The ups, the downs and the insides out of growing your own in 2024!

sammy_kaye18

KajiKita said:

Started potting up onion seedlings this morning …. and ran out of compost!! 😳😢

Trip to garden centre on the return from this afternoon’s tip run is pending … <must not buy anything else, must not buy anything else…..>

KK

Yeah good luck with that. 
I have avoided all garden centres at the minute for exactly that reason. 

This year I brought my seeds and swore that was all I was going to buy

Then I got an email from thompson and morgan
and a spider plant fell in my basket
and chilli seeds
and 138 bulbs because they were good for pollinators and I said I wanted more flowers in the garden
then 50 ground cover pollinator friendly bulbs because well what goes under the tall plants
and a mini patio apple tree because well fruit
and a blueberry bush
and I obviously need ericaceous compost for that
and a tub
or two

Doh! 

KajiKita

Oh @sammy_kaye18, that made me chuckle 😉😂😊

KK

Suffolk_lass

I am looking to remove 2 small apple trees on the most dwarfing rootstock. They have really struggled for about five years and they have split their "trunks" now in the recent storms. It is a real lesson in researching first, and not taking the word of a nursery that just wants to sell you stuff. Then, horror of horrors, Ken Muir, the fruit grower mail order place we have historically bought everything from has permanently closed. I want an apple on M26 rootstock in pollination group 3 or 4. Any suggestions for a sharp-tasting braeburn-like option?

ArbitraryRandom

I bought (edit, all but one) my trees from this place, and they were actually really good when I emailed them saying where I was in the country/the type of soil etc in my garden giving advice on a few different varieties. No idea how they're going to work out as they were only planted this Jan, but the trees were a decent size and there was a choice of root stock. 

https://www.orangepippintrees.co.uk/articles/how-to-choose-fruit-trees/apple-trees-similar-to-supermarket-apples-uk

Farway

I've always bought mine here https://www.blackmoor.co.uk/

Not sure on the variety choice you want but at least plenty of choices

Shame about Ken M, I used them in the past and was lays happy with them

KajiKita

Sown sweet peppers and parsley today (along with nicotiana and sweet peas) and potted up two types of shallots. Finished pricking out the red onions but the white onions I sowed at the same time aren’t quite ready, so have moved those to the windowsill of the potting shed where they will get good light but won’t get the bottom heat of the propagating mat I have just turned back on. 

Harvested a sprig of parsley last night from the greenhouse for use in the finely chopped salad we have on the side of our supermarket curry meals. £1.90 added to produce tracker. 

KK

ArbitraryRandom

Put my potatoes on a windowsill to chit and sowed two squash, 6 beetroot and about 10 leek bulbils. Had a huge number more than expected in the pack so the rest are back in the fridge and I might scatter them somewhere in the verges on a wander. 

alicef

@Suffolk_lass - looking at the orangepippin, (a site I always enjoy having a meander thru'), suggestions for a replacement for Braeburn - the only one I'm familiar with is 'Winter Gem', because we have a tree in our orchard.  It is a delicious apple but, for us, isn't a heavy cropper, (needs lots of sun I think and no cold winds around blossom time).

Pulled some forced rhubarb today and made a rhubarb crumble with preserved stem ginger!

DD265

I moved the peach and nectarine trees (on 'patio' rootstock - but the peach has long branches!) from the back garden where they were potted down to the allotment where they're in the ground and will get more sun. We've been busy moving my trees up onto the banking at the back of my plot to create a mini-orchard. Just the (5) apple trees left to go. I've been planting bulbs between them too, so where the flowers are coming up looks pretty even if the rest of the banking is a mess. Still no progress on the shed due to the plot being too wet, though my husband did create a French drain in that area.

You can see the shed base on the left, then my rhubarb with the little fence (I was protecting the crown from being stepped on). I may need to move the rhubarb, and my comfrey is near it too. The wood for the retaining 'walls' was scavenged off the vacant plot next door when the council were clearing it.

The plan is to get the remaining trees in, then try to smooth out the areas in between, add topsoil and sow wildflower seeds.

The big plastic thing in the second photo is a trough of sorts. It's about 6ft x 3ft, roughly 1ft tall, and watertight. I haven't decided whether to use it as a pond - though really it's too big and I'll never get it sunk into the ground - or drill holes in it and use it as a raised bed. It also came from the plot next door.

In the greenhouse, I've got two salvia (from the reduced section at the garden centre) waiting until I've created space in our front garden for them. I've got three bulb baskets ready to go on the banking (ran out of screws for the wooden planks ensuring the soil stays put!) and I got almost 30 onion sets planted into those little fibre pots - I need to get some more, think B&M sell them cheap. I want to give them a headstart before planting out.

At home in the conservatory, my onion seeds did their thing quite well. Some of the seedlings are floppy and some upright. I can't tell if they're etoliated, but I've got them under grow lights. I did read that you can trim them to 2-3" so I might do that. My citrus trees are putting out new growth on the windowsill.

I'm also feeling the pressure to get sowing more seeds (mainly from FB groups) but I'm holding off. We're in the East Midlands, the temperature is a bit all over the place, and it's still super wet.

Still feeding the critters at the allotment daily. The hedgehog nesting on the plot never went into hibernation; probably not a bad thing as I think it was slightly on the small side. Hopefully it won't be too long before I can release the two (and any others needing a home) that we dropped off at the rescue. I did learn that hedgehogs ideally don't eat slugs, which means I want to fit a small wildlife pond in somewhere to attract toads.

-taff

ArbitraryRandom said:

I bought (edit, all but one) my trees from this place, and they were actually really good when I emailed them saying where I was in the country/the type of soil etc in my garden giving advice on a few different varieties. No idea how they're going to work out as they were only planted this Jan, but the trees were a decent size and there was a choice of root stock. 

https://www.orangepippintrees.co.uk/articles/how-to-choose-fruit-trees/apple-trees-similar-to-supermarket-apples-uk

That's where I got mine from...