Advice for a hopeless gardener

[Appin]

OK.

One of my big weaknesses is gardening. I am hopeless. I can even kill mint.

So suggestions please. Be gentle. How can I educate and improve. I have a typical modern garden ie smallish. Full sun on the back of the house

I have some container grown herbs. Attempts at container based strawberries provided food for birds and slugs only.

So Books? Websites. Advice for the horticulturally challenged please.

Appin

[jansman]

If you have full sun,then you are blessed. Truly.What do you want to grow? Food or flowers. Or both?

[jansman]

I cannot grow carrots. Until this year. I got some 2 gallon buckets from work ( they contained sausage seasoning), punched holes in the bottom, two thirds filled them with home made compost, then topped it with seed compost ( weed free). Thinly sowed Amsterdam Forcing carrot seed across the surface, covered with a thin layer of seed compost and watered gently. Kept them damp, and here’s the result.

Container gardens are very effective, and I have moved that way to a large degree - but they have to be looked after on a daily basis. I will try and find some links.

If there is one piece of advice I could give to new gardeners it would be, to start small, and do it well.

[jansman]

There you go- https://www.daviddomoney.com/10-top-veg ... er-garden/

[GillyBee]

Killing mint takes talent. I presume you had it in a pot? My son killed his by not giving it any water at all for months and keeping it indoors.
Most plants just need some basics but you do need to be consistent.
Light, water, good soil.
The problem as I have learned the hard way is that you have to do a little every day. In cool wet weather you may not need to water but may well need to do a slug or snail hunt. In hot weather, potted plants may need watering twice a day.
If you have very limited time, you may do better to ignore the vegetables and plant fruit trees/bushes instead as these need a lot less time once they are settled in.
Otherwise, start with a few things and play. You wil only get better with practice.

[Ara]

OH and I have been growing vegetables for years and I even had an allotment at one point. No matter how long you have been growing stuff there will always be something that doesn't work. We have given up trying to grow cauliflowers as they never get bigger than about 2" across. Strawberries are now grown in hanging baskets in the green house as they were just slug (or last year, rat) bait. I only found one enterprising slug on them last year and so far none this year.
People tell you lots of things like "work with nature, not against", well, maybe nature doesn't come and eat all their plants as I find I have to exclude (most of) nature or it leaves me nothing. We have rabbits, deer, and birds as well as slugs and snails who love our fruit and veg so now have a fruit cage (the rabbits chewed through the netting and, as it's on a slope the netting was extended with chicken wire but the wrens got in through that and ate all the red and white currants, the door blew open and a deer got in and ate ALL the purple sprouting broccoli - usually a great success).
After years of trying, this year is the first we have managed to grow carrots to a reasonable size.
You are not alone in your struggles but just have to find what works well where you are and keep experimenting.
And, you can kill mint, but we can kill cacti but we still keep trying.
Happy growing.

[CDT]

I have recently taken the dive into growing some veg too, and one of the easiest and low maintenence things to grow so far seem to be potatos. My partner doesn't agree with the prepping idea but is happy to help with these, unknowlingly partaking in some prepping practice ha.

Literally get a seed potato (or one where it's started growing new roots), pop it in some compost and cover up, then every week or so you'll see green leaves poking through the compost, when this happens just sprinkle some more compost to cover them up and keep repeating until your tub/bag is full. Then leave the bush grow on top, wait for it to flower and then the flowers to die off (this is the stage i'm currently at). Then once the green bush starts to die off then it's harvest time!

I water them every day (waiting until the evening usually as I've read watering in direct midday sun for example can damage the growth).

The potato sacks are the green yellow and red sacks and then there's 2x pots of tomatos to the left of them.

[CDT]

Oops wrong picture:

[CDT]

This is the potato haul from just the red potato sack in the previous picture as it was planted 1st. 3 potatos that had start seeding (growing eyes) has produced around 30 potatos couple of little potatos but a few big ones too. Like i've said, super easy to grow!

[jennyjj01]

Joining this thread possibly a bit late in the sowing season. I've coaxed the OH to make me a couple of planters out of some decking 2 of about 1200 by 800 by 400. I already have one growing tomatoes garlic and coriander. Soil is very sandy and troubled by ants and snails. The buggers ate my strawberry Plenty of sun, but I'm in the Northwest, not a hotspot.

I'm Looking for inspiration as to what I can start now or soon. Thinking beetroot, onions, garlic, herbs? but I'm lost after that. I'd like stuff that's easy, with long harvest interval, so I can neglect it rather a lot and eat as I go or dehydrate. I'm not inclined to grow spuds or carrots because they are so cheap. I don't really like beans. Are aubergines and courgettes easy? Parsnips? Turnips?