What Preps are you doing this week

[Carrot Cruncher]

Bought a load of bamboo to support the beans and toms in the garden, just about finished planting out everything now. The apple tree is suffering from green fly so they have had a good spray. Plenty of slug pellets around the Runner Beans, last year I planted out about 20 of them and the next day not one of them had any leaves left...just stalks. This year it's war !!

Decided against growing spuds this year. Last years crop took a hell of a lot of work for not a lot of return and I haven't really got the space to grow enough of them. I can pick up 56lb from a farm up the road for £7 so it really isn't worth it imo. Using the space they took up to grow Swede and Sprouts this year

Spent most of the week working on the new shed and it is just about there now, had plenty of rain last night and there were no leaks so that is a bonus considering my DIY skills

Went down the local ARmy Surplus today on the Industrial Estate and they had a load of Drainpipe type tubes with end caps on them so when we get a finished list in the "Cache" thread I will pick up a few and try them out.

[beefy0978]

The recent splash of rain allowed me to check the rain butts are collecting as they should. One all in order, the other a bit slow so I shall be making the collection area a bit more efficient over the nexty few weeks. I also built a small wooden fence on the edge of the house just to tighten up security a little. Loads more of that needed.

[Selfsufficientwoman]

-Planted out 18 tomato plants, 3 of each type of plant -6 plants for immediate use for cooking etc and dehydrating the rest.

- Carrots planted out and sowing a new set to continue through season and to dehydrate at the end of the season

- strawberries and grape tree coming along nicely and will dehydrate some at end of season

-8 Cucumber plants planted out - not sure about dehydrating - but will try one and see how it comes out

- planted out sunflowers where the veg and fruit plants are to ensure good pollination - as they encourage bees into the garden

- Stocked up on veg and fruit, which is considerably cheaper in warmer weather and dehydrating a whole batch and also will start looking a specials in grocery particularly tea coffee, rice, flour etc - again alot cheaper as most people eat lighter meals in warm weather and grocery need to make a little more effort to shift these items

- Purchased some mylar bags in preparation for dehydrated fruit and veg -from excellent seller on Ebay - they seem to have all size bags, including ziplock mylar bags, which great - for fruit and going to get a couple of those at the end of the month - link below if anyone interested

http://stores.ebay.co.uk/Emergency-Food ... upplies-UK


- Put a fence up to block neighbours and passers-by from seeing all veg and fruit growing and getting ideas!! - had a bag experience last year where people were walking over picking flowers because they could see them from the road

- Purchased 24 AA and 24 AAA batteries for torches and portable radio

[diamond lil]

Wow. I feel guilty now... I have been saying all day "I need to ... " and never actually done anything ! I can't grow carrots, that I do know.

[Selfsufficientwoman]

Wow. I feel guilty now... I have been saying all day "I need to ... " and never actually done anything ! I can't grow carrots, that I do know.

Just curious why cant you grow carrots????? Is it space related or........

[cavealaska]

Spuds, Planted in 5 sacks and the raised Bed: Total weight harvested about 4lbs

small tip, I have great success on potatoes in sacks/buckets, spuds will rip the nutrients out of the soil in no time, make sure that they get fed regally with potash and calcium nitrate, water it with a tea made up from nettles, smell like hell but works well, or the one i like to water with, is get some seaweed from the beach give it a rinse, fill a rain butt about halfway up with seaweed then fill with water leave a week mix it well, then use that on all your vegetables, you will have the best results ever, I get bumper crops by doing this. just keep toping up the rain but the seaweed will last for a while

[itsybitsy]

Eeek! I haven't given any of my veg any added feed at all! I just stuck everything in tubs of organic compost...

[smileyt]

Eeek! I haven't given any of my veg any added feed at all! I just stuck everything in tubs of organic compost...

Don't worry itsy, you have plenty of time left to feed your veg! Just start with the spuds now, and I think the fruiting stuff like tomatoes and peppers will be ok until they start to fruit. Although a little seaweed feed wouldn't go amiss now. If the compost is fresh they won't take all the nutrients out of it immediately.

[Poledragon]

Sowed a batch of various brassicas in seed trays, and some squashes, beans and courgettes in the greenhouse. A bit late this year due to one thing or another but now I'm allowed to walk around, I'm doing as much as I can and ordering the kids around to do what I can't Also found a few packets of flower seeds so threw some stocks, cornflowers and alyssum in, to help feed the bees.

Had a bit of a sort through the freezer and have decided to cook down a whole batch of sad looking, unidentifiable chunks of game, mainly venison and pheasant from last year. I'd run out of my normal labels and the ordinary ones I used just fell off when the sticky stuff froze! I'll make a couple of big pots of game pie filling/stew and then bottle it when my pressure canner arrives. Have waved pictures of this http://foodstoragemadeeasy.net/2009/02/ ... ting-rack/ can rotating bin at DH and he's sketching ideas to build it into a stack of regular shelves.

[itsybitsy]

Eeek! I haven't given any of my veg any added feed at all! I just stuck everything in tubs of organic compost...

Don't worry itsy, you have plenty of time left to feed your veg! Just start with the spuds now, and I think the fruiting stuff like tomatoes and peppers will be ok until they start to fruit. Although a little seaweed feed wouldn't go amiss now. If the compost is fresh they won't take all the nutrients out of it immediately.

Yeah, it's all brand new. I'll get some liquid seaweed feed and start mixing it with the water - I assume that's okay and will pretty much cover everything? I really don't want to have to fork out for 17 different types of bloody fertiliser - kind of defeats the object of trying to save money by growing my own veg!