Winter sowing advice. Wanting to get a head start for a productive garden next year.

MovingForwards

Jjah the mag costs £5.99 and I got 10 packets of seeds each month. I drew a plan of the garden and worked out where things will be going next year, just because I could.

The garden has been transformed from a neglected plot, with oversized trees and so many tree stumps, into a viable plot with trees and stumps removed, uncovering a great patio and allowing a walled herb garden to be grown, a salad bar hastily put together and a lot of pot / bag growing while the rest was undergoing a lot of preparation for next year.
My OH did the hard work, I would swan in and do the planting / tending and any other simple things (health reasons), there was a steady stream of food as I would only pick enough for that meal.

The patio provides a nice section to sit and read in, whilst also having edibles; half the patio is for relaxing on, the other half for growing. Hopefully next year I will get seats!

Most of the other section is for food, with a few roses, bulbs and companion flowers.

Compost bins are on the go, as is leaf mulch (collected locally as the leaves fell) and I've always wanted to do what I'm now doing, thankfully my OH has too.

There were no worms when we first moved in, now they are starting to arrive. "If you build it, they will come" was going through my mind, and they did! 

My plot is 8x11m, including the patio, which is why every inch will be used and various pots, bags and anything else will put to use to gain more growing space. It's mostly south facing and in Scotland.

I'm sure you will have so much fun with each passing year.

Jjah

That's an impressive project.:D  I do hope you are taking progressive photos.  It's satisfying to compare the development.

Leaf mulch collection is something else I could easily do but haven't yet.  I'm hoping to not waste such resources next year.

My plastic compost bin got bindweed growing from within a few years ago so I daren't use the contents now.  

Watching gardening videos the last few days has made me regret the all the lawn clippings I've disposed of in the council green waste collection.

I was worried about weed seeds but the soil needs the organic material.  I resent buying compost but it's going to be a necessity this year to feed the soil.

I could do with collecting manure at some point too even if it is to stay bagged in a part of the garden til it matures enough to use.

I bet your garden will come on in leaps and bounds now so much ground work has already been done
It ought to be a good gardening year

MovingForwards

There's plenty of photos, I do that with all my projects.

Dispose of the compost contents and start again, I've very cautious about what I put in. If it looks suspicious, it's not added.

We had several builder sacks of compost delivered, to feed the garden, which has done wonders for it. Have a look to see if there's anyone local to you as it works out a lot cheaper, as does manure.

One of the first things I did when I picked up the flat keys was join a few gardening groups, most people enjoy passing on hints and tips.

Think of 2020 as being your early learning year, from here on in the only way is up 😁

Jjah

Feel free to share your before and after on here, moving forwards

I've got an available source of manure from stables 15 minutes from here.  It is always bagged near to the road.  It's another job I want to do this week.  

I sourced a compost (dark fine top soil really) at £12 per tonne with £20 haulage so that's a consideration but I really need to try setting up a better compost system at home.  The 2 dalek compost bins were full of bindweed last year.  Did you repurpose the builder sacks, MF?
I watched a vid of someone who uses the builder sacks to make a hotbed for the greenhouse.  Seems an interesting idea

I'm going to throw myself into sorting out the back of the back garden and tackle a few huge jobs there.

The big veg bed is weeded and mulched and still has plenty of greens that are overwintering (DC kale, perennial spinach, chard, sorrel, collard greens(and 2 rows of garlic just sown along the length of the bed: about 80 cloves) but the growth has pretty much stopped.

The rest of the back of the back garden, however is in trouble and needs rescuing.

First job is to clear the site of huge branches from my fruit tree (that need breaking up) so that I can double layer cardboard over the woodchip. 
I have an ongoing battle with bindweed and the last 2 years I surrendered. 
This meant that for 2 years I have been unable to harvest the few figs and huge crops of soft fruits as they disappeared at the height of summer. 
In fact, EVERYTHING disappeared. 
It was just a huge mound of bindweed. 
Benches, bushes, even the summer house were obscured from view!

I'm determined to take back what's mine this year and harvest what the garden has produced in that part.

Charles Dowding recommends weakening it by smothering so that's what I'm going to do when I get the cardboard. 

It crept into my greenhouse for the first time last summer so that also needs a cardboard carpet.

The summer house and trellis gazebo need removing from the back of the back garden too as both are near collapse.  

Priority is the cardboard though so hopefully this will be tackled in the next 2 weeks once sufficient material is collected.

I'm eager to change the layout of this part into one even more productive.

