The all new 2019 growing your own thread!

Primrose · 3 February 2019 at 9:04PM

I wouldn,t prune your gooseberrybushes innthis frosty weather but you can do it as soon as the temperature rises a few degrees and certainly before the first little green buds start forming.

Trim out surplus shoots in the middle of the bush to let adequate light in and prune back shoots by at least a third if they have got long and straggly. If your bushes are extra prickly, you may want to prune out extra shoots to make access for picking easier.

If you want to move one of your bushes I would suggest pruning it back fairly hard befoe this growing season starts. . It will soon recover but the less growth it has on it, the lower the shock and it will soon recover, Prepare and dig the hole in the new location before digging the bush up to prevent roots drying out. Don,t move it when the ground is frosted though.

Water in well and if you have some spread some chicken manure pellets, a little manure or some general fertiliser aroundn the base of the bush.

Kantankrus_Mare · 3 February 2019 at 9:06PM

Just found this on the BBC site

Pruning gooseberries

A gooseberry bush becomes tangled and unhealthy without pruning.
Good management means keeping the centre open to air and sunlight, leaving a few, regularly-spaced, main branches.
In winter, prune out dead or diseased stems, and any crossing in the centre.
Cut back to a young shoot.
Thin overcrowded areas and prune drooping stems to an upright sideshoot.
Shorten new growth by half to maintain an acceptable size.

Pablosmummy · 4 February 2019 at 12:31AM

Can I join? I don't have an allotment or a veg garden but I do have a typical rental new build house garden...square of grass with a gravel border.
Over the last few years I've built my collection up and now have a family apple tree, two cherry trees, blackcurrant bush, two blackverry bushes, who knows how many strawberries and then I will be growing a few tomatoes, peppers, carrots etc which I haven't decided yet.
All of this is in pots and large containers so I'm pretty limited to the amount I can grow.

I've also got a patio raspberry on order and I've just ordered that amazing t and m offer. No idea where I'll fit them....

Anyway I hope to get to know you all!

Slowdown · 4 February 2019 at 7:45AM

Thank you Kantankrus mare and Primrose

Excellent advice given which I will be taking up. That is if the utter deluge lets up at all. Apparently hideous rainfall here for quite some days so I'll wait and see.

I'll also wait and see if my temporary shed roof holds up! I do hope so or I'm in for a damp time.

Hi to Pablosmummy. It sounds like you've got plenty going on in your garden already. And more fruit bushes to come. I hope the summer brings plenty of sun to ripen it all off!

Thanks again for the tips.

Suffolk_lass · 4 February 2019 at 10:36AM

Kantankrus_Mare wrote: »

Thats funny..............I'm no expert but I was always under the impression that if you are going to move things, its best to do in the winter months whilst dormant. Not sure I know what I'm doing with pruning but I just snip off longest branches and make it tidier. Raspberries (Autumn) are pruned quite close to the ground. Not sure about summer raspberries as I dont grow them and I think they are pruned differently.

I have two blackcurrant bushes also looking straggly. Didnt do anything with them today so will have a google as Im not sure about them.

Re Raspberries - summer you can cut right down to the ground when they have finished - autumn you are supposed to prune this month or January, taking the older stem down to the ground, leaving the new shoot which will be for your 2019 fruit. The latter are hard little beasts and if you get it wrong, they are quite forgiving - we still got fruit but less when DH cut everything down to the ground. - Actually if in doubt, cut it down is a good rule of thumb if you are not sure what you've got.

Re stone fruit - Nobody has mentioned these but pruning is normally after they have fruited, before they go dormant.

I see you updated on keeping the gooseberries open in the middle. I obviously got the timing rather than the style of pruning wrong as large swathes just died. You can make new plants if you encourage a low hanging plant in to contact with the soil and then pin it in place (wire or even a bit of brick) with a shoot the other side of the ground contact and it will root and you can then separate it from "Mum"

I have also bodged blackcurrant pruning and seem to have a large amount of flowering currants with no fruit. These are easy to make new plants from. Just plunge your cuttings into a nursery area and wait for them to root - some will do so.

Primrose · 4 February 2019 at 10:39AM

Pablo's Mum. I,ve found one of the biggest challenges tompermanent growing fruit or vegs in containers, apart from regular watering, is keeping the compost healthily fed, especially plants like beans or tomatoes which are greedy feeders.

I turn my pots into mini composter in autumn, and to a lesser extent during the growing season, by gently forking in certain kitchen waste like veggie peelings, chopped banana skins. They quickly compost dow, add goodness to the compost and this saves the trouble and expense of having to replace all or part of the compost every year.

If your potted tomatoes get blighted don,t regrow them in the same compost the following year in case blight spores have infected the compost but I,ve found this process works well. In summer the peelings compost down very quickly. Even in winter, if the pots are in a sunny situation the material decomposes fairly quickly and if you don't have room in a small garden for a compost heap this ensures that some of your valuable kitchen vegetable peelings arent wasted.

If your vegetable pots contain compost during the winter but no vegetables you can tip the compost out into a big trug, mix in your vegetable waste and refill. Even if it hasn,t rotted down by planting time in spring don,t worry. It will cont8nue decomposing while the roots of your young plants plants grow around them. You have only to watch how successfully a self seeded marrow or tomato seedlings will sprout in a compost hep to see how well this system can work.

Yiu can always accumulate your peelings in a black plastic sack in a corner of the garden until you're ready to dig them in if you're planning a one off operation.

Pablosmummy · 4 February 2019 at 8:22PM

AHH I've done that this year! One of the YouTube gardeners I follow ( home grown veg) did a video last year about composting in buckets, so I have a little stack of buckets hidden behind the garden table that will hopefully be refreshed. I was planning to mix this with fresh so hopefully that will do!

Regarding the T + M offer, can anyone recommend a pot size for the blueberry plants? I'd imagine they're pretty small to start? Will be buying the ericaceous compost this week so I'm prepared.

Primrose · 4 February 2019 at 8:47PM

Can't recommend a pot size as I don't know what size the plants will be. - rather small I imagine, but a word of advice on pot shape.

Definitely avoid any pots which curve in at the top. Choose something which is V or U shaped, preferably a wider opening at the top. At some point your ant will need to be repotted as it grows bigger and without a wide opening at the top you will either damage the plant or break the pot trying to dig the plant out with its root ball intact ! A little planning at an early stage will save a lot of hassle later on.

JIL · 5 February 2019 at 10:05AM

We have been offered an allotment, however it's not in a good way, it's full of weeds and clumps of clay mounds.
Any tips of how we can get it useable would be very much appreciated.

zafiro1984 · 5 February 2019 at 10:34AM

Potatoes have arrived

time to turn off the heating in the utility room.

Regarding pruning Raspberries Alan Titchmarsh has a tip of leaving autumn fruiting raspberries unpunned, they will form a hedge about 12" wide. He says eventually you'll have to prune them but in the meantime you'll get a huge crop of raspberries providing you feed and mulch them well.

I'm going to give it a go. I'm all for being a 'Lazy gardener'

The all new 2019 growing your own thread!

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