The highs and lows of growing your own dinner 2015

Dizzy_Ditzy

I've been waiting for days to do this, I wanted to do it on Boxing Day!

This is a follow on from the Grow Your Own Dinner 2014 thread. Come on in, introduce yourselves!

Post your ups and downs of growing your own dinner what works well for you? What doesn't work so well for you?

What do you want to grow this year? Anything you've not tried but would like to?

Dizzy_Ditzy

I have two allotments, on different sites. In a massive coincidence, they are numbered 6A and 6B, so they will be known as this from now on. 6A is the more established of the two.

I shall be going to 6A shortly to start as I mean to go on- get a cabbage and some brocolli for tonight's dinner. I hope to be able to have a general tidy up while I'm there, now it's "warm" enough :rotfl:

6B is a different project. I'm having chickens on that one :j It's split into two halves, so one side will house the chooks with some growing going on around it, and the other side will be put to full use.

I want to grow everything! The most unusual thing I'll try is bananas. I've had to bring the plants indoors over winter but as soon as the greenhouses are empty of palms, they'll be back out there again!

Last year, I got 6A in June so didn't get a full season out of it. This year I can get two full seasons :j :j

Geodark

Did grow my own in 2013, but last year we adopted a dog and she likes to trample over everything. So this year I am going to build some raised beds that she can't get into and grow some stuff in them. She is an english bulldog so anything about 18" she will struggle with.

Keeping it simple though, carrots, onions, kale and beetroot. I have some containers that I use for potatoes, salad and spring onions and in my greenhouse there will (hopefully) be tomatoes, peppers, chillies, cucumbers and cucamelons.

I also fish, so hopefully the freezer will be full of trout, codling and pollock (but that depends on my fishing luck!)

Well that's the current plan anyway

chella

My granddad used to grow masses of veg and fruit and he made it look effortless!!!!


Following on from him, I have tried ....with varying success levels.


Have grown peas, they never make it to the pot, I eat them fresh!!


Runner beans, went ok, not a big crop. I grew them in containers and am sure they didn't have enough soil.


Radsihes, just went leafy and never grew the radish.


Aubergines, died a death.


Peppers grew really well!!!!! ....... then I saw at the back of all 3 they had been half eaten by a slug or something.


Strawberries never fruited.


Courgettes I got about 5 edible ones n the end.


Tomatoes, hit an miss there too.




I grew mainly in containers, I am thinking I should dig up some ground and make 2 raised beds?? each would be about 2 by 2 meters.


I also don't have a greenhouse.




This year I am attempting....
French beans
peas
radishes
spring onions
carrots
tomatoes
cucumber (last year they were prickly and bitter?????)
strawberries.
aubergine
courgettes
and squash, also grew last year and nothing appeared.




HMMMMMM still got a lot to learn

sparkychris

Morning team, and happy new year!

In a few weeks me and missus will be moving to a place in the country which has a greenhouse and an established veg spot, which is nice!

Never had a greenhouse before so am rather excited! Have had little gardening experience- I had an allotment once but everybody down the allotments were all nasty, spiteful bitter people who were more interested in infighting and politics than growing spuds. Sounds bizarre, but that's how it was. On my first day there when I was looking at my weed strewn mess, an old mon warned me not to get involved and 'keep my head down'! I thought he was a bit mental but his advice was spot on!

I got thrown off in the end for not bringing my plot up to speed quick enough- I work long hours and struggle with back pain so concerntrated on small patches.

Anyway. I digress!

Am hoping to be able to have a successful year this year. Would love to be self sufficient, food wise, but I think that's pushing it a bit!

I have friends that shoot, so I always have game in th freezer and we have chickens for eggs.

Rather looking forward to it!

Remember the name- I feel lots of stupid questions coming on. Bear with me!

Bee70

hello can I join in?
We got an allotment last year, with zero growing experience. We did manage to get a good few courgettes/marrows and the carrots, onions and parsnips did well. More than we were expecting considering the conditions - clay mixed with glass and rock
This year we will trymore of the same, hopefully will actually get some brasiccas as they all died/got eaten last year. We got some fruit bushes this winter, including currents and cranberrys (I love cranberry sauce) and we will try something new - vegetable spaghetti. Our popcorn which the kids grew did well, so we'll try that again.

Where does everyone get their seeds from? Too many places to choose from!

sparkychris

Bee70 wrote: »

hello can I join in?
We got an allotment last year, with zero growing experience. We did manage to get a good few courgettes/marrows and the carrots, onions and parsnips did well. More than we were expecting considering the conditions - clay mixed with glass and rock
This year we will trymore of the same, hopefully will actually get some brasiccas as they all died/got eaten last year. We got some fruit bushes this winter, including currents and cranberrys (I love cranberry sauce) and we will try something new - vegetable spaghetti. Our popcorn which the kids grew did well, so we'll try that again.

Where does everyone get their seeds from? Too many places to choose from!

Hi bee!

Maybe if a couple of us get a few packs of seeds we could do a seed swap?

I'll only want, for example, four courgette plants but you get loads in a packet!

Mse or what?! :T

Dizzy_Ditzy

Welcome all

There's no such thing as a stupid question


I've just come back with kale, cabbage, brocolli and mint. My mint doesn't seem to mind the winter at all. Shame it's beef for dinner tonight and not lamb :rotfl: i have taken some spinach out of the greenhouse too :j

I've already learnt this year that if I grow kale again, it'll be double debris netted. It took me ages to get rid of the dreaded cabbage whitefly :mad:


I think a seed swap is a great idea but we will have to figure out the best way to organise it :cool: maybe a private facebook group or something... MSE roolz are such that we might not be able to do it directly via MSE

TallGirl

Quick hello from me thanks for starting the thread I love veg growing. I've got a very small back garden so my veg patch is only 2m x 9m but I have four espalier fruit trees and two fruit bushes in that space plus a hexagonal greenhouse which is being used to its full potential.

Bought my seeds already mainly doing salad, squash, winter squash, peas, beans and spinach. Green house for flowers for pots and cucumbers I don't like tomatoes. I'm on a low carb diet so shouldn't really grow spuds but new ones are the best so one small bag will have to fit that in.

Slugs main problem here but nermatodes are good if not expensive.

Look forward to reading all about your ups and dowas on here.

Wooftastic

Hi!

I'm fairly new to gardening but I'm full of enthusiasm so fingers crossed by this time next year I'll have lots of fresh home grown produce stoked away!

So far I've planted some strawberries and my herb patch is well stocked although it could do with tidying up a bit. Once the raised beds are built I'll hopefully be able to get the garden being much more productive but we all have to start somewhere.

Looking forward to picking up loads of helpful hints from everyone!

Richtea78

I'm interested in this. I've never grown anything but want to try salad stuff and strawberries. I have a tiny garden though so it's going to all be in containers