The great, good and not so good bits about growing your own dinner 2017

Fruittea

Morning Everyone

It's already too hot for outside!

I've ordered some blackberry plants for hanging baskets. They were on offer from T & M and I couldn't resist. The new fence in the front garden looks a bit bare so I thought they might brighten it up a bit. Well they're on their way - so we'll see how they go.

Brought back 5 kilos of white onions yesterday. All good and some nice sizes to - so I'll plait them up for storage and use.

The blueberry plants are show ripened fruit so that's another addition to the crop - I'll eat a few and freeze them as they come. I think I have about 10 plants in pots and at the end of the season I'm keeping an eye on them as I plan to take cuttings from the most prolific and grow some on as it's a crop I really enjoy. I'll let you all know which I think is best - so far it's Blueberry Denise.

How was the cucumber Maisymoo5 - it's always lovely to try something for the very first time.

Happy growing.

Jojo_the_Tightfisted

Heh. We beat the pigeons for the first year ever. One handful of huge, fat, lush, sweet and still warm from the sun Cherries from one sad looking sprig (not hefty enough to call it a twig) that emerged out the back end of the half dead mini tree.

The borage is taller than the tree. And there's a lot of it, complete with intransigent Honey Bees. It makes navigating the patch quite tricky when the clover lawn is alive with bumbles of every size and then you have to reach through the borage to get to anything else. And I can't actually remember sowing any?


Seems like the key to survival in a wild garden is to fill to overflowing with random plants so that things are missed by hungry beasties.


Hasn't quite worked with the Broad Beans, as they were too big and obvious and have disappeared without trace, but the last surviving tub of runner beans has made a dash for it up the drainpipe and is coming into flower, the courgette is happily producing male flowers :cool: and, amongst the three foot high clover, buttercups and various grasses that have grown as though they were intended to be in tall and pretty drifts, the sweetcorn is starting to look like a bunch of plants.

There is a great mass of raspberries that has collapsed over the entire back - once I've taken off the fruit, as there's far more plant than I could ever reasonably need, can I just chop the lot down, just leaving a few green shoots to get woody for next year? (the fruit appeared on old sticks).

The thornless blackberry has also decided to get on producing flowers and fruit rather than spiny suckers once it collapsed over the other side and the nasturtiums are just scrambling about everywhere.

The tomatoes look a bit skinny but are valiantly trying to produce a few flowers and fruit.


And the non existent potatoes have suddenly hefted into life. I expect they'll be done for by blight, but I'll leave them in the tub nonetheless.


It's certainly [over]full of life out there - not as much edibles as I wanted, but keeping things neat and separate only seems to have led to everything being decimated.

But oh, it's so hot. Himself was duly sent out with the [sshhh!] hosepipe this morning, so we still have some stuff alive out the front as well. I suspect he probably hosed himself down as well in the process, as he's not doing his usual wilting waify thing in the heat.

I am, though.

We need some thunderstorms, please! One tonight and preferably at least one or two more in a fortnight so I don't have to endure a trip to a sports arena at my expense to supervise kids who don't actually want to be participating in sports day any more than I do. They can yell and run around on the school field quite enough already, i see no need to endure the trip and the enforced physicality of it all when I'd rather be 30 foot from the kettle, a fan and a bathroom that isn't rendered unsanitary by 750 smelly teenagers within half an hour of getting there.

unrecordings

Too hot here but continued to harvest onions and leave them in the sun (within hobbling distance of the backdoor in expectation of that thunder that never showed). Realised that it was actually squirrels eating my raspberries - it's the first time i've noticed, so i'm a little concerned they'll go for my tomatoes. Outdoor courgettes all dead bar one, i'm considering hoiking it out and putting it in a pot somewhere safe(r)

Suffolk_lass

Jojo_the_Tightfisted wrote: »

There is a great mass of raspberries that has collapsed over the entire back - once I've taken off the fruit, as there's far more plant than I could ever reasonably need, can I just chop the lot down, just leaving a few green shoots to get woody for next year? (the fruit appeared on old sticks).

Hi JJ - To answer your question re raspberries - there are two types. The summer fruiting ones should have leaves starting to go yellow at the tips now and these are the ones you cut down as they fruit next year on the shoots from this year. The berries on summer fruiting ones are usually smaller and very now.

Just to confuse things, the bigger, autumn fruiting raspberries are just fruiting now. These fruit on this year's shoots, that usually bigger and more vigorous (more like a thin bramble, but growing up) - the fruits are bigger and more vigorous - they throw up new shoots around the bed - in paths (!) and wherever. You chop these down at Christmas!

