Nothing like fresh BB's eh!we had them yesterday fresh from our garden, along with some rather nice! just dug jersey bennies. yummy! ps. make sure that you leave some pods/seeds on the plants so you will have seeds for next seasons crop.
shopaholic76,
Dec 18, 3:14am
How do you know when to stop covering potato shoots and just let them sprout! do you wait till the flower dies off then dig up your potatoes, Im doing mine in tyres, and do you have to dig em up all at once!
tjs641,
Dec 18, 3:28am
Not sure which bit you didn't get so to summarise: Garlic needs cold to be able to form a bulb Planting in straight compost is fine as long as it's well rotted.
sunshine,
Dec 18, 5:33pm
When is the latest you can plant potatoes to ensure crops through winter , I am also returning to growing as much as we can for our large family ! thank goodness I have the land , but sadly lacking in time .
jillbo,
Dec 18, 6:51pm
Foursisters, thats right you cut off the runners. They will have fairly long roots and you just need to plant as you would any other plants. You should really replace a 1/3 of your plants with runners every year as they decline in fruiting.You don't need to do this until 3rd year. Hope this helps
pentax1,
Dec 19, 12:33am
Hi, could someone tell me why the leaves on my tomato plant don't open up properly, it is growing and has some flowers on it but the leaves are all curled up.
4amber-lee,
Dec 19, 12:39am
Jills.Sounds like you're using too much fertiliser ,a handful should do about a metre sq. As for the nasty maggots, yuk! Can't imagine why they are there, but I would pour boiling water over them. (same as for ants )I've been growing veges for a while now, but there's always new things to learn and sometimes others have better ways of doing something, so these threads are helpful. For learners I'd suggest easy plants like beans, peas ,tomatoes ,cucumber spring onions ,raddish and courgette. Also pumpkin if you have plenty of room.
leftydave,
Dec 19, 12:41am
remember to leave some pods on the vines, next year seeds for free:)
buzzy110,
Dec 19, 1:37am
Well today I dug up one lot of potatoes. I had planted them incorrectly, forgot to put the required fertilisers on till long after I'd started to mound them up and never watered them. I reckoned I'd be lucky to get enough for Xmas day from my 7 plants. Most of them had died off and there was no trace of the plants to be seen either, just a huge mound where they were supposed to be.
When we started digging up huge, healthy spuds I was truly amazed and thought we'd started with a lucky plant. But no. All the rest yielded OK as well.
I estimated we got at least 12kg. Not bad. I too, got very excited. After swearing I'd never bother with potatoes again, I am now planning where to put them next year and how to grow them better so that I get even more. lol
buzzy110,
Dec 19, 1:43am
Yes gardening is exciting. My second lot of broccoli are enormous. Everyday I go and look at them wondering if they will bolt but every day they have just grown a little bigger. I better harvest the bigger ones soon though.
Tomorrow we have a guest for dinner and all the salad veg, broccoli, baby carrots, new potatoes and celery will be from my garden. The dessert will be made with lemons and tangeloes growing on my trees and for the fruit we will have freshly picked, juicy apricots from our tree as well.
And I thought apricots couldn't be grown in Auckland! Our tree is loaded and the fruit is perfect.
buzzy110,
Dec 19, 1:44am
Just skiting. I just go and stand in my garden and am amazed. Everyone who passes by is dragged into my garden and heaven help them if they don't admire the perfectly growing fruit and vegetables. They become my enemies overnight!
soc_butterfly,
Dec 19, 2:01am
I sucessfully harvested some baby carrots this week, they're so sweet :)
leftydave,
Dec 19, 2:43am
the same happens to anyone visiting our place! :-)
ps. we always grow a 'green crop' in the place where we have just grown potatoes. good for the soil and if there are any wire worm who have been visiting the spuds patch then it seems to get rid of them.
shopaholic76,
Dec 21, 5:20am
shopaholic76 wrote: How do you know when to stop covering potato shoots and just let them sprout! do you wait till the flower dies off then dig up your potatoes, Im doing mine in tyres, and do you have to dig em up all at once![/quote Bumping for answer.
buzzy110,
Dec 21, 5:36pm
Hi shopaholic. I have read several gardening books and while they all advise mounding up none seem prepared to say when that should stop so here is my experience from exactly one crop of potatoes which I grew and have now dug up, waiting to be eaten (they are delicious by the way). I made mistakes but I have learned from those mistakes.
I stopped mounding them up when the plants stopped growing and started to produce flowers. That's about it really. There was also no advice about when to harvest, but once again, I reckon you can harvest anytime after the exposed tops start to die off.
Another poster has said that you can just leave them in the ground till you want them.
There. The sum total of my new, learned-all-by-myself, knowledge. You can take it or carry on looking for an answer from someone more experienced. I certainly won't be offended.
soc_butterfly,
Dec 21, 8:28pm
I did it three times, once they got to about 20cms I topped up by half to 10cms, then twice again.Then I left them to mature and die off.None of mine have flowered, just died off.They are nadine and jersey bennes.
shopaholic76,
Dec 21, 8:31pm
Thanks so much you gorgeous people fantastic advice from you both! will take and run with it. Have a great Xmas
i_see_trees,
Dec 22, 12:26am
I'm a new gardener adn have just started using what our school calls "worm tea" too and its done wonders! had to dilute it a bit. Burnt the first lettuces!
soc_butterfly,
Dec 22, 3:36am
lessons learned!great going, I burned my new hedge plants with too much fertiliser, luckily they forgave me and grew new leaves phew.there's 49 of them!
donnabeth,
Dec 22, 3:01pm
HELP! My tomatoes are naked.
There are hardly any flowers appearing.My tomatoes are growing well and look healthy; some have the beginnings of small fruit, but without flowers to begin with I wont get the huge crop I was looking forward to.
Am I worrying too early or am I doing something wrong! This is my first time growing in a tunnel house and I used the fertiliser I was sold with the plants. I have 8 plants of different varieties. the one with the fruit is living up to its name it's called 'early girl'.
soc_butterfly,
Dec 24, 10:09pm
Mine are the same, I've just given them some fertiliser in the hopes that I'll get at least something this summer!
lala2,
Dec 24, 11:35pm
First time I am getting some lovely broccoli of my plants and am wondering if once I have cut the head off do I pull out the plant or will it grow some more.
stevee6,
Dec 27, 11:09pm
With tomatoes you need to pinch out the laterals(those little shoots between the stem and the leaf) and keep them tied up to a long stake so the flowers and fruit don't get windblown or dragged in the mud. With your peas, keep sowing them as the plants don't last that long. As soon as the pods are round, pick them. Leaving them won't improve the peas, sad to say.
buzzy110,
Dec 27, 11:22pm
lala2. It depends on the broccoli plant. Some are non sprouting. I have taken heads off my non-sprouting broccoli and nothing else has grown, even though I have left them in the ground for a month or more after picking. On the other hand, those that weren't non-sprouting are still producing small heads. I pick those when they are quite small as the heads are not quite as compact and tight looking as the original heads. However, because I pick them quite small the stems are lovely and tender so I eat the entire head, stem and all.
leftydave,
Dec 28, 12:46am
you will if it was/is sprouting broccoli
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