Brambles wrote:Oh don't talk to me about putting gardens to bed! mine was SUPPOSED to be done by now. However, due to the interference of a Cat a flight of stairs and floppy slippers(I'll leave the rest to your imagination) I have a bad back and nothing has been done!
bit of a pain in the arse I should think
In more ways than one Su! I need one of them there manly men types
the ones with lumberjack shirts and trapper hats...
I've just pulled up the last of my tatties, all the onions are drying nicely in the shed but my greens are still doing well, the spinach is showing no sign of slowing down. but the idea of green manure thats interesting what plants would you suggest? remembering I never plant anything that is eatable for me or useful for my bees.
Marrows this year have been outstanding so much so I've has a bit of a glut been handing them to the neighbors!
Going to split the rhubarb soon getting to much to handle thought I'd take half the root and plant it in a nearby wood, let nature do the rest! sort of gorilla gardening, did it with chives a couple of years ago and now theres a huge patch, handy if needed.
A winter draws nearer and the garden begins to look more barren I have spent a few hours tonight looking over my garden log for 2011.
My outstanding vegetable this year has been the Patty Pan Squash, those small squashes that look like a yellow flying saucer. I got the seeds off a chap in the pub who had got them free with a magazine. I sowed 4 seeds just as an experiment. What a result, over 100 small tasty squashes, delicious both raw and cooked in stews, soups, etc. They are definitely on the list for next year.
My vegetable garden is quite a way from the tap and I have not yet put an outside tap closer so that I can use a hose, therefore to water I need to utilise watering cans. As my soil is pretty sandy (a hungry soil as my Granddad says) regular watering is essential at least once per day in the summer months often twice or three times. Schlepping about with two full watering can soon loses its initial appeal. So, for the more water demanding plants, I have cut the bottoms off 1lte squash bottles and sunk them upside-down in my raised beds. For instance, with 4 courgette plants in a square, the bottle goes in the middle. I then water into the open bottom until it is full. The water immediately goes to the roots where it needs to be and reduces the amount of water needed quite markedly. This I will do next year as well.
The final revelation has been Earth Buckets (Sometimes called Self watering tubs). I managed to get hold of 50 11 ltr. white polythene buckets that had held Washing Powder from a laundrette. Have a squint on You Tube for the details but I have grown Tomato's, Courgettes, Cucumbers and Butter-nut Squash in them and the results are spectacular in terms of yield.
Despite it being a challenging year, the only crop that I really consider to be a failure were onions (White, Red and Spanish) – they did not thrive and yields were disappointing. However Spring Onions grew like topsy and I even had to make Spring Onion Soup at one point to mop up the glut.
