The ups, the downs and the insides out of growing your own in 2025!

greenbee

Peppers and aubergines will soon need potting on (currently 5 per pot), but I don't think the greenhouse is warm enough yet. Lots of tomatoes have germinated, as have the first lot of cucumbers, the padron peppers, and my luffa cylindrica, which are an experiment this year. 

I need to get more outside crops sown, and also more flower seeds going in the greenhouse. 

However, I also need to pressure wash the patio, weed the borders, and empty the planters on the patio (I'll use the spent compost as mulch on the borders). 

My lovely gardener/handyman is currently making and putting up shelves in a rickety old shed by the compost bins using leftover bits of wood/ply/OSB etc so that the crates of pots and other bits and pieces are more accessible. The bin of paper/card for composting lives in there, as does a bin full of wool insulation from deliveries that I plan to use as part of my slug defences (and then compost), along with cardboard tubes of bamboos, tomato supports, and more. I'm hoping he'll have time to sort out the guttering and the water butt too - it's only a small water butt but can be used to help keep the compost bins damp. 

Plans have been made for fencing the veg plot (primarily to keep the dog out) using fencing pins and deer mesh. It means it'll be easy to change my mind about the boundary, and uses stuff we already have (I've just had to get another pack of fencing pins, but they're cheaper than wood!). I'll get some arches for the entrances, and make gates out of trellis panels... and then grow stuff up the arches. 

carinjo

Only 10 months after the first attempt at putting the greenhouse up and it finally has a raised bed with soil in it! Also a table for seedtrays. Got a min/max temperature gauge and a rainwater meter too.
First filled bed and ended up with some gladioli in the middle of the box. The cover is for any cats. wondering if i could put some veg seeds in the same box now, lettuce maybe, or even some beetroot.
Enjoy a lovely weekend!

alicef

It's raining now so I've retreated indoors.  

@FreeBear, a very nice tree surgeon, hired by the National Grid, came round to survey the power line cutting across our field, to determine whether any trees need cutting back. He will do a little bit of pruning, but when I said could we have the chippings. he said do you want a little or a lot? Hopefully now the local work will be done such that we can have the chippings from a number of sites!

@carinjo I love the look of a greenhouse.  We have a polytunnel which, though functional, doesn't look as nice.

Someone mentioned seed producers?  I can't locate post.  Anyhow, for veg seed I use Kings Seed – not least because our organisation’s collective purchase results in a significant discount, (50%). I find the seed to be reliable and the packet quantity reasonable. This year, however, I have bought, ad hoc, a new packet of parsnip seed, (Fothergill’s I think – from the supermarket), as my older seed didn’t germinate. I do impulse purchase varieties on and off. I will sow whatever seed I’m donated by the village, (mainly tomato seed), though if the module row fails, I will then sow the whole lot in a section of a half tray and then !!!!!! out if anything germinates. @dND I am on Chiltern’s mailing list, and admire their selection enormously – the 2025 edit catalogue is gorgeous! I already have a few packets of flower seed for cutting though so won’t buy anymore this year.

So far – am sort of on track. Haven’t tied in last autumn sown broadbeans but have put in first lot of pea sticks – hopefully this will keep the pigeons off. Really need to get my shallot sets in, but haven’t quite finished digging over new area. Bulbs in new cut flower beds coming up, which is very exciting! I’ll start sowing annuals for cutting once I’ve cleared down my potting area, though my OH has built more staging for me, which is fabulous. I haven’t quite started overhauling my ornamental garden. Have been shifting crates of potted on veg in and out of the potting shed. My citrus looked like they need some magnesium so I applied a diluted solution of epsom salts.

Most often I go and gaze at the snakeshead fritillaries at the bottom of the orchard which, after a number of years planting bulbs, are starting to bulk up.

Suffolk_lass

I have bought Yorkshire Seeds for most of my F&V this year - they came in little brown envelopes with the label on, but no "when to sow" - it says check our website for when and how to plant. That said, there are lots of seeds. I will let you know about germination. 

I also use Kings Seeds but had a real issue with squashes last year - it might have been something else but zero germination across 30 pots for cucumbers, pumpkins, courgettes and butternuts. The strawberries and sweet pea new plants are up and running this year though

@carinjo - I have an old piece of carpet on the ground in my greenhouse. I recommend it - yours looks great!

ladybird1106

Thanks everyone for your seed companies suggestions. We finally have tomato and aubergine seedlings 🥳. I was beginning to lose hope and had gone and bought some seed compost. Hopefully more will appear over the next couple of days. I’m itching to get up to the plot, it’s been OH birthday this weekend so been stuck at home. We are using the last of parsnips ( £4.45 for a 1kilo, however not used that many. Probably about 250g =£1.11)for tea tonight😋.
love 🐞

greenbee

Some of my veg seedlings are starting to need pricking out/potting on. I sowed 4/5 to a pot so they'll need moving into their own pots but aren't ready to go into their final pots yet. I'm not sure whether they'll be OK in the greenhouse yet, or whether I should keep them in the nice warm kitchen for a bit longer. 

alicef

@greenbee - I have always worked on the principle of warmth for germination (where needed) but once germinated then light takes precedence,  So for my early sowings - propagator for germination; pot on;  then find light. I don't have a conservatory so I find it is easiest, once daytime temps get above 12 degrees centigrade to put my potted on veg into my potting shed, which has more light and is built of brick, during the day and bring back inside overnight.   

Suffolk_lass

alicef said:

@greenbee - I have always worked on the principle of warmth for germination (where needed) but once germinated then light takes precedence,  So for my early sowings - propagator for germination; pot on;  then find light. I don't have a conservatory so I find it is easiest, once daytime temps get above 12 degrees centigrade to put my potted on veg into my potting shed, which has more light and is built of brick, during the day and bring back inside overnight.   

I agree re germination. Mercifully, my newly planted tomato seeds are showing little loops, in an unheated, covered propagator, on my kitchen windowsill. I have no idea what happened in the greenhouse to make them so hot that they all failed. Anyway; they dead!

A productive couple of days, DH has been moving things around. So now my three cold frames are in the right places, on pavers to prevent mice joining the plants, and all the compost we have is in a different place, on a pallet. Lots of clean pots ready now too, with bags of JINo2 ready to be deployed! Many, many seeds planted in trays and modules. No squashes yet.

It seems we are into bee season (my friend in SE Essex collected her first swarm, yesterday!!). We will be visiting ours today, assuming it warms up!

greenbee

alicef said:

@greenbee - I have always worked on the principle of warmth for germination (where needed) but once germinated then light takes precedence,  So for my early sowings - propagator for germination; pot on;  then find light. I don't have a conservatory so I find it is easiest, once daytime temps get above 12 degrees centigrade to put my potted on veg into my potting shed, which has more light and is built of brick, during the day and bring back inside overnight.   

The problem is I don’t always have the time to take the trays to and from the greenhouse every morning and evening - and when I do there’s a serious risk of being tripped up by the dog! There’s a fair amount of light in the kitchen, but leaving them in trays without lids risks the cats discovering them and seeing whether they are edible. 

I did wonder whether I could use the bubble wrap insulation from the old greenhouse (smaller) to create an insulated area and just cover/uncover daily.

Suffolk_lass

Yes! We often put seedlings outside the back door for the day and bring them in as the temperature drops; with and without covers