The smaller summer fruiting ones are the best for jam, and autumn for freezing to use through winter if you get a glut.

Dizzy_Ditzy

Afternoon growers!

I've taken today off and done a full watering of Plot A because we've had zero rain for over a week :eek: while I was there I picked another pot full of raspberries, stripped the surprise blackcurrant bush of its fruit, and had a peek at the other one and there are tons of currants on there :j

Beetroot coming ready at that plot now and I've been pulling it from the other plot regularly for the last couple of weeks I came home with a load of marrow fat peas that I wasn't expecting to be ready too so they've been podded are frozen.

All 70+ garlic are hung up drying in various places. I've held off on the onions for the time being but they'll be next once the garlic is ready.

I'm coming home every day with a good handful of dwarf beans. Carrots are doing well too

8kg of gooseberries are in brewing buckets ready to be siphoned off into demijohns and left to do their thing. Rhubarb has been crap this year but like so many others, it seems to be having a second wind and has suddenly became very upright again :rotfl:

Plenty of jam in the fridge and pickled beetroot in the cupboard. Beetroot cake has been made and scoffed.

Loads of potatoes pulled up and probably about the same still to go.

This growing lark is hard work! But worth every late night, frantically busy day and crazy brain nights :j

tibawo

Morning all... not been on for a while as real life has got in the way! We harvested our first ever crop on the allotment. Granted it was potatoes I had started in bags but it was fab to see the girls faces as they pulled some up. .. usually they are bored after ten mins. There are enough for two teas and enough to spur me on to get the rest of the allotment sorted!

zafiro1984

After a good few days without a computer I'm back up on line. We changed internet provider and that was the start of the problem.

No rain here for ages, it's so dry, I'm spending a good half hour each night trying to do some watering. having said that the weeds are looking remarkably healthy and robust - there must be a lesson in that somewhere.

Now pretty much self sufficient in veg, beans, tomatoes, cucs, kohl rabi, salad things, beet, pots, carrots, peas, broccoli, cabbage, courgettes
The things coming soon will be sweetcorn (now in flower), fennel if the rabbits don't find it, celery, peppers, chillies,
I've second sown some more carrots, peas, french beans, beetroot, kohl rabi, lettuce to hopefully take me into the Autumn.
Main pots, onions and shallots, squash, brussels and kale are growing well.
I think at the end of this month I need to make a move on sp broccoli, leeks and things for over wintering. I never have any success with cauliflower so I'm going to give it a miss this year.

I've treated myself to a strimmer and I'm waiting for it to arrive. I've had to get a battery one which will give me more scope on where I can use it. Hopefully it will help me keep the place more tidy as the weeds along the paths are getting at me - literally.

Tomorrow will be more of the same but I if I can I'll be up early before the temperature gets too much and my energy levels plummet.

Suffolk_lass

zafiro1984 wrote: »

I've treated myself to a strimmer and I'm waiting for it to arrive. I've had to get a battery one which will give me more scope on where I can use it. Hopefully it will help me keep the place more tidy as the weeds along the paths are getting at me - literally.

The man at the agricultural machines place that eventually sold us a hedge trimmer, said that the main thing is to use all the charge in your machine and recharge it regularly. They fail due to lack of use. Apparently all the kit is moving over to batteries so his position was that you buy the thing you like and then all the others by the same makers so that they can share the battery

Jazee

Morning all. I've never had any luck with strimmers so stick to shears now for edging. Went to get them out yesterday and remembered I'd lent them to DD.

Anyway, lots of peas, strawberries, courgettes and salad stuff at the moment.

Runner beans growing nicely as are the leeks and onions. I only cut the grass yesterday. I need to fit in some weeding, put the last of the begonias in the flower bed, and then the greenhouse is empty apart from peppers so I'll start planting up more seeds.

Need to plant kale and chard especially as I now have none left. I'm not good at this succession business.

unrecordings

I got a cheap battery strimmer from Screwfix (one of their Titan range) a couple of years ago and it's brilliant - very light and great for picking up and just tidying up a spot. Much much better than the 'proper' Black & Decker one which never got used then eventually broke

In other news, onions & shallots are drying in the sun and I found out where the slugs went - hiding inside my Longor shallots, which was unfortunate for them as they pretty much all shrivelled up

Raspberries still being decimated by squirrels, runner beans are just beginning to flower. My little borage patch is also flowering now, this stuff self seeds really well, so I'm hoping it'll be a permanent fixture