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

leftatthetrafficlights

Loads of seeds sown on Monday and raspberry canes planted. Jerusalem artichokes planted on Tuesday in one of the beds out the front that we've converted from flowers 😁

Suffolk_lass

Potted on some tomatoes, ready to leave in my friend's care. I also potted the pepper seedlings into their own pots and I can see the first two chillies have finally germinated after 6 weeks! Nothing else sown as we are away for two weeks from Sunday

kiss_me_now9

I had given up hope on my lettuces but they've suddenly sprung in the last few days! 

Feels like I have a mountain of tasks to do in the garden and very little time to do them. 

I need to: 
- Buy a lot more compost
- Clear the old soil in the greenhouse out 
- Replace said soil with new 
- Weed all the beds (I rarely weed because I hate doing it and we have brambles in a few of the beds, but I desperately should do it)
- Pot on all the seedlings
- Decide whether I want any more plants starting - a lot of my tomatoes didn't germinate which has surprised me, and my cucumbers haven't done particularly well, but equally how many of each do I really need? I've got at least one of each variety of all of them and limited space. 
- Plant out my sweet peas (though more importantly decide where they're going)
- Clear out the old planters
- Weed the patio (see above)
- Edge out the paving stone path that's currently covered by grass
- Mow the lawn
- Try and figure out what to do with the cherry tree...

The list goes on and on! 

leftatthetrafficlights

Seedlings all potted on and new bog garden made for the wild garlic I was given 😁 Today will be the planting out of salad leaves and beetroot along with making a couple of herb pots and sowing more seeds

Kantankrus_Mare

Sold my first two trays of strawberries yesterday so a tenner in the allotment fund.

Tidied up the rest of strawberries in the greenhouse so they are ready to grab if I get any more sales. Weeded another bed and made a start on weeding around the raspberries. No mean feat as they are surrounded by couch grass and nettles so will be a long job. 
Potted my tomatoes and cucumbers on at home.Look healthy enough, just need to get a growth spurt on.

Picked some of my forced rhubarb and am going to have a go at cordial. Need to find something other than crumble to use up my glut of rhubarb .

Three asparagus spears have popped through in my bed that I planted last year. Hopefully first of many. Im aware that I should not touch them this year but can do so from next year. Might just have one picking to see how they taste dipped in boiled eggs.

Farway

leftatthetrafficlights said:

Seedlings all potted on and new bog garden made for the wild garlic I was given 😁

Watch out for wild garlic, it can be a spreader, like mint. 

Nice to have but maybe not one to let loose

kiss_me_now9

Hands up if you're dumb enough to try and harden your sweet peas out in gale force winds... !!!!!!.

kimwp

Anyone more experienced know why my tomatoes are so floppy?  I'm currently potting them on, think I left them a bit long but they've been a bit floppy for a while.

leftatthetrafficlights

Farway said:

leftatthetrafficlights said:

Seedlings all potted on and new bog garden made for the wild garlic I was given 😁

Watch out for wild garlic, it can be a spreader, like mint. 

Nice to have but maybe not one to let loose

I'm hoping it does to an extent but thank you for letting me know! 😁 The bog garden we've made for it is lined with plastic so it will be reasonably contained (unless it's a really windy day when the seeds drop!)  

@kiss_me_now9 - we planted ours out over the easter weekend so hoping that they survive 🤞 

@kimwp - it may be that they have just been in their small pots for a little too long but I wouldn't worry, we had a couple that did the same but since potting on last week they are now upright and the stems have thickened 😁 

Cauliflowers that we started last year have been planted out as have our beans, peas, salad leaves and beetroot that we sowed several weeks ago. More sowing to be done tomorrow!! 

-taff

kimwp said:

Anyone more experienced know why my tomatoes are so floppy?  I'm currently potting them on, think I left them a bit long but they've been a bit floppy for a while.

They usually go leggy for lack of light and to be fair, the levels are quite low if they're inside more so than outside.Mine that I started in the propagator went leggy when I forgot to take the top off when they sprouted.  They're also in small pots for the size of them. Pot on, but bury them to the depth of the baby leaves or further up if you feel like it, the little hairs on the stems will turn into roots in contact with soil and gove you a sturdier plant.

I don't think it's damping off, they're just leggy. Actually, having looked, there may be two suffering form that but if you pot it all on, like I said, the hairs on the stem will form roots. You can do this with tomatoes at any time. Say you take the side shoots out [when the plant i much bigger obviously] if you stick them in soil, they'll be floppy for a few days but they'll soon grow roots and you have a free plant.