Whats been good,whats been bad?

oldtractor

spent an hour starting to clear some of the allotment this evening. Good have been peas and broadbeans. Bad have been kohl-rabi,beetroot and fennel. What have been good and bad for you?

Painkiller

Bad - Tomato 'Big Boy'... they're all falling off and rotting before turning ripe.

Good - Tomato Black Truffle (only plant that's produced ripe food so far), Tomato Yellow Pear, Purple Jalapeno, Cayenne Pepper & Sweet Corn are coming along nicely

STOCKWIRE

Good; potatoes, onions, brocolli, cabbage, swede, cauli, strawberries, raspberries, asparagus, & my sprout plants are nearly 5 ft tall already !

Bad; Peas & Carrots !

oldtractor

I hope to plant more fruit trees this year. I have a victoria plum and a blenheim orange and ashmeads kernel as well as royal gala and james grieves. I am interested in heritage varieties but know from past experience that some are quite flavourless or suceptable to disease. I could do with disease resistant flavoursome varieties please. what are your recommendations and why please?
Sorry in wrong place, was meant to be a new thread.

lisa26_2

good - runner beans, spring onions, gardner's delight toms (not many ripe yet but millions of fruit!), cucumbers, mangetout

Bad - beetroot, strawberries, second batch of mangetout, outside tomatoes (tumbling tom and red currant, mostly flowers still, hardly any fruit).

Not sure yet - baby sweetcorn, pink fir apple spuds (but early signs look good!)

elsien

mangetout and carrots good, courgettes really not worth planting.

STOCKWIRE

oldtractor wrote: »

spent an hour starting to clear some of the allotment this evening. Good have been peas and broadbeans. Bad have been kohl-rabi,beetroot and fennel. What have been good and bad for you?

Do you by any chance lime your soil before planting your peas ?. Thanks

mumtosix

Courgettes, runner beans, french beans, sprouts, brocolli, peas, sugar peas, radishes, potatoes, tomatoes, cucumbers -

sweetcorn, carrots, lettuces, peppers, chillis (slugs eating these!!) -

Rummer

My Kale has been fabulous this year, tall and in great health. Everything else however has been a crushing disappointment especially my courgettes, this is the first year that they have been tiny and in limited supply. The soft fruit and fruit trees that we planted a few years ago have really come into their own and we have had a great yield.

GreyQueen

Good; couch grass, creeping thistle, curled docks, fat hen, black medic, common mallow, bindweed and nettles.

Bad.....strawberries were almost non-existant but I had divvied up a bed in autum 2010 so that couldn't have helped. Peas were a bit rubbish and courgettes were a waste of space. Beetroot hardly germinated and mixed Italian salad mix bolted immediately. No gourds at all forming on butternut squashes.

Plusses were broadbeans, dwarf french beans and runner beans. Turks turban squash growing like triffids. Potatoes dug up 6 weeks later than usual and cropping heavily. Marigolds loved it but the cornflowers germinated pitifully.

Have also successfully cultivated a nest of giant redtailed bumblebees........

It's been a funny old year and no mistake.

radiohelen

good - beetroot, climbing beans, potatos, runner beans, tomatillos, tomatos (purple ukraine and another one I can't remember) chicory lettuce - seeds bought from france, kale, strawberries, parsnips

bad - garlic (how?), peas, fennel (it bolts EVERY time), peppers, cauliflowers (they all bolted), raspberries (they look all shrivelled and pitiful), blackcurrants (I think I have disease), carrots.

Things I have learnt

I need a scaffolding board.
I need 27 hours in a day minimum.
I need to divvy up the patch more, sow everything in modules and plant out later.
I can't grow carrots - I am the anti-carrot.
I can't grow spring onions... they just die.
Don't plant courgettes/squashes directly into a pile of muck - water goes straight through it and they die.