The even bigger and better and hopefully not lower bits of growing your own in 2022!

carinjo

@MissRikkiC, I'll let you know once i've accepted the disappointments, still waiting after doing this for 4 odd years. 
You should however be very proud of yourself for growing tomatoes from seed, and managing everything up to this point. Each year you will learn something new and every failure will feel less personal and each success that much sweeter. 
Keep going and remember the joy of your daughter finding those potatoes!

MovingForwards

I lost all my tomatoes last year due to blight. All were grown from seed, carefully tended, planted out and carefully tended. The blight even took a batch of potatoes out.

This year I wasn't going to grow any toms, but MIL wanted some bush type and I kept one. My OH was given some tom plants by a workmate, which I've tended and restored to health. All are grown inside as I can't face losing them again.

I'm on my 4th sow of carrots in the hope some will grow. Some spinach and onions have bolted, due to heat and I've now increased the water on those days to prevent others following. I've even harvested my garlic early this year.

It's all part of the ups and downs of GYO.

sammy_kaye18

MissRikkiC said:

Now I’ve vented my emotion at the tomato plants, they’ve been refed and will see how they go. Not sure what else to do. 

I’ve also sorted the trellis for the squash to hang on to; just hoping the tendrils shoot in the right direction! 

A few other bits also done, transplanted a tomato that was in a pot, moved a pepper (the only one in the ground) and transplanted the extra courgette and BNS i sowed last week. I now have 1 bed left for autumn/winter veg at the moment but assume that providing I get everything started now in pots in the lean to, I can plant them out once everything else is done later this year?

I have done the same. I have a few pots and a few beds. I made 4 beds this year. One is currently full with rocket and mixed leaf lettuce growing to get us through the last part of the summer. One has my only surviving cucumber plant in it but it will be hopefully added to as I planted the last of my cucumbers seeds a few days ago and have figured out how to protect them properly in it so that will get filled. Another bed has grass breaking down in it and will be covered with compost soon enough to use as a winter veg bed and the 4th is small and an inground bed which will also hopefully be for winter veg.
I have started my winter veg off in tubs - sprouts, cabbage and leeks so far with a view to grow parsnips and small globe carrots as well nearer the time - all of which are already taking off so I am just hoping I will have enough growing space now once everything else is finished. I have runner beans and peas growing up my fence, another large tub of carrots and several courgette plants, not to mention a greenhouse full of tomato and cucumber plants.

@MissRikkiCIsnt it wonderful to see little ones faces when they have grown something. My daughter is 11 and she is loving finding veg in our garden - we have our first ever red strawberries (only 2 so far) but have about 10 pea plants all producing pods at the minute and she is eager to pick them - we even thinned some carrots yesterday and she had her first mini carrot. 

Also a plus side is anything I dont use growth wise gets to go to our lizards or our guinea pigs so in turn it really is feeding the whole family! Even the dogs get a little left over veg on occassions!

Suffolk_lass

Personally, I never plant tomatoes in the ground because I know we have a touch of blight. There are two beds here where despite a four year gap, the potatoes get it when grown there (they are of course the same family). So my tomatoes are always in halved grow bags or large pots for me. @MissRikkiC I got blossom end rot because my watering pattern was not regular. I work on every second day when it is warm. I must say, they are packed in the greenhouse at the moment and that lends itself to it too because the air doesn't circulate too well. I think the RHS advice pages are excellent for this 

@sammy_kaye18 be ultra careful thinning out your carrots - apparently the carrot root fly will smell them and go for them if there are any within an unlikely large distance (I can't remember how far) - this link to the RHS page might help

Can you tell I'm a fan of RHS!

themadvix

Another fan of the RHS website here (and even Mr MV refers to it for his rare bits of gardening). And you took the words out of my mouth (fingers?) SL, re carrot root fly and thinning carrots. It’s something I’ve only learnt this year so it’s top of mind!

MissRikkiC

I wonder if I could rescue them by taking them out and planting them into pots and sticking them in the green house. 

They got an absolute soaking last night, I suspect maybe my husband hasn’t been giving them quite enough water despite watering them daily 

Alnat1

I grow my carrots in my herb bed along with a few lettuces dotted around. The smell of the herbs, especially chives, rosemary and curry plant, is supposed to disguise the carrot smell from the root fly. It seems to have worked so far.

A bronze fennel in there is my "sacrifice" plant, in spring the aphids all head for it and leave other plants alone. By May the ladybirds find the fennel and lay eggs all over it. June, ladybird larva hatch, eat the aphids, then the blue tits take the larva to feed their young. Fennel finally gets going and I get a nice show of flowers and some leaves and seeds for cooking with. 

Mother Nature sorts it all out by herself if you give her time.

Suffolk_lass

Ooh @Alnat1 that's what I love about this thread - other people's solutions. I may have to copy that. 

@MissRikkiC you could certainly move the ones with BER but not the ones showing blight damage. You don't want to put them in your compost either as they are now carrying the spores. Not sure about the suggestion on the RHS page to bury deeply. We sneak the waste into our black bag rubbish as we know all domestic general waste is incinerated at very high temperatures and will contribute to energy production.

You are not alone. I found a small tomato in my greenhouse with BER. It is definitely because they are squashed in together. I give them about two thirds to all of a 10 litre watering can to each tray (90cm square, 5cm deep), each with 5 plants in. I also think that certain varieties are prone to it; costoluto fiorentino because the bottoms pucker up for example.

I picked the dessert gooseberries that were still on the bush. It is clear that they were also under attack and the yield is about 20% of normal 😞. Definitely time to protect them now the birds have found them. 

themadvix

Another fan of the sacrificial fennel idea here (especially as I can't stand aniseed flavours, so would never grow it to eat - a few seeds would be good though!).

droopsnoot

Suffolk_lass said:

I give them about two thirds to all of a 10 litre watering can to each tray (90cm square, 5cm deep), each with 5 plants in.

Can I ask please, how often do you do that? I have tomatoes in large pots in a lean-to greenhouse on the back of the house, I give them some water in the morning and, if it's been warm and they look a bit wilted, some more in the afternoon / early evening. Once a week they get tomato food. They look healthy enough and two of them are starting to have actual tomatoes on them, but I'm never sure whether I should water them more or less. The leaves on some of my pepper plants look a bit curled up, they get about the same amount of water. I am using a small watering can (less than a gallon) and on my schedule a fill of that can lasts a couple of days / four-ish watering sessions.

Too much, too little, just right?