Jjah

This is my shameful 'before' picture of the 'back of the back' garden taken in July last year.  The second year that I surrendered to the bindweed and gave up so nothing was harvested again.  I just avoided going in that part of the garden until the bindweed started to die back in Autumn.

Hang on a mo whilst I find an photo of the battle of the bindweed... 

(The 'front part of the back' garden is an even bigger area which has 2 lawns and 6 fruit trees with a brick shed and patio needing replacing.)

Jjah

This was taken in July last year also.  I had begun pulling it back to reveal the garden furniture in a bid to get to the soft fruit bushes that line the perimeter but gave up

MovingForwards

There's not much to show, my garden had a laylandii in the 'lawn' area and another in the patio, plus so many other bushes and tree stumps around the boundary 😬 

The laylandii I got a local tree surgeon out, then for a few months my OH worked on the one tree stump (17+ trunks) to get rid of it. Having the stumps ground would have been almost as much as having them taken down, which I just couldn't afford due to only moving in about a month before.

All the other tree stumps were dug out, bushes etc cut down and my OH made hugel mounds to dispose of a lot. Aside from that he does 'no dig' in the garden, loads of cardboard to cover everything (free from shops and when things were delivered).

Builders sacks are repurposed, one has tree leaves, another compost bin (we found that sack in the garden) and a couple will be used to grow my spuds next year on the patio, leaving a few spare. 

We have a proper compost bin and I'm tempted to buy two more, then I stand a chance of having enough each year.

I will be making comfrey and nettle water as a plant feed next year.

Ash has been created by having a fire pit. 

At some point the garden was loved and looked after, as was the flat, but further down the line it fell into being a rental; both are now receiving TLC.

With your garden I would get a machete, or very sharp kitchen knife, start hacking everything down and covering with wet cardboard and weigh it down, move on to the next section.

Dispose of the waste and carefully keep digging out the bindweed. When you have clean waste (veg peel, normal weeds / plants etc) put that into compost.

YT have loads of videos from gardeners, allotment growers and it's worth watching, learning and picking up loads of tips 🤗

Farway

Jjah, I bet the insects & bees loved your garden even if you were not too keen, bindweed can be a struggle once taken hold and I'm not sure cardboard on top of it in a greenhouse will work, the roots may just spread under the cardboard?

Luckily I don't have much bindweed but I do pull up any I do spot, which although that leaves the root in the top has gone & I console myself that I'm gradually weakening it

Dull day outside and awaiting tonight's arrival of Storm Bella.

Now I'm in T4 not supposed to go anywhere except grocery shopping. There's a joyous thought to take me through to summer

Jjah

MF, that sounds like pretty hefty land prep.  Very well done.  You sound as excited at me at the prospect of 2021 in the garden (mine will be a lot more slog than my previous years due to the knocking down and disposal of structures and rebuilding).

Game on!

Potatoes in the builders sacks is a fantastic idea!!!!!  As is leaf mould.  I am determined to salvage what I can from the woods nearby if I'm not too late to do so.  They are well rotting down now due to footfall and frosts

Faraway, the bees and butterflies were in heaven down there.  It was a pretty wilderness.  Everything was allowed to bolt, flower and seed as I just couldn't get to it.  

I get a lot of butterflies anyway as I don't use pesticides or even cover.  I eat damaged greens as they have more phytonutrients if forced to fight them off.  I don't mind sharing with such pretty squatters  

'Storm Bella'? Oh no!  News to me.  Let's hope we don't get battered.

Sorry to hear you are in T4.   At least this madness is affording us some opportunity to work in the garden.

This morning was spent putting the 14p potatoes and other veg haul in the shed.  I am repurposing a lloyd loom that was awaiting the charity shops resume taking donations. 
It will hopefully serve me well if I ever succeed in growing enough to store in the shed

twopenny

Sooo impressed by these productive gardens. If you want to store stuff the old ways were a dustbin full of sand for carrots. You lay them in a circle fat end outwards, pointy end to the middle and layer them. Potatoes in dry compost. Both in dry shed or garage of course.

MovingForwards you could try some purple sprouting broccoli. It is a wonderful flavour compared to the shop stuff and the gift that keeps giving. Easy to grow.

I found seeds for sale and the gardening stuff in our local DIY shop where it would normally be sales of old Christmas stuff and plastic storage but they can't get it so forwarded the gardening, a pre Christmas thrill for me. Yep, it's down to that. Should have been the Maldives but have to get excited by seeds and pots these days.

There were free Christmas trees left outside the garden centre, some quite big and all still wrapped. Very sad.