Help MBE grow his dinner 2012

annie123

Badrick wrote: »

Has anyone tried double cropping Autumn fruiting raspberries,

Yes. You'll get 2 small crops on most but not all canes and not worth it as you may as well grow summer ones if you want loads of canes hanging around as you'd get a bigger crop.
You could do what I did and that was do it once just so you know how to do it should the need ever arise. Not that I can think of a single reason why it should!

aliasojo wrote: »

Am I right in thinking that my strawberry plants that have all developed red spot and leaf blight need to be binned and can't be cut right back and left to regrow for next year?

They're just old leaves and yes take the shears to them, they will be fine. Don't cut into the crown.

mrbadexample wrote: »

All right, all right, I know I've been a bit quiet of late but what's my thread doing on page 2, eh? :eek:

Not my fault if you go wandering off and ignore it I would have posted but I moved my computer Wednesday evening and it wouldn't work after that my brother's fixed it now

mrbadexample wrote: »

eaten kohl rabi (my most pleasing vegetable this year),

I'm jealous, I gave up due to snails, hopefully next year will be sunnier and dryer so I can have another go.

Still not taken a pic of 'guess the fruit' but I'm guessing it's a cucumber, it looks like a cross between a lemon and a loofah. I might pick one tomorrow and find out what it is.

Fay you may want to do the same as me and grow blight resistance ones next year. You can stop blight from getting as bad as yours if you catch it quickly and remove all the leaves daily. Even with black stems I'm still picking toms and a good crop considering the weather and blight.

My leeks have been flattened by a fox or cat sleeping on them :mad: I hope they recover, tried earthing up a bit but they're only little still.

I strung up my chilli peppers a few weeks ago and they're nicely dried now, only a few but plenty more to come.

Next door but 1 garden has promised to get someone to hard prune the 35' sycamore tree this winter :j it's just started overhanging my garden and blocks out nearly all sunlight now till mid day. I hope they keep their word as I only have an 8 x 5' section that gets sun now due to the tree, it's grown a lot this year.

annie123

Last thread on the bottom of the page so thought I would bump it up to keep MBE happy;)

I've found another BNS growing hidden under the leaves, it's a reasonable size too so I just might get 2 this year there's soooo many other flowers on it now but the chance of mild sunny weather for the next 2 months is nil but at least I know I've found a spot they like.

Feel sorry for the leeks, now a cat has pooped on the edge of the area, not on them thankfully but too close so I've put chicken wire over them and held it down with home made compost bags.

Runner beans are slowing down, which will please hubby, already have a freezer full of them so will let these turn to seeds for next year.

Round courgette stems are currently around 4' long, definitely growing them upwards next year.

Off to roast some home grown toms for sauce for tonights dinner:D

RedLass

annie123 wrote: »

Next door but 1 garden has promised to get someone to hard prune the 35' sycamore tree this winter :j it's just started overhanging my garden and blocks out nearly all sunlight now till mid day. I hope they keep their word as I only have an 8 x 5' section that gets sun now due to the tree, it's grown a lot this year.

This is excellent news. 35' is immense! Apart from less light on the veg, it's much nicer to have some sun on the garden in the morning, especially if you're the wandering-around-with-a-cuppa sort (I aspire to be this, but in reality am a zombie for at least an hour after getting up )

I have teeny tiny little french beans on my dwarf plants. I hope a handful make it to full size.

I've had a change of opinion on the success of my pepper plants... popped in to see OH's Mum this weekend. When my six pepper plants arrived back in June I kept three for myself and planted them into the ground and I gave the other three to her which were planted into medium sized containers. So, we have one of each variety, each. My plants are about 1ft tall, with a handful of leaves and 2-3 peppers on each. Her plants are 2ft tall big bushy jungles, and one of them has 10 peppers on! I think it's clear which spot they preferred

katholicos

One of the few things that grew very well, or even reasonably well. come to think of it...

The seriously super squash i harvested this evening...


[/url]
Massive squash and other harvested fruit and veg by Kahoolakat, on Flickr

Tomorrow i might well be making squash chutney :T

aliasojo

I've got NZ Flatworm. Loads of them. Under my raised beds.

I'm tidying a lot of things away as most of my stuff has been infected with one thing or another or badly eaten and I'm giving up for the season. So I moved some of the raised bed planters only to find loads of these things underneath. I also found loads of small, pure white eggs. I've no idea if these were the worms' eggs or not.

I knew this place was particularly bad for plant diseases and beasties but I wasn't prepared for just how bad, lol.

I may feel less bad about the thought of using nematodes next year. It will be all out war from day one I think.

aliasojo

I also have a frog, a thing that looks halfway between a frog and a small lizard and loads of what I assume is frogspawn.

All under my raised bed planters. Not a pond in sight.

Do I just leave them? :huh:

alixandrea

aliasojo wrote: »

I also have a frog, a thing that looks halfway between a frog and a small lizard and loads of what I assume is frogspawn.

All under my raised bed planters. Not a pond in sight.

Do I just leave them? :huh:

The "thing that looks halfway between a frog and a small lizard" looks like a smooth newt to me - you lucky thing! The spawn might be baby newts too. Yes leave all in situ, they'll move eventually.

Alixandrea

mrbadexample

aliasojo wrote: »

I also have a frog, a thing that looks halfway between a frog and a small lizard and loads of what I assume is frogspawn.

All under my raised bed planters. Not a pond in sight.

Do I just leave them? :huh:

That's a toad.

Sorry to hear about the NZ flatworm.

Badrick

Newts and Toads eat worms (dunno about New Zealand flat ones tho )

annie123

aliasojo wrote: »

I've got NZ Flatworm. Loads of them. Under my raised beds.

Are you sure? they're not that common.
http://www.gardenersworld.com/how-to/problems/lawns/new-zealand-flatworms/408.html
taken from above link:
Should you discover a possible flatworm in your garden, please take a digital photograph and email it to mike.lole@adas.co.uk. When taking photos, place an object such as a pencil, or a key, alongside the creature to provide scale.

Verified for free so you know if you need to take action or not.

Great looking toad and newt by the way.