Help MBE grow his dinner 2011

Sambucus_Nigra

Sow indoors - now.

Not that you deserve any help after your little jape.

mrbadexample

Sambucus_Nigra wrote: »

Sow indoors - now.

Not that you deserve any help after your little jape.

Propagator? Heated? Or just in a pot on the windowsill?

And no I don't but thank you.

Sambucus_Nigra

Either.

I crack them in the heated prop then remove immediately to unheated greenhouse. But my unheated greenhouse is sheltered so does keep the heat quite well. Plus I like to grow things hard.

My first yellow Italian courgette is starting to show little courgettes already - in said unheated greenhouse. This is where the summer starts

mrbadexample

Sambucus_Nigra wrote: »

Either.

I crack them in the heated prop then remove immediately to unheated greenhouse. But my unheated greenhouse is sheltered so does keep the heat quite well. Plus I like to grow things hard.

My first yellow Italian courgette is starting to show little courgettes already - in said unheated greenhouse. This is where the summer starts

Whereabouts in the country are you? Channel Islands? :rotfl:

It's a bit nippy here at the moment, after a glorious weekend - you think they'd last in an unheated greenhouse?

Doesn't stuff die if you "grow things hard"? :huh:

emiff6

mrbadexample wrote: »

I realise that not everything likes to be manured when planted. I want to get some on the plots (I already have some in a bean trench) - is there anything in the list of things I'm growing that would not like some compost at this time?

Carrots and parsnips will grow extra legs, but if you're going for the "rudest vegetable" cup, then definitely shovel on the compost.

Potatoes, peas, and beans will love it, and show their thanks with bumper crops. Radishes like it 'cos it helps keep the moisture in the soil, same with all the squashes.

Sunflowers are greedy beggars too, and will grow bigger and stronger with added compost. This is why they do so well under my bird feeders, where the birds have been sitting all year. (Darn the h on this keyboard!)

(But sunflowers hate potatoes and runner beans and inhibit their growth if planted near to them).

Not sure about turnip and swede, but as they are brassicas, I expect they would like it, as long as it doesn't make the soil too acid.

mrbadexample

emiff6 wrote: »

(But sunflowers hate potatoes and runner beans and inhibit their growth if planted near to them).

Is that the runners & potatoes that get inhibited, or the sunflowers? One wouldn't bother me, but runner beans are the competion entry this year, so have to do well. I was planning to plant the sunflowers between the beds, near both runners and potatoes, so this post might have saved me! :T

emiff6

The sunflowers flourish, the spuds and beans don't.

emiff6

Beans like carrots, sweet corn and potatoes, and are happy with squashes, but not any of the onion tribe.

A quirky but possibly useless fact is that you can dig up runner bean roots in autumn and overwinter them like dahlias, then replant in spring, or start them into growth and take cuttings for planting out

Sambucus_Nigra

mrbadexample wrote: »

Whereabouts in the country are you? Channel Islands? :rotfl:

It's a bit nippy here at the moment, after a glorious weekend - you think they'd last in an unheated greenhouse?

Doesn't stuff die if you "grow things hard"? :huh:

Midlands

No, it doesn't die if you grow it hard. It dies when you are too soft and then it gets a waft of chilly wind and falls over. My tomatoes and peppers have been in an unheated greenhouse for at least 6 weeks; but they are ALL hardened off properly and were fleeced for the first few weeks so that the frost didn't get them.

Crack the seed in a heated prop then as soon as you see any signs of life, shove the pot into an unheated greenhouse - and then after a week or so you can pr1ck out and pot on. If you leave the seedlings in a heated state they grow soft whippy stems and can't cope. Then you are stuck with them all indoors for ages.

I have 3 toms and 3 peppers indoors; all the others [about 100 toms and 100 peppers] are all in the greenhouse. And all doing fine!

Sambucus_Nigra

emiff6 wrote: »

Beans like carrots, sweet corn and potatoes, and are happy with squashes, but not any of the onion tribe.

I grow my beans [and bearing in mind I grow over 100 different French Bean varieties] and onions together and have never found this to be true. It is quoted on every companion planting chart but I get both fantastic onions and fantastic beans and all grown in the same bed.