is to dig up the weeds, get rid of the stones and turn the soil.

The bottom left flower bed

2010 so far

What’s been done so far this year? The major change has been the replacement of the panel fence that we used to have. Every time there was a big wind at least one panel would end up in the garden below ours or a fence post would break. It was a very high maintenance fence that didn’t stand up to the wind very well.

On the recommendation of a friend we hired Henrys Tree and Garden Care to take the old fence down and replace it with a hit and miss fence. It took Henry working on his own about 4 days to complete the job and so far we are more than pleased with the result. All the wood has been pressure treated so I don’t have to paint/stain it for a couple of years yet…. result.

I dug a hole bottom right of the garden in the centre of the paved area and using a post and other bits of wood left over from the fence build and re-sited the bird feeding station. I then put up the bird house and also the seed tube on the post. It just needs to be re-stained.

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The Reluctant Gardener
Spring Heat!

Apr 11th 2010

By: Paul

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What weekend weather! The temperature inside the greenhouse was topping 30c and some of the young plants were wilting quite a lot.

I was mostly repotting things this weekend, moving young plants from their propogators into bigger pots. They have also moved on from the greenhouse into the cold frames to free up some room.

The raised bed frame has been improved, so the netting is easier to remove to work on. The netting is stapled to a long section of wood that can be lifted up over the top bar so that it takes it all out of the way.

The hydroponics kit is now is full flow, so happy with the progress on that so far. I started by measuring out how many litres of water were going to fill the resevoir. I needed this to know how much nutrient solution to add. It turned out that it took 15 litres and I added 7ml per litre. I also had to alter the PH level of the water, to begin with from the tap it was around 7.2 so I used phosphoric acid to bring it down to about 5.5, this is also what the nutrient solution required. I also made a new wooden cover and pre-cut 6 holes to place the rock wool cubes in. I then laid the spreader matt down on the tray, placed the wooden cover on top and planted into the cubes.

I have planted 2 x ‘Gardener’s Delight’ tomato, 2 x ‘California Wonder’ pepper, 1 x Basil and 1 x Corriander herbs.

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Pauls Garden
Signs of life!

Apr 7th 2010

By: Paul

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The recent planting of the strawberries has already proven successful, as we have some flowers already – at the beginning of April!

The power socket is now installed in the greenhouse ready for the hydroponics. I’m going to get this up and running at the weekend.

I recently gave the pepper plant that managed to survive the winter some tomato feed. I’m hoping that this will spur on some new growth in the greenhouse. I also need to remove the baby pepper growing to encourage more leaf growth first.

The young tomato plants are proving to excellent so far. These are all ‘Gardener’s Delight’ variety. They have been moved from their propogator to small individual pots.

These young ‘California Wonder’ pepper plants have now sprouted and appear to be healthy. They will also need potting on soon.

The single clove of garlic seemed to die a couple of weeks ago but have now sprung back into life since moving from my flat into the greenhouse.

I finally managed to get round to planting on the ‘Kelsae’ and ‘Alisa Craig’ onions that had started from seed. They are now sitting securely on the left hand side of the raised bed.

Pauls Garden
Progress in the garden

Apr 7th 2010

By: Doug

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With the rubbish weather forecast I was not expecting to be able to get outside quite as much as I did this weekend. I ended up making quite alot of progress.

I have nearly finished the greenhouse. All the glass is in and all the broken panels have been replaced with 4mm corrugated polycarbonate. I didn’t have very high expectations for polycarbonate but first impressions are good. It was easy to work with and seems to be stiff enough to hold up to the elements. One thing i will be doing is adding a few extra clips in here and there as this seemed to keep everything a bit more solid.

I built the workbench out of some wood i had in the shed, One end is slatted and on the other I made a solid edged platform for sowing seeds on. The edges should stop the soil from falling down the back. I am planning on putting boards along the lower supports to make a second shelf. This was a really simple DIY project and providing you use a tape measure you can’t really go wrong! The timber for the bench cost about £20 but i did have to make use of a few off cuts i had in the shed.

If you don’t fancy making one you can buy them pretty cheaply. Garden centre online do a couple of aluminium potting bench’s that are a reasonable price.

potting bench – Garden Centre Online

If like me you working on a wooden bench, this one looks nice.

Deluxe Wooden Potting Table | Outdoor Accessories

For now I have wired in the existing electricity supply, this was conveniently in place from the shed that used to be on the site. It is simply a fused spur to with the house sockets and lighting switches on the end. I will be replacing these ASAP.

I finally planted out the few broad bean plants that were sown in February. Up til now they have been getting hot and bothered in the conservatory. I hope they survive the shock of being put outside! Broad beans are hardy little buggers so they should be OK. I also planted out some runner beans that were planted in trays on March the 20th.

I also planted out my Kelsae and Alisa Craig onions that were sown in Feb. They were not looking as big as i had hoped so rather then plant them far apart and give them space to grow big, I have packed them in with about 1″ between plants. I will gradually thin them throughout the season. This way i will get a nice supply of spring onions, followed by some shallot sized onions followed by a few big ones! – That’s the plan anyway. I am pinning my hopes for growing some monster sized onions on the onion plants purchased from Fothergils. They should arrive soon and I am planning on preparing a bed for them in the new greenhouse.

Also put a fence around the main veg patch, hopefully this will help keep the cats and the chickens off.

On Saturday Hayley sowed Parsnips, Carrots, Golden Burpee Beetroot, and Crimson Globe beetroot in the raised bed. The glass was put on top to keep the cats off until I build a fence.

Nice to see some better weather!

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Dougs Garden
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