Growing veg, starting now?

[ccmummy]

Ohhhhh I'm so excited. When we first moved into our house years ago we were told the large patch of grass between our house and the next was the councils so don't touch it. With the idea of starting a small veg patch I rung them today to find out if they would let me/rent it whatever 'uh no it's yours' was the reply! Yey! So, now I have a large patch of grass to grow on. My question is, where do I start? I've looked online but most places say I should be harvesting right about now and I haven't even started digging and preparing the soil (which I also don't know how to do) Keeping in mind I managed to kill the kids school cress project does anybody have any good tips, or can point me towards a step by step guide?

[Moony]

To grow on grass (the lazy way - the way I did it) put down some old cardboard boxes to kill off the grass and let it mulch down a bit, then stick a raised bed frame around the area (I bought 1m square ones, or it would be easy to knock up frames from pieces of timber). Leave it a few weeks (depending on how much rain you get and how quick the boxes rot down and degrade) and in the meantime you can start growing some seeds, get a few cheap seed trays from your 99p shop and start off some easy seeds like radish, tomatos, lettuce, etc. Then add soil and/or compost to the frames and plant your seedlings in.

Using the cardboard directly on the grass avoids the hard work of digging through old turf and turning the soil and all that malarky. Started my beds this way last year and got a fine crop of carrots, spring onions, leeks, radishes, beetroot..erm beans and some other stuff

Remember to either weight down the cardboard with some old stones (or peg it down with tent pegs like I did) or you look out one morning and your cardboard will have blown away before you get the soil/compost in
Another advantage of using the cardboard is that you can cut it to size and move it around a bit while you decide where to place the beds and how big you want them quickly and easily !

[jansman]

You are pushing time for growing "Summer "crops now. However, get the soil stripped of grass, turned over and worked to as good a texture as poss. The I would suggest getting to a garden centre/nursery. From the end of August you should be able to find Japanese onions, garlic, Spring cabbage. All for over-Winter.
Right now, you could start lettuce in trays and if quick, get to the nursery and see if you can get hold of cabbage/brussel and sprouting broccoli plants. But be quick!
You are too late in the season for seed sowing really,but the above is do-able.

[Arzosah]

Thats great news!

I'd say a mix of the above - get going on what digging you want to do, sure, but in the meantime, cut *all* the grass as short as you can, and get cardboard or permafleece or carpet over it, weighted down as advised so it doesn't blow away. Doing that starts to weaken the grass, easier for you to dig, if you go the digging route.

The other thing is that there are some thing people buy as full plants - fruit bushes, for instance. You could buy a couple of fruit bushes now (and especially if you buy from a poundland type shop, make sure they've got buds on - there's plenty of dead ones on the shelves). Either put them in pots (which might need to be insulated with bubble wrap over the winter) or plant them in the ground in full sun.

[gm_prepper]

Some links ye may find useful, the first being an online seed seller, all natural and now GM shite, so you can cultivate and re use seeds after harvest (GM are one use only).

http://www.realseeds.co.uk/

The second being a load of downloadable books including in depth gardening.

http://www.preppers.info/Free_Downloads.html#Skills

[PreppingPingu]

Fab news As the others have said! Don't worry about not get it all going at once. I am a year and a half into my allotment from scratch. With very little knowledge to start. I have done a little at a time, that way you don't get overwhelmed. Think of the rest of this season as prep for next season! I put some of my fruit bushes in in the early autumn and that way they were nice and established for the following spring. As Jansman said, plant garlic and onions in the early autumn to over winter. That made me feel good this year in the spring when I started in earnest in my patch, as I already had something visible in the ground! Also in the autumn you can see if any of the local horse riding stables have any free rotted horse manure that you can dig into the ground so that come spring the nutrients have filtered through and you will be ok to plant. Good luck and enjoy!

[junmist]

Go slowly ( hard to do for me) read books and decide which method you wish to use there are loads of different ones, raised beds normal and permaculture to name but a few PREPARE the ground for your chosen method. Collect or make cloche's to help warm up the soil in the spring and to help protect your crops. PREPARE the soil, collect seed (heritage seed bank is a good place to start) wait for snow ice and rain to finish, PREPARE the soil and start planting in the spring. Sorry to put a damper on things, we all want to start strait away but soil is every thing and the most important thing to get right and the thing we most often thing we all forget to start with in are eagerness to get started with the planting.

[Highlander]

I'm no expert by any means but I have nearly finished putting 4 raised beds on top of my rear lawn

a LOT easier than removing the grass and digging it!

Have a look here. (soaking wet cardboard won't blow away. so hose it down)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZugARiOJCQ