veg growing Newbies- Feb 2010! lets learn together!

moneymabel

Thanks Sally thats a great idea! I've already got some copper tape and beer traps coming for the slugs so hopefully that will sort them and I've got some netting for the birds that i can cover the plants with when I plant them out-dont think I'll bother with planting directly in the garden again!
Off to buy some windmills! Thanks for your help :-)

Orange_King

My sprouts and brocolli seeds are germinating only a week or so after planting but no signs yet of the parsnips - do they take longer than the others to shoot up?

Have also had to wait on the peppers that were put in the mini propagator in the greenhouse - the cucumbers planted at the same time have all come through very quickly and are close to touching the lid.

Courgettes and strawberries are by far the best performers as yet with the French Beans in a close third place. The spuds in the Tesco bags for life don't count - these are usually success stories and the side panels seem to be helping keep shape.

sarymclary

I've been introduced to this thread by alliwantistosave, and I'm so impressed with the pictures, generally everyone's great efforts.

I've been gardening since a child, but know very little of the science of gardening to be honest. I tend to just do what feels right. My dad was convinced I had 'green fingers', and I'm fortunate that pretty much anything I plant grows. I like to salvage 'dying' plants from the garden centres, and bring them back to life.

This year I have acquired my 1st greenhouse. I was determined to rehome, rather than buy new, and am so glad I did. It's now full to bursting with my seedlings, and I have a variety of things growing: pumpkin, carrots, spring onion, red onion, candytuft, nasturnium, petunia, lobelia, cucumber, tomatoes, pepper,mixed lettuce/salad, raddish, etc., and I'm really pleased that I have managed to get some of the seedlings to grow from seeds I harvested from my hanging basket plants last year, and even the pumpkin I bought the children last halloween from the co-op.

I had a raised bed last year, but we had to dismantle in order to site the greenhouse. I've now just acquired some scaffold planks that my OH is going to convert into a new 'U' shaped raised bed beside the greenhouse, filling in an unused part of the garden. The long winter, and the recent colder spell has made me not want to place many things outside, although I have my carrots growing in a planter, with an old plastic drawer over it acting as a cloche.

With regard to the subject of greenfly, or larvae on leaves. Whenever I find a ladybird, I put them on the plant I find infested. They like to munch on the larvae much like wasps do - and easier to pick up and take into a greenhouse. I find it's hard to convince anyone that a wasp is a friend in the garden, but I do like them. I found lots of ladybirds in my garden a few weeks back, and collected them constantly, placing them in the greenhouse to do their thing. Worked very well.

GarnetLady

Hi everyone! :hello:

I haven't got much in the way of gardening done in the last few days. I've had to catch up with the dreaded housework and husband and I have been doing some more decorating.

My lettuces need to go outside, they're going to get leggy if the stay in the garage much longer, but I need to decide on my slug defence measures first! (there's already paw prints in the compost, had dogs to visit and one decided to investigate the trug lol)

I'm going to try and get some more seeds planted as well. Got more carrots to do, spring onions, silverskin onions and something else that I can't remember!

We've worked out the layout for the back garden more or less. We've got 40 odd slabs and a ton of sand being delivered on Saturday along with the wood for the fence between us and next door. I see a lot of digging in my future!

Loving everyones pics btw. Always good to see how well everyone else is doing. :T

Jo.G

More newbie (probably silly) questions:

What do you mean by hardening off?

I've got 3 tomato plants in a terracotta pot in my conservatory and they seem to be growing quite well. But about 3 weeks ago I started feeding them once a week with liquid tomato feed and I've just read on here I'm only supposed to do this once they actually have fruit on them. I wont have harmed them will I? I will stop doing this!

Also, Im growing herbs and a chilli on my kitchen window sill. Do the herbs need food or will water be enough?

I have grown herbs before, but once I start cutting leaves off to use, they always start to die off and I never get nice big fat basil leaves or parsley? Any ideas?

Also, I have an old potato in a dark cupboard. It has a few green shoots growing out of it - if I plant this will it grow?

Sorry, complete novice and no idea what I'm doing! If the tomatoes work I might try more stuff next year. I've also planted some strawberry seeds but they have taken about 5 weeks to grow into tiny seedlings so I'm not expecting much from them this year! If the tomatoes dont work I might give up!

heynonnynonny

Hardening off is getting the plants used to the ourdoor way of life, bringing them out in the day then back in at night for a week or 2. I only found that out a couple of months ago myself when I started gardening!

Went for a long walk earlier...can tell I'm getting obsessed with plants and things as constantly looking around me and seeing it all...there's so many brambles everywhere can't wait til they start fruiting then can take a little basket with me for picking!!

vatic

Thanks for those photos of sugar snap peas katholicos! I just sowed some yesterday (really excited because I've never done peas before and I lovelovelove sugar snaps) and it's good to see what they'll look like in a few weeks!

Yesterday I also sowed basil (grew last year and tbh still have frozen basil ice cubes in the freezer!), more salad leaves, more spinach, and put my beloved butternut squashes that came from saved supermarket squash seed into their final resting pots.

elantan

sarymaclary thanks for the advice re ladybird ... i found green fly today and spent ages squishing them as i am trying to avoid chemicals as much as possible ... will try and find ladybirds tomorrow ...rarely see them about though ... can you suggest anything else.. (did have one wasp but the blighter escaped lol )

kimmee

misskool wrote: »

Can you come and help me finish sowing my stuff? I still have about 50 french beans (maybe a bit more) and loads of successional stuff and more pumpkins. And flowers

With temperatures, it depends on where your plants are. If they are in pots and they are on shelves, then the air around them will be the determining factor on how cold the compost they are sitting in will be.

If they are in the ground, then the ground temperature is what you're looking at. But remember that the ground does hold some heat in overnight (depends on how cold it gets though).

Thought I saw some frost this morning but realised it was just morning dew. I almost gave myself a heart attack as my courgettes are in the unheated greenhouse.

Hehehe ....wish I could but it's just the veg I've finished sowing, I'm still growing flower seeds and I've got about 30 or so aqualeiga to re-home, plus I've got a tree peony, a mini peach tree, a rhododendron and other assorted things on order, oh and two blueberry bushes. How many french beans do you plan to grow?!! Wow, makes my 5 or 6 seem pathetic :rotfl:

Thanks for the advice re ground temps, most useful. I just wish it would hurry up and warm up a bit at night. I was speaking to my sister who lives in California on Sunday and she said 'oh it's been a bit like that over here (when I said what weather we'd been having) only 80 degrees' - I just laughed!! Don't think I'll be laughing when I go to visit her in July, the temps then can get to 120 where she lives :eek:

Can't wait for everything to finally be in their respective pots and putting on a show

Plasticman

Having put my toms outside this weekend, they got completely battered by the wind. One is dead and the others don't look too good either. Not a good start!